We hopped in the boat and headed to the West End of the island full steam ahead. Despite a sharp, searing headache that kept me bedridden the days prior, I was craving the last smell salt air. Just one more before being sentenced to a landlocked life. I needed one final fishing trip to Dauphin Island to say goodbye. In the blink of an eye, the weekend before my wedding arrived. The looming stress of internship kept me in denial and it was the last thing I needed to keep me from fishing. In the back of my mind, I knew what the cause might be, but I had no time or left over money to worry about visiting the doctor. I even walked up the stage to receive my diploma with a limp from a painful, golf-ball sized mass on my right hip, chalking it up as a torn muscle from a recent long run. Sure, it was odd that I could hardly get out of bed without nausea for a whole week, but it went away eventually. I took little notice of the week of night sweats, chills, and fevers that soon followed. Between the excitement of finally being titled a real “doctor” to tying the knot, everything seemed perfect. In that span, I have hardly been happier in my life. For three full days, I trudged through brush and weeds in pursuit of trout.Īfter a great week in Steel City, I returned home to fish out the last few months of my time in Mobile. No bug spray, no full body inspections, no problem. In that moment in time, I hardly gave the sign any further thought. After constant MRSA, TB, and diarrheal precautions, I was numb to the thought of surrounding illness and disease. Below the painted welcome in the parking lot a plank read: “CHECK FOR TICKS.” Medical experience is partially to blame for my reaction. It even made me pause and stare for a moment because it was out of the ordinary for a southern-bred fisherman. Looking back, I remember the sign on the stream. It had helped me persevere through the roughest exams and rotations, and I could hopefully lean on it again. I had found my reliable escape from the hustle and bustle of medicine. Somehow, the experience made moving even easier. A few Google searches led me to the streams surrounding Pittsburgh, and soon I was able to send pictures back home of the colorful trout roaming the hills. Since we had been apart during my schooling and her job in Pennsylvania, the excitement was building for my big move.Īs any obsessed fisherman would do in this situation, I found time to try to fill the empty space soon to be left behind on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. During the week we planned to move into a new apartment and settle in before graduation, the start of residency, and the upcoming wedding.
Last April, in the four month break between medical school and residency, I flew up from my home state of Alabama to meet my then-fiance in Pittsburgh. This all changed before I even entered into a Pennsylvania hospital as a fully-fledged resident. There were no bumps, no curves, and it certainly was void of any road blocks. That might be the most boring paragraph on this page. Before I knew it, I had matched into a competitive residency program at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh and married the girl of my dreams. I graduated high school on a full scholarship to Louisiana State University, and in four years I entered into medical school as the top ranked student in the College of Science. Up until a year ago, you probably couldn’t have drawn a straighter line than my path to pediatric residency in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Here is how and why The Bonnie Fly came to be, what has inspired me to create, and why I will never look back. What I do know for certain, is that I have never regretted my decision to leave medicine in pursuit of a different passion. On the surface, switching from a physician to an illustrator seems backwards and unimaginable. I’m not sure anyone could have guessed the 180 degree turn my life has taken over the past year. It’s been almost a year since I last stepped foot into a patient room.
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