Hi, and welcome to this month's episode of the Thought Podcast, a trainee-led podcast from Australia Psychiatry. This month we're talking about the challenges and triumphs of parenting while in the psychiatry training program. My name is Jen Wilkes, and I'm psychiatry of old age events training in Canberra and a parent. And I have several other trainees from around Australia and New Zealand joining me today. I uh Ed Miller, Stephanie Azure, Matt Ryan, and Chance Truman, and I'll let the magistrate itself as we host for the episode. So I don't know which of you guys wanted to go first, but I was interested, and I'm hoping some of you will be interested as well in hearing a bit about you, where you're from, where you're training, how far through you are, and a little bit if you're okay with telling us about what your families look like and what your clinical load versus your family load looks like and the kind of supports that you have. Anyone want to put their hands up?

So um, yeah, hi everyone, and Kyoto, as we would say, New Zealand. So yeah, I'm Ed. I'm um an advanced trainee in child and adolescent psychiatry in my final rotation ever before I become a consultant. And yeah, just a little bit about me. So I'm actually I'm based in Auckland at the moment, that's where I sort of live and work and where I've settled, but I'm from Adelaide originally in Australia, and that's where I did my medical training, and then spent some time in the UK and have been here for about three years. Um so yeah, I've I've got um I'm married and I've got one little boy who is um 13 months old, and had him after I'd done all my exams, except for the long case. So just before I got into advanced training, and I just actually finished all my exams and and passed the MEQ and the CEQ. And the day after I passed it, my wife came and said it's time to have kids now. So I was like, okay. Um I think for me that was that was the right time to have kids actually, because when you're studying for exams like sat Saturday and Sundays, I'm studying, and yours kind of burden um and workload is quite a lot more, and so it was really good to actually not have to worry about that. And you guys might have had different experience, but a few of the people in my study group had kids already, and I could tell for them it was much harder trying to organise a a time to do the study group, and they seem to have a bit more of a burden than I did at that stage. So pri prior to that point I was training full-time, and then when when we had him, I had some paternity leave. So and it's probably different in Australia and and maybe each state in Australia might have different paternity leave or maternity leave sort of conditions, but in New Zealand it's different for the main caregiver and then the sort of the primary caregiver and the secondary caregiver. So as the husband, I was sort of the secondary caregiver, which meant that I got two weeks of paid paternity leave. If I wanted, I could have two more weeks of unpaid paternity leave, which I took. So I had four weeks in total, which was a really good decision, and I'd highly recommend people to do that.

The first month is so overwhelming and it's awful when it is just yeah, you go part after two weeks and then they're back at work while you're still like trying to breathe and work way work out what weighs up.

Yeah. It's just like your life gets flipped upside down. You know, literally your day-night cycle gets flipped upside down, inside out, but just the bonding time that we had together as a family, just in in those early stages, I think really set set up my relationship with my son from that point on, and you can't get that time back. So just actually that amount of time that you spend together is really critical. But one thing I didn't realise was um I'd initially planned on taking one day a week off on paternity leave for six months, because in the New Zealand employment law, you're able to do that as the sort of secondary caregiver, you can split time with the primary and the secondary person. And and I'd applied for that like six months prior to uh to when we knew that he was going to be born, and then about a week before that was due to start, the um HR people got back to me and said, actually, we've found this clause like buried very deeply in the employment agreement for registrar doctors saying that you can't do that. So you're only allowed the the initial four weeks of paternity leave, and after that you can't take any more. Um so they were reasonably flexible in the sense that they let me have one day off, just so I went down to like 0.8, so I went down part-time, and they were quite good in in being flexible with that. I mean, being a registrar is very difficult because there are so many technicalities and regulations and like the amount of time that th things count towards, and it and it just does become a little bit of a nightmare no matter how much you do try to plan for things. So, yeah, so that's impacted on my my total training time now, and so before I can become a consultant, I need to make up a couple of months specifically because of that time that I took off. Um, so yeah, there's a little bit of a sort of added burden, but like I said, the one day a week that I've had for the past 12 months, and which I've taken off just to be with him, I wouldn't change that for anything. So it's just time and you can't get time back.

And also I imagine then lessening the burden on your partner and meaning that you guys are all more relaxed as a family unit, and that you get to it's not just you with your kids that it's you with your partner and you with uh the ecosystem around you, get you get a bit more time if you can go down to time.

