Choosing Wisely: Fertility, Risks, and The Decision to Become A Physician Parent

In this episode the host, Amanda Quijano, interviews Christine, a third-year pediatric emergency medicine fellow and new mom, discussing how she decided when to start a family during training. Her decision-making process was partially shaped by her experiences as a medical student, her identity as a Black woman physician and her awareness of higher maternal morbidity and mortality risks.

She talks about her journey freezing embryos during residency, navigating early-morning appointments, schedule swaps, and trying to time her procedures and recovery with her schedule.

She talks about how she ultimately began trying to conceive in fellowship, and experienced a late second-trimester miscarriage.

She highlight how her program provided flexibility near delivery (including a virtual rotation and no third-trimester overnights) and then how she had to navigate advocating for herself and her baby around her delivery and post-delivery complications - as well as the systems she had put in place ahead of time to make sure this would happen.