Norm is Alive

It has occurred to me that the title of this blog is "Norms life...." but you rarely see a picture of Norm or have me talk about him. That's because Norm spends 12+ hours a day away from the fam studying in a little cubicle at the local library. Sounds fun huh?

Well today Norm started his first day of 5th semester here with Ross U. For 5th semester you can either be located to Michigan, Miami, or stay on the island. We are obviously now here and Michigan and learning to love it. 5th semester is a little shorter than the average Ross semester only lasting 11 weeks unlike the 16 normal weeks of a semester. It is here that he will "start" clinical rotations. He'll have 3 days of class still (lecture) and a day or two a week going to hospitals in the area. 

While doing all of this Norm has been preparing to take the COMP exam for Ross. He will take this test next Thursday. Basically everything they learned on the island for the last 16months crammed into one test. Although you do get 3 chances to take and pass this test, if you fail the first time it sets back the date that you can sign up to take the USMLE Step 1.

The USMLE Step 1 is like Ross' version of the COMP on steroids from what we've heard. The Step 1 is a huge deal for medical students and will decided where we can get rotations for the next 2 years and eventually our options for residency positions. So it's kind of a big deal. After the 11 weeks of 5th semester Norm will have approximately 8 weeks to study for the Step before baby #2 comes around October-ish. In a perfect world, all will go well with the pregnancy and he can take the test before the baby and have a few weeks off while we wait for the scores for us to adjust to being a family of three to a family of four.

Here's the hubs on the first day of school. He was of course overly thrilled that I wanted to take his picture at 7:30 in the morning, so his smile is clearly forced.

And for those of you requesting a belly shot, here it is. According to my Dominica doctor I am 19 weeks today. But I finally made an appointment to see a doctor here tomorrow so who knows, all could change at 1:00pm. Also, I am forced to take a classic "facebook" shot of a picture in the mirror because my husband is never home and I would prefer for my son to not take the shot from the ground up showing as if I have 3 chins.

What I think to be 19 weeks. And yes I am wearing a jacket. That because we now live in Michigan and we're in the month of May and the high today was 48.