Authors: Meghan Etsey, Tatiana Turcanu, Kristine Wilson
“Our Voices, Our Future” is a podcast by the Gender Equity Task Force of the American Medical Women’s Association that explores the challenges, stories, and successes of those working to advance gender equity in medicine. Through candid conversations with changemakers, advocates, and leaders, each episode dives into issues like pay gaps, leadership disparities, and inclusive workplace culture. Tune in to be inspired, informed, and empowered to take action. Full episode listening links are available below the transcription.
Meghan Etsey: Welcome to Our Voices, Our Future, the podcast where we amplify the voices driving change and equity within medicine and beyond. Brought to you by the Gender Equity Task Force, a committee of the American Medical Women’s Association, we’re here to challenge norms, break barriers, and unite conversations that matter. I’m Meghan Etsey, and in each episode we’ll bring you candid discussions with leaders, changemakers, and advocates working to create a more inclusive and just world. No more silence, no more waiting. You’re listening to Our Voices, Our Future. Let’s get into it.
Today we’re welcoming Ms. Kristine Wilson. Kristine has a master’s degree in medical health science and a bachelor’s degree in exercise science. She is currently pursuing her second master’s degree in physician assistant studies. Beyond her academics, she is a wife and a mom of two boys, a three-year-old and an almost two-year-old. She had her first son during her undergraduate degree and had her second right in the middle of her first master’s degree. She has served as president of her AMWA chapter at the Utah Valley University and she has held other leadership roles in both her undergraduate and graduate educational pursuits. She has an overall goal of becoming an OB-GYN PA, and working in leadership at a hospital, as a board member and PA advocacy. Thanks for being here today, Kristine.
Kristine Wilson: Thanks for having me.
Meghan Etsey: So can you kind of just start by sharing a bit about your journey into medicine and what inspired you to pursue becoming a PA, especially while creating the little family of yours?
Kristine Wilson: I would describe my journey as fairly typical. I didn’t have an insane experience that led me to the medical field, but I was a gymnast. I was a competitive gymnast growing up, and so I learned I was very performance motivated. I wanted to learn everything that would enhance my gymnastics career.
So I actually started doing my own little research on YouTube and probably learned a lot of misinformation on my way. But I went in and did a ton of research on my own just to figure out how I could become a better athlete, how I could gain muscle while also maintaining flexibility, all this stuff. I kind of just fell in love with the process of learning about anatomy and the body in general. And so I decided to pursue that. I have a whole plethora of experiences that kind of steered me towards medicine in addition to those, but that was kind of the main thing.
And I decided ultimately that I wanted to be a doctor. So I was pre med for three years. I pursued that wholeheartedly. I joined all of the clubs. I learned as much as I could. I’m also a first generation college student, so I kind of had no idea what I was doing. But I just kind of went in head first into that field, and I was super lucky and got married in between my sophomore and junior year of college. I was still head first into medicine.
Then I found out I was pregnant shortly after getting married, and that was a huge surprise to me. I have always wanted to be a mom, but I was like, oh my gosh, what is this disruption in my timeline that I’m looking at here? So that was kind of a big surprise, and it led me to do a lot of thinking and reevaluate what I really wanted.
And ultimately, I decided that for me personally, the home-life balance wasn’t great with what I was going to be trying to achieve as a doctor. So I started looking into PA and I loved it. I started shadowing some PAs, and I just felt like this was exactly what I wanted. I applaud and admire any woman who becomes a doctor and is also a mother or wants to be a mother. I think it’s absolutely possible and beautiful. I just personally wasn’t willing to make some of the decisions that would be required with that decision.
So I respect it so wholeheartedly. It was just for me that PA was exactly what I was looking for. Ultimately, that’s what led me here.