And and so what it's allowed is that my wife can work on the day that I'm looking after him, which means that she has that role for herself which is being fulfilled, and she doesn't lose that that side of herself, which is really important for her as well.

Um Steph, I know you're kind of at the other end of parenting. Would you mind if we we switch to you and have a chat about your experience?

Yeah, that's fine. I'm I'm actually glad I'm on this podcast because I think I bring a kind of different dimension to it in the way, as you said, being at the other end, but also from a migrant point of view and all that comes with that, because when you're training, yes, it does have its own demands, and when you are training in an environment that's new, that's a whole level of challenge. So my background is um um I'm originally from Nigeria, West Africa, so my primary degree was University of Benin in Nigeria, and um I did my initial part of my residency and got my membership of a college in the UK in 2011, and at that stage I already had three children. So, as I I know looking back, I don't know what I was thinking, but you know, they were here, they they were there, and that was it. I I already had had a kid as a house officer, but the amount of support I had then was different, and I think training in the NHS with some of the peculiarities of the NHS, such as kind of moving around almost every six months. At that time, I think I probably had just one when I first started, and by the time I had the second child and had to then move, because you would often have to move depending on on your locations, because you were your training was done under diner's and your hospitals could be within two, three hours of each other. So you would either choose to have a very early start. Like I do remember at a time getting up at 4:30 a.m. to get on a train to get to where I was at that time. So, and that was because I didn't want to disrupt the dynamics at home too much. And the other part of parenting and training is when I say support, the immediate support in the home for you and the kids. So I had a husband who was a doctor who was doing residency as well. So we're like, okay, who is moving where in the six months? So it was a whole different challenge. Somehow, with um three kids on the seven, I managed to get the MRSC Psych. And I think at that point, one of the things in the NHS then was that, you know, I still have a friend who still says I'm not sure if you were brave or mad. We still haven't decided. One of the options at the NHS then was when you got your MRSC psych, you had the option to use a different pathway to become a consultant, which often didn't involve moving around and give you stability. So of course I jumped at that. And my area of interest was old age at the time, um, psychogeriatic. So I worked as a staff associate specialist in that field for a while. I had that option of not moving, which was great. So sometimes in the career, you make certain decisions because it works for the family. Not because it's the best career move, but um it's the most ideal move for stability. And um, when my husband decided he was coming to Australia, I actually ended up working in New Zealand when we got here. Because we we decided, you know what, if we're gonna have an adventure, let's just see where it takes us. The kids are young enough to hopefully adapt without disrupting things too much. So I went to New Zealand and worked in Waikato while my husband was here in Canberra. And um I think going to New Zealand, it was a lovely, lovely walk environment. I have to say, they were they were very supportive the moment we realized childcare was not easy to get. I was in a situation sometimes where it would be lovely members of staff who would offer their teenage daughters to babysit while I went on call. So it was really lovely, but it wasn't easy. So when you are a migrant, that's that put another layer of challenge to training. And by the time I came to Canberra, because obviously it was gonna be easier if both of us were in the same place, because my husband was having to come to New Zealand every 10 days. Initially it's an adventure, and after that, you're like, oh heavens. And so we've made a decision to come to Canberra, and I started the training program here. But I think there is just so much you can control as a trainee in terms of other factors. You might put everything in place and hope it all falls into place as you've planned, but there is a part of it you cannot predict, such as how do the kids adjust. At first, I think at first my youngest would have been about four. He thought we were on holiday. You know, he was like, oh, why are we going to school on holiday? So they they were already used to the UK system, New Zealand and here, all within a space of barely two years. I think by the time I came into the program here, I think everyone was exhausted. And so my husband and I made a decision that we had to prioritize the family or the children, make sure they settled. And that was what I did then. I started the program in Canberra, and then um I was fortunate there was an opportunity and I was able to move into general practice. And so that gave me the degree of flexibility because of the way general practice works. And I was able to even negotiate even more flexibility so I could feel a little bit more settled. And um I love psychiatry. I found I was doing a lot of it in general practice. And um, when my kids were older and I felt they were more settled, I decided to go back into training. I get into stage three next month. And at various times, again, you know, you even the needs when your children are young is so different from the needs when they are older. And I'm glad because then it gave me some hope that oh my they will grow. And so when they got to a certain stage, like not brushing anyone's teeth anymore, you know, they can actually get themselves where they need to go, they can stay safe until I get back. And and then I realize, oh, you still have to look after them. It's just a different kind of looking after. And I I realize the same thing I had in general practice, you can actually go part-time. I think that can sometimes be what you need to catch your breath. Of course, the other side of it is it makes the journey longer, but I think it just makes it more doable. It you don't feel like you are climbing this endless mountain. Yeah, so I I think being able to walk part-time made a difference. Yeah, that's good. Thank you for sharing.

