Whirlwind

Well, it seems that once again I have neglected the 'ol blog! Life is just so crazy and its hard to believe that the last entry was back in July while I was still in San Antonio! Well, to recap, we moved into our new house about a week after I returned home from the Army's Officer Basic Course. It has been so nice to be home with Meghan, Braylei and Tayscen! The day before moving, Braylei had tubes put in her ears to help reduce the quantity of ear infections she has, and I was impressed about how tough she was about it! She was real groggy after coming out of the light anesthesia, but after I got her some apple juice and cheez-its, she was in good spirits!

The actual moving process was a lot smoother than I expected. We had a loading crew out at Meghan's parents house and a bunch of med school buds made up the unloading crew at the new house. We have since unpacked, and made the new house a home. Braylei loves it! Since Tayscen needs the crib, we got Braylei a "big kid bed" that will last her a long time! Since being here, she has slept really well at night, too! Tayscen is doing really well, too! He's such a happy, laid back little kid with a big coolness factor goin' on! When we first moved in, he was still getting up a couple times a night to eat, but is now sleeping 10-12 hours straight typically! He has grown a ton, too! He loves being on his tummy, too! He would probably play (and sleep) all day on his stomach if we would let him! As a result, his back muscles are really developed and he is trying to roll over and scoot now!

A few weeks ago we were able to bless Tayscen at church. It was an amazing experience! While we were standing in the circle, he was smiling, cooing, and looking at me with his big, blue eyes! We also had a bunch of family out for the event, and that was really nice to have everyone out here on this side of the valley rather than us traveling all the way out east. Since everyone did come all the way out for Tayscen's blessing, we decided to have Braylei's birthday out at Meghan's sister Kim's house. It was pretty low key, Braylei wanted to have a "Cars" party, and picked out sunglasses for party favors! Braylei loved it because she got to go swimming with everyone! She loved going down the waterslide! She has gotten so grown up, too! Her speech and comprehension is scary sometimes! She just picks up words and really understands them, too! She uses multi-word sentences all the time and has no problem vocalizing any concern she has. Last week when I was giving her a bath, she was tossing around her floaty turtle and said, "Daddy, I want to catch it to you!" Then she tossed it to me so that I could catch it! It was so stinkin' cute! She also is very skilled with the crayon! She holds crayons and markers properly already and is displaying pretty good control and loves to use tons of colors.

Meghan is doing great. After delivering Tayscen, she was up and about right away! She is simply amazing! She takes care of the house, the kids, me, and makes excellent dinners while still finding time to work out! I am so, so very lucky to have her in my life! She spends all day with the kids, playing with them on the floor, interacting, and when the other is down for a nap, spends one on one time with them, helping with developmental skills. She does exercises with Tayscen everyday to help him as he gets ready to roll over. Braylei is so advanced because of the amount of time Meghan spends with her everyday.

Meanwhile, my second year of medical school at Midwestern University-Arizona College of Osteopathic Medicine is well under way! It's hard to believe that we are almost halfway through with the fall quarter already! This year is absolutely nuts! The classes are way more rigorous, expectations are higher, there are way more small assignments, and much less time. We have the triple threat of Pathology, Pharmacology and Microbiology this year, and if that's not enough, we have tons of clinically oriented classes and the best of all, our Osteopathic Medicine class. I am still trying to get find a solid rhythm for studying and spending time with family. I am getting up at 3:30am everyday, going to school, working out, studying before and after classes, and I try to be home by 6pm every night to have dinner with the fam, and getting the kids ready for bed. I am trying to go to bed between 9 and 9:30pm, which is needless to say, much earlier than my classmates. But it has been a good schedule for me, as I at least get a couple hours of family time in a night and then in the morning, everyone is sleeping, so it's not cutting out of their time. Oh, and me being me and wanting to get involved, I'm the President of the Sports Medicine club, Vice-President of AMOPS (Association of Military Osteopathic Physicians & Surgeons), Vice-President of the Latter-Day Saint Student Association (LDSSA), and also the class liaison for the UAAO (Undergraduate American Association of Osteopathy.) We do a lot of lunchtime speakers and evening workshops to facilitate of medical school learning, so it's pretty beneficial on the whole. Plus, it helps me to get to know the 1st year students and students from the other programs. Hopefully I'll get fully into it soon! We have a huge Pharmacology test tomorrow morning, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll do well!