When I was pregnant with my first, I never really even thought about taking a break from school, which is so funny, but I was just like, oh, this is what I’ve always wanted to be a mom and to be a provider, so I’m just going to make that happen. I can be pregnant at home or I can be pregnant at school, so let’s do this. So I never really took a break, but I’m glad now that I didn’t because I think it just kind of kept the motivation up for me, kept the momentum.
While I was raising my little family, I just decided that this is ultimately what I wanted the whole time, so I might as well keep going.
Meghan Etsey: I love it. And congratulations on being a first-generation college student and on your second master’s degree, that’s incredible. So you’ve described being a mom in medicine as not only possible, but deeply fulfilling. What does that balance kind of look for you in day to day, and what helps you stay grounded in both the mom role and the student role?
Kristine Wilson: It is deeply fulfilling. I always tell my friends that I get to come home to my greatest “why?” every single day. And I feel like that is such a huge blessing. It’s not something that I, you know, rarely remember – that one experience that led me to medicine, and I can think about that when it gets hard. I come home to my biggest little motivators every single day of my life. So I feel super, super lucky to have that perspective.
And as a student, it’s a daily juggling act. The balance is, you know, some sort of combination or recipe, I guess, of four ingredients for me. The first ingredient is that I have to dedicate time to just being mom. Just mom time.
The second is that I have to dedicate time to pretty much just being a student. And I say pretty much because I can never really turn off “mom brain”. I’m always thinking about my kids, but dedicated time to focus on my studies is absolutely essential to my success.
And then the third would be that I do have to dedicate a little bit of time to my husband every single day. Just sometimes it’s a few minutes where I’m just talking with him, but he’s also doing so much for our family right now. So I have to recognize that he needs breaks and he needs time too. So that’s definitely part of the daily juggle. And then four is just a tiny bit of time for me. Just a little! So [what] that usually looks like is I wake up early and I get my workout in, and that’s kind of my “me” time. I’ve always loved that. So that’s how I’ve kind of channeled that into having some “me” time. And it’s just time to, like, quite literally work on myself. So I love that.
And then when I’m at school or in class, that is my pretty much dedicated student time. I can still, you know, check-in on my kids and send a text here and there to see how they’re doing. But ultimately, when I’m at school, I try to be as productive as possible so I can enhance my time to just be mom when I get home. So super productive at school as much as I can. There’s good days and bad days, of course. But yeah, that’s the goal.
And then when I get home, the first really I try and make it at least an hour. Sometimes it’s longer, but just a solid hour where I put down my phone, I put down everything. I’m sitting on the floor playing with my kids, just dedicating some time to them. And so it’s kind of it’s something that I definitely look forward to every day and something they look forward to every day too! It’s just mom’s home and we hang out for a little bit. I also kind of mesh in some mom responsibilities here and start some laundry and stuff like that. But, you know, just the essentials of life. But I do try and make that a special time for them. And then, like I said, that’s usually like an hour or so. And then it’s study time.
And something that I have to be really disciplined with is I don’t go in another room and study because I just feel a little bit too much mom guilt with that. I feel like it’d be like me leaving all over again. So I actually have my desk in the living room, and I’m right there with them as I study. And it’s become this, like, beautiful thing because my little three year old, he’ll come up, especially when I have, like, a microscopy image on my screen, and [he’s] like, “Oh mom, is that a germ?” and we start talking about it. He’ll be like, “Oh, so what happens if a germ gets in my eye? Or what happens if a germ gets in my toe?”. Like the most random questions. But it’s this beautiful little moment for me to explain things to him in the simplest ways, and it’s so fun to include him in my studying. And it helps me remember that he is not a distraction, but he’s part of what I’m doing.
The goal has always been, like I said, to be a mom and a provider. So I’m doing it simultaneously. I’m not being a provider here and then being a mom here. It is happening at the same time. And that kind of just solidifies that, by just including him in my studies. And then at bedtime, I prioritize their bedtime. I stop what I’m doing, no matter what I’m doing, and spend that time with them. That’s a nonnegotiable for me. And I’m a religious person, so we read a verse together every night. We pray together every night, and that’s just our nonnegotiable time as a whole family. All four of us get together and do that every night. So it’s honestly, with little kids, it is the little, short, high quality moments, and that is absolutely balanceable in school. It’s just another way to include them in my day.