That's so impressive. What about you, Chance? What's your what's your story?

So, yeah, so I'm 37 and I live in um Albany at the moment. So I moved from the Metro setting down to Albany two a little bit years ago. I'd um met my wife initially in Albany, um and she was a nurse, and now she's an emergency uh medicine trainer and doctor. We'd met initially here as well. So we've moved, and this is where my family's from. We had our first as an intern, and then we had our second while during my first year on training. And then we had our third seven months ago, six, seven months ago. And so I have just started advanced training in child adolescent um, which is excellent. And so I'll get to hang out here, which is very friendly. And yeah, so I do full-time, and my wife's currently doing part-time. So we started that two months ago, which has been pretty tricky to navigate that. But yeah, one's at school, one's at daycare three days a week, and the other one's just about to go into a bit of daycare, but we've been having family and doing shifts around when I can kind of come in and scoop it back up. Yeah, I had a um a nurse on the ward said, Is um training a good time to have kids? And I kind of said, No time's a good time to have kids. I thought it was a very interesting question, and well, training them all gets in the way of having kids, but so did everything else, yeah. Um obviously come with their challenges, and and we had a few different difficult pregnancies and then navigating um uh particularly our last one and me being down here and then in the middle of exams. But uh yeah, no, it's great.

I love it. I didn't realise you're a cams AT as well, because it is, of course. So I'm interested to talk to both of you about how that changes your parenting shortly and whether it does. But I want to talk to just get a story from Matt first before we jump onto that, and then I will talk to you about CAMS.

Yeah, so thanks for you. I'm Matt. I'm uh I've just recently applied for fellowship, which is very exciting. And when they're sort of thinking back over the last couple of years, I I've I've been in training or and a combination of training and breaking training for the last I think it's been seven years or so. So it's it's definitely made longer in a sense uh because of having children throughout the journey. But yeah, I'm I'm 36 and uh I live in country New South Wales, just outside of Canberra, and uh currently enrolled in the psychotherapy advanced training certificates, um, although I've been on a break from that as well. But I've got a four and a half year old and uh two and a half year old um who's really starting to find his voice and learn how to say no, which has been a fun challenge in itself. I think my experiences have been very similar to sort of what you guys have shared. I had a terrible reputation for procrastinating, and I left my exams to the latter part of my training, and the kids were in the middle of all that as well. And so there were some pretty unique challenges trying to find that time and opportunity to study, kind of like what you were saying, yeah, like all your friends that had their kids to like be able to attend or join study groups or even just to find a spare weekend to be able to study was always up and down. But I was fortunate that I've got um my parents-in-law lived nearby and and they've been able to help with a day of daycare once a week, which has been really helpful. And my parents would come down and visit every now and then, which would be super helpful as well as well for those weekends. But like one thing I when I was reflecting on it that used to really tear me up was that I'd be trying to study and be working on exams, and then just hearing the little kids like knocking on the door and go, Oh daddy, can you come and play? Can you come and play? And the like kind of guilt wrenching, like, Oh, I really I really want to play and be with them, but I also have to got this exam next week, and and those kind of been uh pulled between um both those places was was pretty tough.