P.S: Here's some funny video clips!

Update: OBC pictures

I have added some of the pictures from my Army Basic Officer's Course. Please disregard the lack of picture quality. I opted to take a disposable camera rather than our $500 camera. One of the guys in my squad broke his $400 camera while low crawling out in the field. I'll try to get better copies of some pictures from others who had better cameras!

Update

I have now added pics from the 4th of July with Russ Wilde! They are under "Another Wilde Week!" Enjoy!

Almost Done!!!!

Oh, Boy! It feels so incredible to be done with all of our field training for the Army Officer Basic Leadership Course! It felt just as good to take a shower when we returned to post Friday evening! Although baby wipes and liberal amounts of medicated Gold Bond (the menthol is a real treat!) do wonders, nothing can beat a real shower! What a week it was, though! This whole week focused on AMEDD operations, or medical related simulations. We were given a full OPORD (operations order), which describes in detail the simulated situation and mission. It was pretty funny that we were sent in to protect the newly liberated Southern Republic of Texas (SRT) from the communist People's Republic of Austin (PRA). We also had to be aware of SRT insurgents who called themselves the Texas Unification Front (TUF). We were charged with the challenge to provide medical support to the US troops sent to protect the SRT from the PLA and TUF. On one day, my group was in charge of setting up a battalion aid station, which is a level 1 station. This is typically acts as a casualty collection point for injured soldiers. Casualties are brought in and are triaged, treated, and, with minor bumps and bruises, are usually returned to battle, or in more serious cases, are taken to a level 2 hospital. I was in charge of triage, where I had to evaluate and rank the severity of the casualties coming in, which determined who was treated first. Another day included setting up an AXP (Ambulance Exchange Point). This is an intermediary point between level 1 and level 2 stations in order to cut down traveling distances for the vehicles. An ambulance from the battalion aid station would bring the casualties to the AXP where they would be taken off, quickly triaged and then placed on the ambulance belonging to the level 2 hospital where it would return. The key with the AXP and level 1 is that these are unestablished areas that need to be secured and cleared before they could be set up. The last task dealt with setting up a level 2 hospital, which is set up within the FOB (forward operating base). This was split into two parts. The first was concerned with running a level 2 hospital, which received and treated casualties from both the level 1 via the AXP, as well as the FOB, which was concurrently under attack. I was part of the quick response force (QRT) aid and litter team. the 4 of us were the first responders to immediate casualties on the FOB. It was pretty intense to go into hot areas to retrieve the injured soldiers and take them to treatment. It was hard work, too! I got pretty tired after carrying a few 200 lb soldiers a few hundred yards! The second part focused on FOB operations. My duty was as the lead radio transmission officer, where I relayed all incoming radio messages from all posts on the FOB to the company commander. It's really hard to try to relay a message as three more are coming in! The whole day was crazy as we were dealing with insurgent fire, mortar attacks, angry civilians, and injured soldiers, but it was a great learning experience!

Overall, I thought this week was very beneficial. We had some breakdown in leadership that caused a lot of moaning and groaning, as they decided to enforce rules that were never mentioned before. And then on the last night, they went crazy on us as we were cleaning our M-16 rifles! They were given to us in pretty poor condition, but they acted like they were brand new and expected us to return them as such! We cleaned them for hours on end and were up past 1am! Then we had to get up at 4:30am to do a 3 mile road march. Little did we know that we would end up doing over 5 miles due to the cadre's miscalculation. It was a good march, though. I was given the charge of keeping everyone in the back of our platoon together. This was very rewarding indeed, as I was able to motivate my platoon, keeping morale up. This was especially important toward the end, as we began to realize that our march was going to cover much more than 3 miles. Some of the platoon was pretty frustrated, and the lack of sleep did not alleviate the matter in the least! But in the end, we stayed together and it we made it through our last week of field training!