And then, like I said, I always need to include a little bit of time for my husband. And most of the time, if the balance is struggling, this is what struggles the most. We make time for each other, but it’s very simple. There’s no elaborate date nights very often, but just time where we chitchat every night and check-in on each other. I try to make sure that he has time to go to the gym, or he has time to go hang out with friends and just do things that help him feel prioritized in my life because he is. He’s the reason that I can be so successful. Like, this being a mom in medicine, it takes a village! It really takes a huge support system. He is that for me, along with my family, but he is the primary. Like, he’s working from home right now so that I can go to school and balance watching the kids at the same time. So he is absolutely amazing, and I try and make sure that we communicate well so he can get the time off that he needs too. But yeah, it is a deeply fulfilling juggling act every single day. And as long as those four ingredients are really hit, we have a recipe for success.
Meghan Etsey: You mentioned creating traditions and routines that help your kids feel prioritized. I’ve heard that Sundays are different for your family. Can you tell us a little about that?
Kristine Wilson: Yes. Absolutely. So one thing that I do, is I take Sundays completely off. There’s no studying happening, no school work happening on Sundays. If something’s due on a Sunday, I’m doing it Saturday or hopefully earlier than that. But I really schedule my time pretty strictly during the week so that Sunday can be just mom all day. And it’s been an essential part of that recipe for my kids and for myself. I think that everyone should do it. I don’t know, it amazes me that people can just go hard every single day. But it’s a great break for me mentally. And I do need to do laundry, and I need to do dishes, I need to be a mom! And so that’s how I kind of structure my life. And it helps me on the days where I’m super unmotivated. You know, it’s where starting to get to that point where when we get home, it’s dark outside and everyone’s tired and I know that like, okay, I have my Sunday, so I’m gonna work super hard right now and I can get through this day.
So it’s motivating on multiple levels. But yeah, I make that day different. It’s part of my faith observations as well. We go to church together. We pray together. It’s just it’s just a beautiful day that we have to just be a family and prioritize that.
Another little fun tradition that started kind of accidentally at first, was when I started working out early in the morning, that kind of meant that I would not see my kids until after school. And I hated that at first because, you know, they’re not awake that early. And I did not like that, just from a mom guilt perspective. I just felt like that was a really, really hard thing to do for me.
So what I started doing was I left my kids a note one day. I left them a note on my whiteboard. I made it fun colours. And when they woke up, and my whiteboard’s kind of big, so they were like, “oh my gosh, look how cool!”. And they don’t read yet, but my husband reads it to them. And sometimes I’ll draw a little picture so they know more of what’s going on in the message.
But I started writing these little notes, and they really responded well to them. They loved them. And so I started making it, like, a little bit more than that. Some days it’s still, like, “mom loves you and is thinking about you”, but sometimes I leave them, like, a secret agent mission while I’m gone. I give them a task, and one time I said something about how I left them in charge of the kingdom, and they were the knights guarding the kingdom, and then I built a fort for them to play in. So they woke up to that. Just something really small that takes me ten minutes to do in the morning that they kinda have a piece of me while I’m away, and it gives them something to look forward to, and something interactive all day long. When I have a test, I’ll trace my hand on the whiteboard and so they can give me good luck high-fives. And my husband says that they’ll go high five that whiteboard a bunch of times throughout the day. So it’s just this little fun thing that we do that helps me more than them probably, because I just feel like they know that I’m thinking about them. And then I, of course, during long days, I always call them during lunch and chit chat with them a little bit. They love FaceTiming and seeing my school. And then I dedicate a little bit more time if needed to that after school time if the day is really long. So I just want them to feel loved, that’s my primary goal, and I want them to feel that love in my absence and in my presence and so those are some things that I try and do to help them feel like a priority.