Yeah, when I when I was pregnant and I was tossing up sitting my CEQ and MEQ or just leaking it, my boss at the time said no fee. I he left it and he tried to study with two toddlers and said it was just a nightmare for that exact same reason and so bullied me into doing it. I'm so glad that he did.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, another thinking about like uh advanced training certificates and how that might be impacted by having kids or not too. I I interestingly, in when you're in the psychotherapy training in Canberra, one of the rotations you do is perinatal. And my first child was born during that rotation and it kind of was quite close to home. I didn't didn't appreciate how the experience of having a kid was going to be itself, and then also the sort of the experiences through that rotation were quite at times it we there was some sort of challenges that would come from that. And one of the training components of the psychotherapy advanced training is infant observations, and I've sort of kind of decided to not do that while I've sort of got my own infants and sort of put that off. I don't know whether that's a similar thing that occurs in childhood training, but uh yeah, it's an interesting sort of well chosen interruptions to the advanced training as well because of kids sort of experience some of the challenges that can occur, like with daycare drop-offs and having your rotations when your rotation changes and it's all of a sudden the other side of town to where your daycare is and negotiating with your partner and who's doing drop-off, who's doing pickup the times. And then also another thing that was my my partner's an academic working at AMU and something that we are constant negotiation of.

That's such an interesting thing to say. That question of who has the greatest utility to take a day off. And sometimes it's if there's a breastfeeder, uh then uh it's usually going to be the breastfeeder, but if not, it's usually like, well, I've got patients that I know that I've been booked in that are expecting me to be there versus my wife who works in ED, where it's kind of like whoever, and then it's well, shift work is money, a lot of money falls into it. And you never want to be caught out, it always being someone as well.

Uh we've got this work ethic medicine where you just don't want to stop, you want to keep going and going, going. It's hard to like sort of just go, oh, hang on, I can take a sick day, that's okay.

One of the things I realized was that with young children, even for exams, the timing actually matters. So kids tend to fall ill more in the winter months or in the colder months. So if you have exams around that time, chances are you're gonna end up having to look after children at some point or the other. And so along the way, I kind of realized it's not really a good idea to set in exams in the cold months. And so I, while they were younger, I started moving my exams to the summer or the spring months because it made a huge difference. I also think, you know, in training, having a really, really good supervisor who isn't just a supervisor in the academic sense, but a supervisor with a very humane touch makes all the difference. They almost become like an informal safe space for you at work. Yes, you've got the leave, you're entitled to it. But there is something about a lot of us as doctors where you do not want to cancel your clinic, you don't want to be seen as not being reliable. But having a supervisor that you feel comfortable enough to say, this is the situation, I am gonna need that. Without feeling, you will be perceived in a negative light. So I think in training, as a parent, having an amazing supervisor is is really invaluable.

And having people to model that behavior for you as well, work will always be there. This right now is more important than having them actually put their money where their mouth is and take their own leave to look after their kids.

I've been quite fortunate. Even in the UK, I remember my one of my last set of clinical exams. I was almost nine months pregnant. Um and the way the UK did the exams, if there were clinical exams for fairness and equity, you couldn't do it in the same place you worked. So um I was too heavy to fly. So I I had my husband drove me halfway, and then I took the train halfway. So that kid is almost 18 now. I did try to move it, but um I was told I couldn't. Uh if I moved it, I had to go do that cycle of exams again. But thankfully, I I think things are are shifting, and I think they are taking into consideration that life does happen and you don't always have complete control over it. But you, you know, at that time I had the support of a director. Um, you know, they they try to put everything in place to support me to be able to sit that exam. But I look back, maybe somebody should have just said, don't do it. You do know what I mean? And and I was like, no, I've started, I'm going, I'm doing exams. But you know, they they did the best they could at that time. There are some things that you cannot um completely plan for as a parent, and you just have to make the the most of the situation at the time, which includes for me using the resources available, like you know, a good support network, um, really good clinical um, you know, educational provisor. I found the balance growth. And I think in my own case, this so we had a trained therapist coming in weekly to meet with us. And I think I found that quite helpful. Um, because uh if you're a parent, you are likely to have times when you are turned in different directions. And I think sometimes knowing that you can be in a space where somebody else can put a p different perspective on it for me was encouraging.

There used to be a violent group in Canberra, didn't there? But I think it might have gone now. What about Ed and Chance? Are there violent groups around where you guys are?

Yep. Wait, is if you're around.

Are you involved?

I think I'm in Um of them at least. Yeah. Which is good. And is it useful? Like it's uh Yeah, I've always found them helpful. Yeah.

They sound like excellent ideas every now and then you know where they've been in various of our local meetings they try and run them, but I've got to admit I've never been involved, but it sounds very useful. What about you, Ed? Yeah.