This weekend was pretty relaxing for me. I had pretty good food, especially as opposed to MREs! The best part about it was that I had an opportunity to attend a session at the San Antonio Temple for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The little Ft. Sam Houston branch made a little temple trip. It was so wonderful to escape the world, escape the vulgarities of the Army for a few hours and find true peace in the temple. It was revitalizing and refreshing. On Sunday, the investigator family returned to church, this time bringing 2 more members of the family in tow! They are wonderful people and it is a shame that I will never know what paths their lives will take, but I hope that they were able to feel the sincerity of my heart as I testified to them of how I found my place in this world.

This week should prove to be relatively uneventful. We have a lot of lectures, but not much else until our final exam and graduation on Friday! I can't wait to get back to my beautiful family in Arizona! I began to cry as I talked to Braylei on the phone Saturday night, as she kept asking me to color with her. She wanted to see me through the webcam, which is unfortunately blocked from streaming while I am on post. She says, "Daddy! Cue-per!" Meghan said that she also has taken up the pastime of tickling! She will run up to people and just start tickling, saying "Tickle, tickle, tickle!" Tayscen is still eating well, and beginning to go longer than 2 hours between feeding at night, allowing Meghan to get a little more sleep! I miss them all so much! I can't wait until 9:21 Saturday morning when my plane arrives and I am reunited with them once more!

Another Wilde Week!

Only 2 weeks of officer training left to go! I am so excited to go back home to Meghan, Braylei and Tayscen! I miss them so much! Braylei is going through a growth spurt and is getting more and more clever by the day! She loves to carry a little step stool all over the place and is now using it to turn lights on and off as well as open doors. Her new movie phase is the CG animated Madagascar, asking for "Video! Lions!" Meanwhile, Tayscen is up to 9 pounds, is eager to hold his head up on his own, and definitely enjoys eating! Meghan is doing excellent, and her incision from the c-section has healed and looks darn near close to her pre-pregnancy self, save her uterus is still a little enlarged. She has adjusted to taking care of two kids amazingly well. I don't know how she does it! She is incredible! I can't wait to see them again.

Meghan has also been working hard, with the help of her family, in painting our new house so it will be ready to move into when I return! Everything looks so great! They painted the living room, loft, and the kids' bedrooms! The living room is a khaki color called prince I believe, while the loft, which will be the kids' play area primarily, is kind of a khaki green. Braylei has a sherbet green half wall with yellow and pink stripes, and Tayscen's room features a rich chocolate brown. We haven't decided what we will do with our room. We also ordered chocolate brown leather living room furniture and bookcases for our room and the loft. We are looking at TVs but haven't decided on that quite yet either. I am so excited for our house! I get to install ceiling fans and a garage door opener when I get back! Yea!