Meghan Etsey: I love it. So switching over a little bit from mom to medicine, you’ve been working on policy reforms since your first master’s program and you have found that only about a quarter of medical schools even have a parental leave policy. What is it like to uncover that gap and kind of what emotions and realizations did that spark for you?
Kristine Wilson: I found out that I was pregnant four days after I got accepted into my program. So I was like, okay, I’m doing this program. I just found out that a little boy is gonna be joining us, and I want to know all of my options. So I started scouring the website. I was looking everywhere, you know? I already knew what my program was. I already knew the school. I was trying to just find what my options were, basically. And I was looking everywhere, and I couldn’t find anything. And I was like, this has gotta be user error, I can’t find anything about this!
So it led to me having to – and I was so intimidated to do this – but, I had to confide in my program director super, super early that I was pregnant because I could not find my options. And even though I wasn’t really ready to tell them, I was a brand new student, and you know, you’re never really sure what first impression that’s gonna leave somebody. So I was really nervous to tell them that, but I also needed to plan my life a little bit.
So I had to confide in my program director and tell them that I was pregnant in order to, you know, say “hey, there’s no policy, and I can’t find it”, is what I was saying. So I actually met with him in person, and we had this discussion.
I said, I’m pregnant, and I need to know what my options are because this is when I’m due, and yada, yada, yada. And his response to me was, “Oh, I don’t think we have one”. And I was like, “Oh, what?” What do you mean you don’t have one? Like, this is a 20 year old school. Like, what do you mean? So I was a little bit dumbfounded that they didn’t have one at all.
And so right then and there, I was like, well, can I write one? Can we get the ball rolling? Maybe we can have this in place by the next student catalog and that’ll be perfect timing for when the baby comes out. And he didn’t have a problem with that. He was like, sure, write one up and we’ll see what we can do.
So that led me to doing research at home. I started looking online to get an example of other schools’ maternity policies, right? And then I was scouring their websites and scouring other websites, and I couldn’t find anything. So then I turned to PubMed and stuff like that and found that 25% of medical schools in the country have a maternity policy, and the number really actually decreases to about 16% when you exclude the maternity policies that are specific to employees of that university. A lot of that 25% even includes just employee policy.
Ultimately I was appalled. All these schools claim to be protected by Title IX, which states that you must provide the medically necessary time off following childbirth. However, most schools just have a full year leave of absence option.
So, you know, you’re facing delays in graduation, you’re facing loss of loan grace period. It’s just, it’s a big deal. And when, you know, we’re on this super long path to medicine, we don’t really wanna take an entire year to not be moving forward and progressing in that super long path. So I think that turns a lot of women away from having children in the first place.
But for me, I just couldn’t really believe that this is what was happening because we claim to be protected by Title IX, but we’re actually really not unless we take that full year. So, yeah, I just feel like this is crazy because in medical school, the prime reproductive age is the age of all the people there. So I am just shocked that they don’t have a maternity policy more, that it’s not more popular in medical education, but unfortunately it’s just not.
Meghan Etsey: So when you did your research and eventually proposed your own policy and began advocating for this reform, what kind of challenges or resistance did you encounter and how did you stay motivated through all these “We’ll get to it” or push aside kind of moments?
Kristine Wilson: There were a lot of those. Still is, unfortunately. So when I had this conversation with my program director and concluded that I was gonna write my own and give it to him, it only took me really a few days after I had done some research and drafted that policy. I sent it in right away. I try and be proactive with that kind of thing. And I was also pregnant. So I was like, let’s get this ball rolling because this baby is coming whether or not this policy comes.