So ours is like a mandatory part of our training. Well in the sense that it doesn't there's no penalties if you miss it, but it's part of our weekly training teaching. Yeah. I love balanced groups. I think they're really really helpful. And you always learn something through the process of the group, even if you don't think that it's going to be that helpful, you inevitably discover something just by just by doing it.

That's fabulous that that's something that's in part of your training. Yeah. I guess maybe that segues nicely into then it talking about what supports you guys have had a life and had from your surfaces from the college, from in in managing the parenting and also being a trainee. Um I gotta say, with my when I had my son, he was eight weeks early, and the director at the time of the trainers and the health service were just phenomenal with that. Because I, of course, just dropped everything. I went into labour on a Sunday, I felt in C all the time. I texted her and I was like, I'm not gonna be in tomorrow, having a baby. Sorry. And it just got managed. I mean, had I not had such a brilliant director of training at the time, I might have been in trouble at various whatever's for not doing broken training forms at the right time. But he he was just you need to use, we will deal with it later. It's fine, do what you need to do. And I felt very supported from everyone at that time. That was really good. Anyone else have have good or bad or other experiences?

I think um at the time I was having children, things were different, Fiona. Expectations were different. It's now it's for the best. I I think at the time I sadly didn't feel comfortable enough to actually tell them because of the kind of pressure you really have. You remember you're you're you're a migrant, you've got a certain amount of time to get this done. It has a lot of other nuances, spoken and unspoken, and its own pressures. I think with my with my last one, I don't think I notified them officially till it was probably well over six months, and they were not very happy about it because I was still doing on calls. Eventually, when I did, they were they were supportive, uh, but you would always at the back of your mind have this concern. Some of that pressure may have been pressures maybe from myself and the cultural differences. I'm Nigerian by culture. You probably would hear that it's one of probably the most the most educated migrant group out of Africa. That has its own pressure, you know, where you're like, are you are you not getting are you not finished yet? What's going on? What's happening? And then have to deal with that pressure of how much further can I keep working so that this counts for my training, or do I take a break? And I think I had to deal with that on my own as an individual. You know, I have seen cases where people take time off to have a baby and say, oh, my, my, you know, I've got ex-wise that coming to stay for six weeks. Not everyone has that luxury. So I think that if I could do things differently, I think one of the things I would have done was to have taken a break well ahead of the time I took it while I was pregnant, because that allowed me not to get into maternity live exhausted. But I think the journey for me, now that my kids are older, I have learned to be more patient with myself. I have expectations of myself and you know where I come from. I have also learned that it's actually okay that I might not meet their expectations at their own pace. So I think this journey for me in training has not just been about the academic journey. It's also been um about it's also been a learning experience. So I have learned through this experience to be patient.

There's a good point there. With each six-month rotation, you're only allowed to take four weeks off, and then you plus or minus can apply for an additional two weeks with your director of training. So it's super essential when having a baby planning, or if it's in the future, or all that sort of stuff, to maintain a really good line of conversation with your director of training to be able to help with those forms or to help with those sort of different considerations, whether you go for the consult liaison or the child adolescent terms, which are generally the harder ones to go or not, and kind of try and see as much as possible what flexibility might be there to kind of help with the disruption or the likely disruption in the training. I was quite lucky, like just by chance, my both my children landed in the middle of rotations, so I could take four weeks on either side. I was such a zombie and I wasn't doing so well with the sleep deprivation that the I think I was happy to sort of uh take that additional time off.

I missed I I didn't realise how important work was as a rudder for me. But I just was like, I'm doing nothing. Like so obviously caring, support, all that kind of stuff, but I'm not like moving around, moving my body. I'm not like going out, getting anything right here. Days and nights are all kind of coming in, you know, that that almost this eraser head-like anxiety of caring for this for this child. And I'm like, I'm I think I'm losing the pot. Am I depressed or is this parenthood? And then I got back to work and I'm like, I need this, and it was just like each one was a break from the other. Parenting was the perfect perfect foil from work, and work was the perfect break. And it's always a lot harder to stay home and you know, it's a lot easier to go to work than I just do.

Yeah, my day job is so much easier than parenting.

I think there's also a lot of um very much like that the gender roles and and but also sexism in that like taking time off for a baby for for female trainees or clinicians is this kind of you chose it. You planned it. You know, and so uh I'm you know very fortunate that to to be able to hide under the halo of of some of those gender roles. But I will say that they are very different.

