Dr. Helen Burney
Appearances
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
You both bring up such good points, especially about communication. On our last, my third child, when we were in, we were already both attending the Indiana University, the maternity policy was I could take up to 12 weeks and I chose to take 10. And if I could give any advice back to anyone, I would say take the full 12 weeks because you never get that time back.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And, you know, I couldn't do that when I was in residency or fellowship. I took Five weeks off after a C-section when I was in residency. I took six weeks when I was after a C-section in fellowship and had to have a third C-section, good figure, and I took 10 weeks. And if I could do anything different, I would have taken 12 weeks because I think that time is so important.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And Peter, to your point, my husband, our policy was that you could have paternity leave for one month. So Aaron thought, well, I'm going to split it up and I'm going to take one week when you first have the baby and then we'll wait a few weeks so that you get settled because we'll have family over. And then I'll take the other three weeks when they all leave.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And so he goes and takes the first week and then found out that it all had to be consecutive and together. And so he never got to take the three weeks. And that was just a communication, right? We didn't clarify when you looked at the four weeks that it all had to be taken together and all at once. So it's definitely, definitely important to talk about these things. And
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
clarify them beforehand so that you really can optimize and maximize your time together as a family. But speaking of family, you know, I think, you know, myself and Aaron, we don't have any family where we live here in Indiana. So all of our family are in different states. And so we really had to rely a lot on outside sources for childcare.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Right now, you know, childcare has really been like the bane of our existence for everything with navigating our careers and being where we are. And right now, our current situation is we have a nanny that comes in the morning because Erin and I go to work. And then we have a nanny that comes and gets the kids ready for school.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
She makes sure that our two oldest are on the bus to go to kindergarten, second grade. And then she takes the baby to preschool. And then she stays and helps with some house management organization stuff. And then in the evenings, we have two weeknights a week that we have two different babysitters. They're like the same one. One's on a Monday and one's on a Wednesday.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And they help us on those evenings. picking up our kids because those are usually the later days for my husband and I. And our kids have sports or games and practices that they have to go to after school. So like maybe I'll get off work and I'll pick up the oldest and I'll take him to his basketball practice. And then she'll pick up the younger two and get dinner ready for them. And
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
help us and then when we get home you know then we'll get the bedtime routine ready but it's no joke like trying to organize this chaos of who's getting the kids and where they're going can each of you kind of talk about what's your child care situation like and and who helps you guys with the kiddos
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Thank you so much for having us, Helen. I am so excited to have both of you because I know both of you outside of work as well, and y'all are two of my great friends. And so on today's episode of Backtable Urology, we're diving into a topic that resonates deeply with many of us in this field, which is navigating life as a dual physician couple.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And we're actually going to explore the unique challenges and rewards of being part of a dual physician couple. Because let's face it, medicine is demanding, it's rewarding, and oftentimes it's all-consuming.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
We also had really good luck finding some nannies on some like the Facebook groups in your area where you live. Like we live in Indiana. So there's like an Indiana or different suburbs like Carmel nanny group, things like that, where you can really find some very good nannies.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
But boy, is that point taken on when you find a good unicorn nanny, you take care of them and they really become family members. And that's really where most nannies will leave. As they leave, it's not even based on kids because they love your family. They love the kids. They just want to feel valued and they want to feel part of your family too.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And if you do that, you can get really lucky and you can find a really great nanny because we definitely have those too. And we're really fortunate because you're right. They're the ones showing up every day, taking care of your most prized possessions, your children, making sure that you can do the things that you do so that you can go to work and that everyone's taken care of and dressed and
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
lunch boxes are ready and their computers are in their bags for school and that everything's ready to go. So such a good point. Peter, what do you guys do for childcare?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And when both partners are physicians, the dynamics can be incredibly complex, from either long hours, from call schedules, career advancement, to even raising families or maintaining your personal time. The balance is really challenging, but it's not impossible.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
So we're going to go into the strategies, the struggles, and successes that come with balancing two demanding careers while building a life together. So whether you're currently in a dual physician relationship, like we all are, or you're thinking about entering one, or maybe you're just curious about how this beautiful chaos works, this conversation is for you. Let's get started, everyone.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
I'm so jealous because we tried the au pair route and our au pair wanted to leave a week into her arrival. She just got homesick and wanted to leave. And then we tried a second one and it just was not a good fit. So I'm so jealous because I have so many friends too that also have au pairs that are really wonderful fits.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And they can do like Katie's nanny, they can do the kind of the split shifts too. So they come to work in the morning and then in the afternoon, they're able to enjoy their day or do whatnot. And then come back in the evening. So that's like a really great arrangement. I know that managing kids is so hard, but outside of childcare, it's like, how do you manage the household chores?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Because when you have dual working parents, you know, who's doing the laundry, who's doing the cooking, who's going grocery shopping, who's paying the bills, who's planning vacations or making sure the kids have their costumes for their dress up day at school and all of the other house issues, right? Like getting the HVAC checked on, et cetera. How does that work in your house, Peter?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
That's so important. That's so important. We do the same as far as outsourcing. We have a cleaning lady and Our nanny actually does our laundry. We also order groceries because I could spend an hour plus in a grocery store. And I just I don't want to do that anymore. I'd rather come home and be able to hang out and eat dinner with my kids and kind of spend time like that.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
So this introduction is going to be a little different. Instead of all of the accolades and where we are, I'm going to talk about that I'm married to another urologist, and he's at Indiana University with me. And we've actually been married, it'll be 10 years this year, and we have three little boys. So we have an eight-year-old, a six-year-old, and a four-year-old.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