So I put it in right away and I was really expecting this couple month long conversation to happen. I was expecting to have it sent back with edit critiques or advice or request to change wording. I was expecting this to go really back and forth, but it was kind of just radio silence. I sent it in, and first of all, I didn’t know who to directly send it to. My program director didn’t either, but he said, “send it to me and I will do what I can with it.” And I do trust that he was, you know, had good intentions on getting it to the places it needed to go.
So I sent it in to him and then, you know, I’m also trying to be successful in school.
So, unfortunately, a couple months went by before I really heard anything. And so I reached out to him and I was like, “Hey, like, what’s going on? What are the updates for me?”, and he responded and said, “Oh, forgot to tell you. At this point, the committee feels like there’s enough framework in place and that is not needed. So they threw it out.”
I was like, okay. So what is the framework? That became the next conversation. I’m like, okay. So I was looking everywhere on the website knowing that I was pregnant, and you’re telling me that there’s already framework in place. I ended up having to meet and my program director didn’t know. That’s where the conversation ended with him. He was like, sorry. You know?
So I reached out to ADA accommodations. I met with different program directors at my same university. I met with a bunch of people and I was like, what are my options? Someone please tell me my options. And it ended up being that my ADA accommodations guy, he was the one who was kind of in charge of pregnancy because it’s considered a temporary disability when you’re in school. So he was like, Oh yeah, well send me in some information and I can get back to you. So I was like, Okay.
So I had to disclose some really personal information. I had to send him ultrasound images. I had to send the doctor’s information. I had to sign a medical release. And I also had to give a conception date, which all of it just felt really crazy. This is my university where I’m in a Master’s program to kind of help you get into your next program. That’s kind of the main goal of it. So a lot of the students go into DO after this and a lot of the students go into PA. So my goal is still to move forward and get into the PA program.
So I was really, really scared to kind of be annoying and to say, well, I’m pregnant and so I need these rules in place. So it felt it was really, really hard. But, yeah, I just had no one really to go to. And so I went to him and he told me, oh, after all this information was sent in, he told me, “Okay, so I think the policy is ten days.” I literally have that quoted in writing, I think. And so I said, “okay, can I see it?” Like, can I see this policy that everyone seemingly referring to that the framework is that I can’t find anywhere? I just wanted to know so I could be sure. This was my second baby and my first one, I had some complications. He was in the NICU. He came very or not very, but pretty early. So I was kind of, you know, trying to be very aware that this could happen again. So I wanted to be proactive about it, and you know, go off of the odd chance that he could be in the NICU and I needed to know my exact days. So, I wanted to see the policy but no one could give it to me. It was still just “I think” and word-of-mouth, and, unfortunately for me, I just felt that it was too high of a risk if I went into labor.
Also, the policy was ten days from the start of labor. That was what he said. And with my first, I was in labor for three days. They were giving me the Terbutaline, all the things to try and stop it. So I was concerned with the timing, and I felt a little bit defeated at this point.You know, they just thrown it out so fast, and that was my only option, and time was running out for me.
So I ended up having to take a full calendar year off of a ten month master’s program. And that was very discouraging and very hard. I really, really felt like I could have done it, but, also because of the timing of when I took leave, I had to completely start over. So I was not only fully paid for a semester that I got absolutely no credit for and acquiring the interest on that. But I was taking a break for a whole year, from a ten month program. And it was really, really hard. But when I came back, I was so hungry for change.
My school has a lactation room. So I would sit in there and pump for my son every single day. And I thought, you know, if enough women spoke up about needing a lactation room, then obviously they had to have given birth. Right? So what is the deal? And I was super motivated. I was ready. So I actually ran for and was elected for a student senate position to represent my program. And this got my foot in the door with the Dean and I was meeting with him once or twice a month because of this position. So after I was elected to it, I started bringing up that conversation again about maternity policy.
