I started reading medical blogs during my premed years. I was originally fascinated by the stories and experiences of medical students, residents and practicing physicians. During this time there were a few blogs I became quite emotionally invested in. Everyday, I would anxiously await new posts to be updated as I followed along each blogger’s saga. Some of my favorite ones can be found in the links section.
Over the years, I saw excellent blogs announce their retirement and have seen others fall off the radar. More often than not that change coincided with residency. I always wondered what it was about residency that could kill a blog so quickly?
This blog officially turned four years old this summer and has been doing the best it ever has. Traffic is up, readership engagement is strong and there is a steady stream of income that more than covers the costs. Compared to three years ago, medaholic has shown tremendous growth and personal satisfaction. Yet with only two months of residency done, I can understand why it’s so hard to maintain a medical blog during residency.
Simply put, residency is a very busy time in one’s medical training that leaves little time for blogging. There are a hundred different tasks in want of your time and attention, and only so many hours in a week. You spend more time in the hospital than ever before, ranging from 60-90 hours a week. The amount of material to be learned is so abundant you don’t even know where to start. With the little free time I have, I try to spend it (1) sleeping (2) eating (3) spending time with friends and family - usually in that order.
There are some bloggers out there who are successful at blogging during residency. Solitary Diner is one such resident and she averages over a dozen posts a month. I’m not sure where I fit in yet. There will be an adjustment period where I will figure things out. Right now, the last thing I want to do is come home after a long day of work and write about what happened at work. I don’t want to write about patient encounters in a public forum, as a junior resident I worry enough about patient care already.
I just wanted to reassure everyone that I will still be blogging for the foreseeable future. Just right now, my posting will probably be more infrequent, at least until residency is not as new and raw. It’ll take some time to adjust to this new chapter of my life.
I sense some burnout, hopefully you will get some time off in the next few months or so. Go somewhere far and foreign. Regain perspective and keep going strong. Wish you the best!
Probably not burned out from residency, I’m finding residency actually to be quite an exciting experience. There’s so much to learn and do. I think just having the nagging thought that I need to put up new content on this blog gets to me at the end of the day.
It will be a very sad day if you are truly gone. I rarely comment but have had you bookmarked for ages.
Thanks for the mention (and the increased blog traffic)! I think one of the reasons I’ve stayed blogging through residency is that I was a resident when I started blogging, and therefore I didn’t develop unrealistic expectations of myself with respect to posting frequency/content/quality. I don’t push myself to write really high-quality posts, but instead allow myself to just get out whatever is on my mind, even if it comes with grammatical errors or is otherwise imperfect. I also really enjoy having the record of my experiences and being able to look back on them, which motivates me to keep the blog going when things are busy.
Hope you find a way to keep it up as a resident!