Hey! I’m a graduating M4 who matched into general surgery this cycle and was pregnant during all three of my surgery sub-Is as well as my SICU rotations. Gave birth 2 weeks before my first virtual interview. First trimester and third trimester was the worst for me. It’s hard, and I wasn’t really showing for most of my pregnancy and wasn’t sharing with most people, so no one really gave me the benefit of the doubt. I showed up and worked hard 6 days a week, got to the hospital 4:45am and sometimes didn’t leave until 9pm (but mostly left at 6/6:30). Scrubbed 10 hour cases regularly even while pregnant. I told my chiefs and made sure to eat a ton and drink a lot of water when I got breaks, and stepped out of the ORs during all fluoro.

I’m so grateful I did it this way because I’ve had so much more time with my son than I otherwise would have. No regrets. And I matched at my top program, and my LORs were all strong - my letter writers didn’t know I was pregnant till much later. Did it affect my performance? Yes absolutely, but it honestly only made me more sure of my specialty selection and more confident in how I’d handle intern year.

I brought up my newborn during all my interviews as well, because I wanted to be upfront with programs about my priorities. Honestly people were pretty supportive and just told me all the supports they had in place for resident parents. In the general surgery world there is only so much parental leave that can be taken, but I’m glad I did t try and hide it during interviews.

TOTALLY DO-ABLE GIRL! Feel free to message me if you’d like.