I think Aaron really enjoys vacation planning because he's very particular about where we go and what place we stay in. So he actually does all that fun stuff. And I hate that stuff because I'm so indecisive. I like can't decide which place I want to go to. So Katie, do you guys do anything else?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
That's so true. And I cannot recommend a scribe more or AI now. You can get them so cheap, so worth it.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Katie, tell me about your family.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Katie, we did the same thing. My husband and I just this year matched our Advent days too. And it's really nice because that also allows you to sometimes get that time for yourself or like a date night or date lunch or just that time to connect. That kind of brings me to another really important point when you're dealing with kids, you're dealing with work. How do you get time for yourself?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
How do you get time for your own hobbies, your own friends or exercise like you mentioned or having like a date night? And I think for us, like you mentioned, Katie, it was matching our admin days together. And then on one of those two nights, like we have Mondays and Wednesdays is when we have help at night. Sometimes that Wednesday night is like our date night.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And we'll go and sometimes we don't even go anywhere. We just order food to the house. We just go up in our rooms or downstairs in our basement, shut the door. And we just like decompress and talk and just communicate and just connect because it's
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
It's so important when you're at this stage of your life where we're all career, very busy, and you have little kids that you really want to spend a lot of time with and be with. So it's really hard managing that time.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Yeah, we have a code word, my husband and I, when we're both losing our mind with one of the kids. It's just you've had a really long day, you've been with them all night, and when you need to be tagged out. So we have a code word to get tagged out. So if I need him to relieve me or he's really losing it and needs some space. But we do the same thing. We try to balance weekends.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And we actually, even though we have now a little gym in our house, We still pay for a gym membership because the gym we go to provides three hours of child care. So we can like go to the gym, drop the kids off in this awesome kids place where they play rock climb, play in jungle gym.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And we can actually go work out and we can like sit and talk and like have coffee or like just get a lunch real quick. So it's like, again, it's so important about like what's more important, your time, your money, like how you're going to organize that.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
You guys have given so much amazing, helpful advice. I kind of have one question that I think is a really important one because I know that I've been really guilty of this before because my husband, while he's at Indiana University with me, he's a general urologist who's not academic per se.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And so, you know, I do a lot more academic tasks and that requires night meetings and going away for conferences and travel and things like that. But I think it's so important that, you know, Making sure that it's clear that one person's practice is not more important than the other person's. So making sure that each partner feels valued and they feel balanced. How do you guys go about doing that?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Oh, that's so cute. So clearly there's a lot going on in both of y'all's households and very, very busy. So I'm going to start with, let's go back to when it was just the two of you, either before or right after the marriage bliss.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
This is all so much helpful, amazing, useful information. I feel like we could all sit here and talk for hours about this topic and everything we do. And I think the main take home messages is that it ain't easy and there's not going to be this one size fits all. You know, you really need to be flexible.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
You need to find what do you love, what matters most to you and where does your time need to go and really build your life around that. You know, we got to
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
ask lots of questions and communicate with your partner communicate with your partner often touch base still make that time for each other and really build your own village outsource ask for help where you need it and don't give up because it does get easier and as you all mentioned there's seasons and you know there's always summer after winter so thanks so much for everybody listening and thanks so much katie and peter for being on the podcast today thank you thanks so much for having us this has been really fun
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Still make that time for each other. And really build your own village. Outsource. Ask for help where you need it. And don't give up because it does get easier. And as you all mentioned, there's seasons and there's always summer after winter. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Backtable podcast, your source for all things urology.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
Did any of you have discussions kind of about like financials or are you going to be on the same page about your lifestyle habits, where you're going to work, things like that?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
You can find all previous episodes of our podcast on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, and on backtable.com.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
No, you bring up a good point. You know, I think urology is such a small world. I, I met my husband at a urology residency interview dinner. So we were, we were actually in Chicago as well. And, uh, we both met and just hit it off and like the rest was history. And we ended up doing six years long distance while we were in residency together. We both were in six year programs.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
He was at Cornell and I was at the We got married my fourth year of residency, and we had our first kid our chief year while we were still apart. So when we were actually thinking about jobs and next steps, we were already married and a family, and we weren't even living together yet. So we were trying to think, where are we going to go? What kind of a job do we want?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
And as we started interviewing different places, you're looking at contracts, and you're thinking of things that are really important to you and as a couple. Were there specific things that you guys thought about as a couple when y'all were selecting jobs?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
like specifically things that maybe other dual physician couples should think about as special considerations when you're doing contract negotiation or other things like that? Or was it really just kind of finding that right fit for you guys?
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
The main take home messages is that it ain't easy and there's not going to be this one size fits all. You really need to be flexible. You need to find what do you love, what matters most to you and where does your time need to go and really build your life around that. You know, we got to ask lots of questions and communicate with your partner. Communicate with your partner often. Touch base.
BackTable Urology
Ep. 213 Dual Physician Households: Managing Parenthood and Careers with Dr. Katie Amin and Dr. Petar Bajic
I'm your host, Dr. Helen Burney from Indiana University. Welcome to this Backtable SWOO episode, where I'm very excited to introduce our guests today, two rising stars in our field, Dr. Katie Amin from the Desai Sethi Urological Institute at the University of Miami, and Dr. Peter Byich from the Cleveland Clinic Department of Urology. How's it going, guys? I'm good. I'm good.