Meanwhile, this past week was pretty exciting. We spent Monday and Tuesday out in the field, working on FOB (forward operating base) operations, and convoy operations. A convoy is a group of vehicles with the mission to get from one point to another. In the field, or in theater (an area of war) anything coming into or going out of the FOB is conducted by convoy. It isn't safe or prudent to have single vehicles coming to and fro. Plus in today's warzone, Iraqi insurgents using roadside bombs disguised as everyday items. So there are many battle drills that we must know so that if something were to happen. I was selected to be one of the Truck Commanders (TC), which was a crazy, but cool experience. I did, however, inadvertently cause the death of two Iraqi citizens at a wedding party due to a gun firing wedding ritual that was unknown to me. I mistook it as enemy contact, and by the time I saw otherwise and gave the command for my truck not to fire, the truck behind me saw my signal and opened fire before I could stop them. That's exactly why we practice these drills before we're actually in that situation for real. During the convoy, the rain started coming down very hard on us again, which in many respects made it seem really cool because we were dismounted at the down and we were simulating a medical evacuation. It was pretty intense. On the Wednesday, the 4th, we were back in San Antonio and we had the day off. I was able to get in contact with my old college roommate, Russ Wilde, who recently took a job as a news reporter for a station in nearby Austin. He and his wife met me in town and we were able to have lunch and see the new Transformers movie,which is brilliant, by the way! We then hit up downtown San Antonio where we saw the Tower of the Americas, the River Walk, and the Alamo. It was really good to see them. The rest of the week was just classroom work, which was pretty dull. Nothing major went down this weekend. I did have a really awesome missionary experience at church today with a wonderful young medic, her 4 year old son, along with her mother and grandmother. I was able to share my conversion story with them, and help answer some of the more obscure questions that I remember asking when I was in their shoes! It is always important to me to express how thankful I am for my upbringing and hold in esteem the catholic church and all others that I investigated years ago. There is light and truth in everything, and we must all see it. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I believe that the fullness of the gospel's light and truth has been restored to this earth. But never let go of all the good within you and around you. I would just invite anyone to look and see if we can help them find a supplement to the wondrous light they already have in their lives, not to reconstruct it, but rather enrich it. People will say what they will about my religion, but the only thing that matters is what our hearts tell us. I intend to follow my heart through the promptings of the Holy Ghost, who so beautiful guides me through this life!

Welcome Tayscen Daniel Schroeder!

At 0933 Wednesday, June 20th, we welcomed Tayscen Daniel Schroeder into the world! He was 8 lbs, 2 oz and was 20 1/2" long. Meghan delivered Tayscen via a scheduled c-section. Due to the vast complications with Braylei's delivery, this was deemed a high-risk pregnancy. However, we were very blessed that there were no complications this time around! Meghan was never on bedrest this entire pregnancy (unlike last time), and she even drove out to our new house to sign the closing papers and everything the day before the delivery! Tayscen was born full term, had no respiratory difficulties, and no jaundice. Meghan healed very fast, much unlike last time, when she lost so much blood and was very weak for weeks. Meghan was up and moving around the same day, and the next day she was moving around with ease! Again, it was a true blessing to us, especially since I have been away with my military training.

Another surprising, yet truly wonderful blessing was that I was granted permission to fly home for the delivery. I left at 0600 Texas time, arrived at 0621 Phoenix time, and immediately headed to the hospital where Tayscen was born at 0933! It was very exciting indeed! I was able to be with them the whole day and through the first night. I had to leave again early the following afternoon so that I could return to my training, and although the time with them was short, it was so worth it! It made the biggest difference in the world and I will always be thankful to the company commander and the cadre (staff) for the opportunity to be present at my son's birth!

As of yesterday, Tayscen was now up to 8 lbs, 12 oz and is doing exquisitely! Braylei, meanwhile is adjusting very well to being a big sister. She loves to help hold him and get the diapers and wipes when he needs to be changed. We had been reading her a book titled "I'm a big sister now!" for the past month or so to help her get excited for her new little brother. Hopefully she will stay that enthusiastic about it!

Officer Basic Leadership Course

I am now in San Antonio, Texas (Boo, I know!) for my Army Officer Basic Leadership Course (OBLC) at Fort Sam Houston. I arrived on the 10th of June and I will get back on the 21st of July. As of today, I have three weeks left! I have learned a great deal thus far. It's crazy being thrown into the Army life of an officer, having all the enlisted soldiers saluting you all the time, and trying to recognize all the customs and courtesies in the military. The first couple weeks consisted of a great deal of in-processing and paperwork, and with 300 medical, dental, vet and PA officers, that translates into a lot of sitting around. We haven't done near as much Physical Training (PT) as I thought, but I have been running daily with Ken, a former Army Ranger who is also going to be a 2nd year at AZCOM. That has been good for me. As far as our PT test, I did better than most with the 2 mile, 2 minute push-up and 2 minute sit-up tests, especially considering the amount of time (or lack thereof) I had from the end of school to my report date. I wanted to spend as much time as I could with Meghan and Braylei before I left so my workout time was reduced to before either woke up each morning!