And this is when I felt a lot of pushback, in person, like, to my face for the first time. Because it had all been very, very personal to me because I was pregnant in the beginning. So I think this time people were more like, oh, like, does this even apply to you? If they didn’t know my story, anything. So I got a lot more pushback to my face, and that was a little bit hard for me. I’m not a super confrontational person, but I was very motivated, and having been impacted by this so personally, I just felt like it was so necessary. So I continued to have conversations. I brought it up. I sent it to the Dean. I met with him and presented it to him as well as presented him with a research paper that kind of showed the numbers of student satisfaction in universities that had maternity policies and versus universities that did not.
And he was saying, okay, I’ll bring this to the committee and that’s pretty much all I can offer you at this point, so just sit tight. And this committee that no one ever has told me what the title of this committee is, or if it’s the actual board, or I don’t know anything about it. But it’s some mystery committee that he has been conversing with that has not been able to provide a straight answer, yes or no, or provide any changes that I can do. And I told him, I’m super flexible. If there is something that needs to change about this policy that I’ve written up, which adheres to your ten day rule while also maintaining flexibility for, title IX requirements that we’re already claiming to sustain, If there’s something that I need to reword or something I can change, please tell me.
I just want the women who are pregnant in this student body to find and access their options somewhere. Even if that stays with a ten day policy, I just think that it should be available to them so they don’t have to go through all the hoops of sending in ultrasound pictures and all that information just to, you know, have some sort of information given to them. So yeah. So I just kept pursuing it. We kept having that conversation, and there have been countless, “we’ll get to it” moments. But, I still have a fire under my feet, and I’m hoping that through just kind of keeping bugging them hopefully that can eventually be enough.
Meghan Etsey: So you have said that your goal is not to just reform at the university but in a broader national way. What steps do you see that are critical to achieving this and medical education around this parental leave?
Kristine Wilson: Yeah, so it’s actually been really cool because since we’ve met, a lot of things have happened. I have always wanted to take this to beyond my school. And with how my school is handling it and all the back and forth conversations and the lack of forward movement, I have felt like, okay, how can I get how can I get around my university and get my word out there? Because, you know, that there’s still that 25% number and that 16% numbers are haunting me. So how can I get my ideas out there? And right now, we’re working on an abstract that we’ve submitted to a research conference in California. Hopefully, that will make it through to just help get the word out a little bit more and be able to have a wider audience and expand some of the awareness to this issue.
And I think that’s gonna be a huge issue because I have felt like I’ve been battling this by myself for two years. My son is about to turn two. I was pregnant. It’s been over two years. And I have felt like I have been absolutely all by myself, but I know for a fact there are other women out there. I actually after returning back to school with this fire under my feet, I had a friend who confided in me telling me that she was pregnant, and she was super inspired by my story and just felt like she could do it. So she proceeded and was pregnant. And, you know, after congratulating her and being so excited, I was nervous because I had received so much pushback for my situation. And ultimately, I ended up watching her go through a lot of the same things I did. She had to tell them the same information and give all that and sign the medical release and everything. And it’s just a lot that the system is just really kind of against us. But I was really upset when she messaged me and said, well, this policy is officially inconsistent because I’ve been given five days.
Meghan Etsey: Oh my gosh.
Kristine Wilson: So right there, I was like, okay. There is a big problem here. This is an issue. So I think awareness is the biggest thing that we really need to happen at this point, so that I’m not fighting this alone, because I’m definitely not. There are other girls who are fighting this seemingly alone wherever they are too. So I want to help get it out there. I’ve also, started looking into other conferences we could potentially take it to if this one doesn’t make it in. And then the next step would probably be a position paper to hopefully make some waves. Get this moving.
Meghan Etsey: Yeah. Absolutely. So for students or trainees who want to start their families, but feel impossible to do both, me myself, I’m about to start residency and this is nerve wracking, right? Like I want babies, but I’m like, you know? What kind of advice and encouragement do you offer from your own journey?
