The Amateur Medical Professional

As suggested in the title and short description above, I cannot yet call myself a professional. I remain yet just a student and a caregiver. And I expect I will continue to fill both of these roles, partially if not fully, until I've earned first my bachelor's in psychology and then my PhD in neuroscience. Right now I am working four 12-hour days per week as a caregiver while my long-suffering-yet-somehow-patient wife, Amy, finishes a two-year nursing program during the weekdays...and works with each of our three, reluctant middle school students at night...and cares for my mom after her mother, my mom's current paid caregiver leaves for the day...and cooks for all of us, even for me sometimes. I owe her for this and so much more; I'm certain I shall never be able to repay her for all the ways she has enriched my life in the five years since we met. In fact, she is the number one reason I even enrolled in school again full-time, so that now I only have one year to go to get my bachelor's.

Upon first opening this folder, I intended herein to place amateur articles or notes I'd written while thinking about neuroscience. But, while that goal remains unfulfilled, I have since written a short essay, or collection of personal notes, about caregiving--more specifically, the ethics of caregiving--(and) more specifically than that, my ethics of caregiving. So I decided to change the title of this folder in order to broaden the scope of its contents, so I may feel now as if I have an appropriately-labeled slot in which to deposit the latest odd and end in my continuing collection of amateur pieces. I'd like to call them "practice" pieces, because every one is like a rehearsal for the scientific studies and psychological/philosophical (perhaps even personal) ramblings I hope to publish--or, at the very least, help to publish--in the years ahead. I still hope for that someday when my words will have some weight, or three dignified letters, behind them.

But, until then, I shall, as I am told, "Write on." I wish to thank those of you who are interested enough--or, who just care enough, perhaps (which is just as important in both caregiving and neuroscience)--for reading on.