We do a lot of classroom didactic study, as that has taken up most of our time thus far. However, we just spent a week and a half out in the field. There is a large military reservation on the other side of San Antonio that simulates what is like to be in a FOB (forward operating base). We had no showers (yuck!) or plumbing (go port-a-potties!), but there was water so we could shave, brush our teeth and wash our faces. We also had air conditioned tents, so that was nice. There were probably 30 of us per tent, so it was pretty large. The cots weren't horribly uncomfortable, and we were very blessed with cloudy/rainy weather the whole time so it wasn't too hot. While there, we did a lot of training, much of which was very new to me. We shot with a M-16 rifle, an M-9 handgun, conducted day and night land navigation, mounted (vehicle) land navigation, and urban tactical training (clearing houses and buildings). I did really well, getting perfect marks in all my land navigation training, and qualifying as a marksman with both the M-9 and M-16! I told Meghan that I'm becoming a real man out here! We had to return to Ft. Sam a day early due to heavy rainfall and flooding, but we are going back for two more days Monday, then we will have another full week after that which will all be medical related. We will be in charge of setting up a combat support hospital, transferring combat casualties (injured soldiers) to level 1 (battalion aid station) to higher levels. It has been a very good experience for me, but I will be happy to return back home! I will add pictures once I get back and develop the pics from my disposable camera.

Our First House!

We are very excited about our new home! We had been searching for quite some time for a home closer to my school in Glendale. It was becoming just too much to be driving 2 hours round trip every day. I was still doing fine in my studies, but it was taking away from family time too much. We weren't sure if we wanted to rent or buy, but we felt that it would be a good investment to buy. But it sure wasn't an easy process! For one, the market by my school is an expensive one. The houses we looked at were not in very good condition, or were very small. It's amazing how different a house can look in person from the pictures posted on the MLS! We were just about to give up when we stopped by a brand new housing development. We were told that we wouldn't be able to get in until November, but then we found out they had a spec home that would be done at the end of June. It was perfect. A brand new home that was bigger and cheaper than the others we had seen. Plus we were able to pick the upgrades, the carpet, tile, and everything else. The mortgage process was not fun as the in-house group did a very poor job. Needless to say we will be refinancing in a few months. However, that being said, it is now ours, and we will be moving in as soon as I get home from my military training! Braylei is excited as every time she goes out there she runs around and goes in her room, saying "my room!" It's super cute! Plus my commute time is greatly diminished, as it is less than 15 minutes from my school! So I can get to school earlier to work out and study, and I can get home earlier to spend with my family!

What the Scrud!?

Whoa! It's been forever and a day since I posted! Life has been unreal! So much has happened! So to start off, I'll cover Spring Quarter. This was by far my best quarter of the year! I did much better than the previous two, and I seemed to have more time for things. My study habits were a lot more focused, and I felt like I was spending more time with Meghan and Braylei! I was also diligent in keeping the Sabbath day holy and not studying on Sunday. This is a really hard thing to do sometimes, especially since we always had Monday morning tests. Plus, this quarter was tougher because we had more classes, and thus more tests. So we often had Monday/Friday/Monday test schedules, so I didn't get to really hit the studying for the Monday exam until after the test on Friday! It was really crazy! But everything worked out well in the end!

I also had a great experience with my preceptorship, Dr. Carfagno. He is a physician who is dual certified in Sports Medicine and Internal Medicine. I was able to see many different cases, conduct history and examinations on patients, and even sports physicals! I learned a great deal, and also gained many volunteer opportunities, like the Valley of the Sun half Marathon, and the Ironman competition in Tempe! I look forward to continuing learning under Dr. Carfagno's guidance.

Another really cool service opportunity came with the TOPS program, which stands for team of physicians and students. We conducted 1000s of sports physicals for an entire high school district in Phoenix. I myself performed over 20, which helped me greatly work on my techniques. It was a really cool experience!

I will definitely enjoy my time off from school, as we don't start up again until the end of August! But it has been a busy Summer, with moving, having officer basic training in Texas, the birth of our son, and so much more! But I will get to all of those soon!