Babies, timing, and residency/practice

[starbuckscoffee]

Looking for some advice from some of you who are a little farther into the derm career pathway than I am...

My husband and I would like to have kids some time in the next five years. He's ready "whenever." From my point of view, I'd like to do it when it will least interfere with my training/career.

From my limited perspective, it seems that my prelim year and 1st year of derm residency would be bad times to have a baby due to the higher frequency of call and the vast amounts of info to learn. Do you think that 2nd or 3rd years of derm residency or the first few years of my career as a private derm or academic derm (haven't decided yet) would be a better time to start a family?

If this changes anything, I do plan to work full-time after taking whatever maternity leave I am given.

Thanks for the advice!!!

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[Dral]

Take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I'd say 2nd or 3rd year of your advanced program would be a better time than earlier.

This may also serve to help guide where you will end up with your first post-residency job, since having a child already might make choice based on location and schools more salient (not saying that you couldn't make this same decision with just the plans of having a baby in mind though).

 

[kleindike]

Dral is right and I think that's the best way to adjust but if you feel like not having a baby yet, that's fine for as long as your partner would agree with you. I mean you don't want to have conflicts with your career and family.