Kristine Wilson: So it’s so special to me because I’m like, yes, all the babies, have all the babies. I wanna be an OBGYN. But ultimately it comes down to like you are going to receive pushback. You’re gonna, you know, have a lot of biases against you and be put into a little tiny box from the start if someone knows you’re pregnant and it’s really, really hard but ultimately, we know what we’re capable of. Better than anybody else. We know what we’re capable of. And I don’t think a school should be telling you what you’re capable of doing by putting their rules on you. You know, we’re paying to go to a school and receive an education. So, we should be able to make decisions in our personal life regardless.
And, it should be easier, to me, to have a baby when you’re in medical education versus when you’re being paid to do a service. I’ve always felt that way, but it’s just not how it’s designed right now.
But really, we know what we’re capable of. I knew the second I found out I was pregnant after four days after I had gotten into my program that I was like, well, this is what I want to do. This is who I am. Like, I’m okay with going to school pregnant because I’m either going to be pregnant at home or pregnant at school. So, I just I want that in my life and I think that the the motivation we feel to have children is so inherently maternal and it’s such a part of that caregiver role for me that I want to explore that and I want to, you know, develop that nurturing and that empathy that comes with being a mother and be able to give that to my patients.
So, we know what we’re capable of. We know what we can do and what we can manage. And if you feel like you can absolutely handle both. It’s gonna be scary. We’re never gonna know really what it looks like until we’re there. Right? But if you feel like you can do it, then by all means, you can. And if I can do it, absolutely anyone in the world can because people look at me like I’m some sort of queen of organization and I promise you, I am just doing my best this day, and I’ll do my best tomorrow. And sometimes that’s different day to day. But if it’s my best, then that’s what I’m giving that day.
And I always say that you’re not distracted by motherhood, you’re driven by it. So my kids, I mentioned they are my “why?” They’re everything to me. They have given me a perspective that is absolutely invaluable because I can see someone, even someone who’s older than me as somebody’s child, someone’s loved one, and I can treat them as such because I know what it’s like to give of all of yourself to a person despite what they’re doing, despite their behavior, despite how close you are, you can love somebody and give them the care that they need and that they deserve no matter what because that’s what you’re trained to do as a mom.
You’re also trained, not really trained, but you develop the ability to show up no matter how exhausted you are, to be a caregiver 100% of the time, and to maintain your ambition and go to school at the exact same time is gonna be, you know, not only develop you further as a person, but it will help your kids witness the strength and the perseverance that can come from doing multiple things at the same time. From chasing your dreams while you’re raising them. It’s just, it’s beautiful.
And I really feel like anyone who wants to have children during their medical education is already halfway there. That is once you’re having that desire, you already have the caregiving, the loving that’s already coming up inside of you but once you have the ability to actually nurture that baby and to, you know, to once you have that baby in your hands and you experience that moment of, wow, this is my greatest why, then, everything else comes so much more naturally. You’re able to see your patients in that perspective almost instantly because you’re like, wow, someone loves them so much, no matter how they treat me. Like, I am gonna give my 100% to them. And I don’t think that your desire to nurture life diminishes.
Meghan Etsey: So that’s a wrap on this episode of Our Voices, Our Future. We hope today’s conversation inspired you, challenged you, and reminded you of the power of raising your voice. The fight for equity doesn’t stop here. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, and if you loved this episode, share it with someone who needs to hear it. Until next time, stay bold, stay vocal, and keep the conversation going. This is Our Voices, Our Future.
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About the Authors
Meghan Etsey is a PGY1 resident in Internal Medicine who earned her medical degree from St. George’s University. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Biology and a Bachelor of Arts in Nutrition and Dietetics from Bluffton University in Bluffton, Ohio. During medical school, she served as President of the St. George’s University Women in Medicine chapter in St. George, Grenada, where she expanded community partnerships and worked to educate and empower women and youth. She also contributed as a member of the Gender Equity Task Force and the Sex and Gender Health Collaborative Committees within the American Medical Women’s Association. Outside of medicine, Meghan enjoys spending time with friends and family, often going on road trips and exploring new places.