What is Cheri doing now?! And why?
Welcome to my new site! As you may or may not have heard, in August 2019, Doug and I retired together after 30 years and 1 day at Mayo Clinic (although it was Skemp Clinic and St. Francis when we started!). It’s been a glorious 2.5 years since retirement: travel, relaxation, book reading, exercise, visiting and catching up with friends and family, cooking, volunteering. . .we’ve been busy having fun! And we have our first grandchild, in Madison, so we are enjoying seeing him grow up.
Well, as I neared retirement and reflected on 30 years of work, I realized that one of the great joys and gifts of my time as a faculty in the La Crosse-Mayo Family Medicine Residency was the chance to teach and learn from resident doctors. When I first started, I was about the same age as most of you, and by the time I left, I was old enough to be your mother, but working with you all was definitely the highlight of my career. By the time I left, I helped over 170 young people to become amazing physicians and that is a super cool feeling. If even one thing I taught you got implemented in your world and your practice, that is a huge impact and as one approaches the autumn of their life, this is a wonderful gift you all gave me! I still constantly find myself remembering patients we shared, stories of your highs and lows, babies I delivered with and for you, lessons and science you taught me, and tears and laughs we shared.
I decided, therefore, to spend time over the coming years looking you all up and trying to visit many of you as we do our travels across the country. Doug and I have a 24 foot travel trailer and are exploring the US gradually, we also are trying to visit our families and friends and reestablish relationships that haven’t been nurtured as well as they should. My son asked me during the fall of 2019 if we’d even been home for 3 days since we retired (and of course we have). Well, then, unfortunately for all of us, came the pandemic and everything, including this blogsite, ground to a halt. I’m just starting to get back into it a bit more now.
I want to get back to visiting you, seeing what you’re doing and meeting your family. I am excited to get back to my blog and share the stories of your lives with all other former residents, faculty and former faculty. I know some of your classes have stayed closer together and others are farther apart, but maybe some of you will love reading about the lives of people who have something in common. Of course, seeing me, and being in this blog are all voluntary and feel free to say “no” when I contact you. I also have no set agenda or time to get this all done in; I am trying to be more “spontaneous” in retirement. Creating a blog is a challenge for me, consider it Alzheimer’s prevention, so if you have suggestions for how to do this better, let me know.
In 2020, right before the pandemic hit, Doug and I went to visit a relative in Iowa City. I looked up 2 former residents who were in La Crosse from 1994-1997. I think we were all a bit nervous, but it ended up being SO fun and we had a great time learning about each other and reminiscing about the residency classes and the good and not so good times in residency. I heard back from both of them appreciating the memories jogged and the time catching up. . .and they are BOTH doing amazing things in their careers and family lives (see first entries).
Update on me:
I am still married (will be 39 years this year) to my Allergist/pediatrician husband Doug Nelson. We have 3 kids. Our oldest, Alison, is an Infectious Disease attending at BUMC in Boston, MA. She focuses on preventing hospital acquired infections and antibiotic stewardship as well as teaching fellows, residents, and medical students My second daughter, Nicole, is married and living in Madison, WI where she is an operations manager for a non-profit. She and her husband John have our first grandson, Teddy, born April of 2021. And my son, Ben, born 22 years ago in 2000, is working at Kwik Trip and living in St. Paul, MN, taking a gap year from college. One interesting fact that not everyone knows is that I suffered a cardiac arrest at work in 2008, over 14 years ago. I fortunately did not have an MI, they don’t really know WHY I had it, but I have a defibrillator now that allows me to travel and be relatively comfortable with being somewhat adventurous. I still don’t exercise as much as I should, but more than I did; I still love to read and travel and am getting back in to some hobbies like sewing that I haven’t done in years.
Hope you will enjoy this journey with me, I’m sure I’ll learn more and more about technology, your lives, and me as we walk this path together!