I feel like I I had so much gratitude to my partner, especially like in the the first six months where there was like a lot of breastfeeding overnight, she was taking the the lion's share of the sort of nighttime waking and stuff, and tried to help as much as possible. And but it wasn't until they're a little bit older when um I was then more able to sort of help with the nighttime, getting up, settling the child, um, when they sort of stop breastfeeding and things. The uh but it speaks to a good point talking about where you can help out and where like they help out and trying to find that very difficult balancing act to to work out as a team, and because the impacts that having children has on your relationship are huge, and then when we're thinking about training and thinking about work as well, like it just sort of it disrupts everything. So it's having a healthy relationship is very very helpful. Yeah, when you're very anxious about exams. I well, I know for me personally, I'm not always my best self when I'm super anxious or super stressed about something as well. It's important considerations.

I was actually kind of specific in seeking out men who I know are involved parents to get them on to talk about it, because certainly in my friends who are in different specialties who women have had very different parenting experiences, and there's much more of this cultural expectation that what do you mean you're even taking two weeks off? You should be at work now. Do you not have a wife? Can they not do it? But in psychiatry, we we simply much better in in having men take on actual equal parenting roles or try to, and I think that's important to say. Well, A, from a recruitment and a family balance perspective. So people listening to the podcast, psychiatry is excellent from balancing families, and we should still be talking about most places still only have one or two weeks of paternity or you know, non-primary care relief. It should be more than that. Because the first body mum is awful. It's it's really isolating being the primary parent there when you when you're part of the gets default back to body work, but you're still stuck in the thick of it being sleep deprived and not knowing what way is up. We should be supporting people as a couple to be there together in person.

It's so interesting. I was explaining to a fellow colleague who had there first. It was like, I used to find it really boring when people would have their kids and I said, Yeah, I don't care. I just still just want to talk about our time. And I just got a message from my wife that my my middle one, my two and a half-year-old, he's wearing his sunglasses at the dentist and then he's got his little toy and how lovely that is. And I don't mind shift work or working overnight, so but oh, it's almost like, what do you want to go up for this convention? I couldn't think of anything worse. What do you mean? I'm gonna do away from my family. And there's there's I know that shift work and that can make things trickier. And there's different kinds of placements, whether it's uh good or bad for that. And I but I also understand that people sometimes they're while you're rest or bouncing is a bit of space rather than feeling almost anxious about being away from something. But yeah, so it's always always that like I think with kids is is you know, you love them, but they can also push all your buttons at times. But uh the uh yeah, I find that really interesting. Yeah.

Oh, I was I was thinking your point about like some of the difference between some of our medical colleagues and in psychiatry, I think like definitely psychiatry is just seems to be so much more flexible and more open and accepting um of both men and female, like on who's going to take that primary care leave. But one thing that's less flexible, and it sounds like Ed sort of had a similar experience, is the surface that you work in. Um for anyone who's thinking about having kids in training, as well as keeping very close communication and linking in with your director of training, being very familiar with your local enterprise bargaining agreement is also very key, which will stipulate how much leave you've got or how much leave you don't have. So, for example, in Canberra was the case that you could take primary care leave as the non-birth parent, but what a little caveat of that was that it had to be within the first 14 weeks. And by me and my partner were originally, I was looking to take six months off, if I could, with our second child after six months from them being born. So she would do breastfeeding for six months, and then I would take the second six months. Got a hard no from not really the service per se, but the enterprise bargaining agreement was kind of not really in favour of that. So only in exceptional circumstances, which I discovered was if your partner died, then you were allowed to take that additional primary care leave. So good contact with director of training, but also good familiarity with what your leave entitlements are.

I think that's fair. And I think that even as you Ed was saying earlier, with the having take part-time, which then extends of the training time out, if you're taking time to be primary caregiver, surely part of that should counter psychiatry training. But I think it's it's just reality, isn't it? If you want to be a present parent, it's going to by necessity affect your training trajectory. But it's is there anything that you guys all think, well, is there any take-home advice that you would have for people thinking about kids' training programs? Like, is there any way that you guys think from I guess an advocacy perspective that we think college or our health services should need to be better? That's feasible.

