Lost & Found with Meghan Rothenberger, MD
The Nocturnists
Emily Silverman
4.8 • 614 Ratings
🗓️ 15 February 2024
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Nocturnists is back with Season 6 of its classic storytelling series, "Stories from the World of Medicine." We begin with Dr. Meghan Rothenberger, an infectious disease doctor in Minneapolis who had to lose her dog, her wallet, and her dinner, before she realized she'd also lost something more important: herself.
Meghan performed this story live at the Parkway Theater in Minneapolis in April 2023, for an event on the theme of "REBIRTH" which The Nocturnists co-produced with the Center for the Art of Medicine.
Find show notes, transcript, and more at thenocturnists.com.
This season of "Stories from the World of Medicine" is supported by The Physicians Foundation. The Nocturnists is made possible by the California Medical Association.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Support for the Nocturness comes from the California Medical Association. |
| 0:04.1 | The season of the Nocturness is sponsored by the Physicians Foundation. |
| 0:08.2 | At the Nocturnist, we are careful to ensure that all stories comply with health care privacy laws. |
| 0:13.2 | Details may have been changed to ensure patient confidentiality. |
| 0:16.6 | All views expressed are those of the person speaking and not their employer. |
| 0:29.6 | You're listening to The Nocturnists. |
| 0:31.6 | Stories from the World of Medicine. |
| 0:33.4 | I'm Emily Silverman. |
| 0:37.2 | Have you ever lost your keys? |
| 0:38.8 | A sweater? |
| 0:40.4 | A coffee mug maybe? |
| 0:44.2 | How about losing multiple items in one day? |
| 0:46.7 | In today's episode, |
| 0:50.5 | Infectious disease doctor Megan Rothenberger talks about the day, |
| 0:55.8 | a series of small losses gradually accumulated until she realized that what she had really lost was herself. In our conversation after the story, Megan and I talk about the |
| 1:02.8 | changes she made to find her way back to herself, which included rethinking her relationship |
| 1:07.5 | to her job and the definition of success. Megan is an infectious disease and HIV doctor at the VA in Minneapolis. She went to medical school at Johns Hopkins and did her internal medicine residency and infectious disease fellowship at the University of Minnesota. Take a listen to her story, lost and found. |
| 1:28.3 | It's 4 a.m. on a.m. on a. |
| 1:47.0 | very cold and dark January morning, and I'm sitting in my pajamas in front of my computer, |
| 1:52.0 | desperately trying to finish a research abstract by a 3 p.m. deadline. |
| 1:56.0 | I've been working on this abstract for weeks, but have embarrassingly little to show for the hours I've put in. And this morning is no different. I can't write. So I'm staring out the window at a streetlight on our corner. It's shining down on a nice blanket of freshly fallen snow. And the familiar thoughts start to come. How have I tricked so many smart people into thinking I know what I'm doing? I know nothing about research. I don't think I know anything about being a doctor either. I use up-to-date like every day and I'm in attending. Stop, Megan, focus. I shift in my seat, but I can't get comfortable because my butt hurts. And my butt hurts because I'm in the middle of a cycle of IVF and I had a bad reaction to one of the injectable medications |
| 2:35.0 | And it made my butt swell up and turn red like one of those embarrassing primates you see at the zoo |
... |
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