Yeah, I was gonna say just go going back to your earlier comment, Fiona, about being a child psychiatrist and also being a parent, I've had to realise there is a difference between being a dad and being a child psychiatrist, even though there is some crossover, but they're also very different roles. And so that does take a little bit of getting used to. But yeah, I think psychiatry is really suited to being a being a parent and and in particular child psychiatrists, all of my colleagues are you know massively supportive of of me and they understand what it's like to be a new a new parent and to have baby brain and and all that stuff. So yeah, my advice would just be, and this this probably reflects my own personality, but just try to be organized and I'd try to plan things out as much as possible in advance. So when you're going to have exams and when you're planning on getting pregnant, and you know, that might not be for everyone, but that's that's how I would approach it, and it did, it did work pretty well for me, and it and it was good to have finished all of my exams and then to kind of go on to the next stage.

Um I guess there's no necessarily a perfect time to have a child, and um and I you can apply for additional time to do training, but you'll never get the time back to sort of see those kids' early milestones. So as you were mentioning earlier, Steph, as well, like I think um if you find a comfort in just knowing that you can just take that little bit longer if needed to do the training time. So far as like if there was to be a wish list on what the college may or may not be able to do to make it a bit easier, I can very much appreciate the kind of four to six weeks. Like there has to be some arbitrary time that they decide that you can pass or not pass your rotation. But interestingly, too, like when they say that four weeks doesn't cross over into your next rotation, which kind of makes sense, especially for the earlier sort of stage one and stage two when you have very important rotations to get those experiences that are quite unique. Once you're in stage three, though, unless you're in a advanced training certificate, you kind of have had most of the experiences. And perhaps in stage three, they could introduce a bit more flexibility with the amount of leave that is taken, maybe have a crossover system so that if you don't take leave in a stage three rotations, a general rotation in one six-month rotation, maybe you could then get eight weeks approved leave in a second rotation if you're stage three and you've had all the required necessary EPAs, WBAs, kind of other rotational experiences. But that's probably a bit too dynamic and a bit too flexible and not manageable. And and I guess to advocate for the disorganized people that you can you get through, you eventually get there and just keep powering on.

I find a certain level of disorganization is like being a drunk boxer, you know, like uh if you never have too sure of a footing, then you can never really lose it either. And then it really helps to roll with everything, I find. You know, I mean training isn't even a job, it's just a part of it of the job that we do. And I feel like in medicine we very much make it our persona of that uh we are our job as well, which is just epic. It's far greater than any training or job, and I know there's a bit to jump through it as doctors, we like to plan everything and have it you know married how to keep holidays. It's again, it's not even a job, it's an aspect of a job that is the kind of thing. And the biggest impact is probably more the having to move around for it, which I think it actually impacts me. But I feel like everything else that when it comes to decisions around when you want to have kids, how to have kids, how to look after your kids, it should be kind of time. For some people that's that's uh uh easier said than done. But I've found that to be um, yeah, I just gave him this work because I like it. Um but you've got to keep yourself well so you can so you can look after your kids.

Okay, that's a nice thing as well, isn't it, about being a parent in the training program is you can get you can otherwise get so bulged up in all of the politics and the nonsense. But if you've got something to keep you to pull you out of that, to remind you that there's there's tough stuff going on, I think that's been really useful for me. Well, thank you all so very much. And it's been really lovely chatting to you all about how we've managed this. And I hope it'll be useful for someone listening, or at least it's been it's been nice for me to have a chat to all of you and talk about different experiences. So thank you. Um, we'd also like to thank Joe Rose, Foto, and Mr. Kuma from the college who give us so much support in producing and editing the show. Um also thank you to Australia Psychiatry for the opportunity to make these podcasts, as well as Sydney Prejudice for our artwork and shady day for music. So for anyone who's interested, you can apparently rate the podcast on whatever app you are listening to it on. We do love getting feedback or suggestions, uh, including volunteers interested in being a guest. Also, volunteers interested in joining the Australasian psychiatry trainee editorial panel, because I, as a trainee, am phasing out of doing that and just about to move into being a consultant. So we need more people and more parents, women, more people from different backgrounds. Please, if you're interested, shoot us an email. Best email is thethoughtbroadcaster.podcast at rnzcp.org. That's it for now. Thank you again to everyone. My name is Jenny Wilkins. Thanks for watching, and I'll catch you next time.