April Client Spotlight: Leslie Rhodes {Frontline Hero}
Our apologies for letting the blog fall so far behind. With every changing circumstances of Covid-19 over the last 6 weeks, we had to put some things at Nourish on the back burner and unfortunately the blog was top of the list.
However, we are coming back with an amazing client spotlight featuring one of our frontline heroes in Birmingham's fight against Coronavirus, Leslie Rhodes. She's a pediatric cardiologist at Children's of Alabama (family of UAB hospitals). She is a long-time Nourish client and we are thrilled to have her share her story tonight.
1) Tell us about your work (quick elevator pitch) and how or why you got started in the medical field?
I don't really remember making the decision to go into medicine. Since I can remember I always wanted to be a doctor-a pediatrician specifically. In the summers I would work in the hospital at the ER or in my dad's office (he was a doctor) and when I was in college at Sewanee I volunteered on the EMT service. I am lucky, because I love what I do. The people that I work with are amazing and you can't help but care for the patients that I take care of.
2) With the even-changing nature of Covid, what is a day or week like in the life of Leslie Rhodes?Similar to the ever changing nature of Covid HAHA! My schedule is kind of crazy/all over the place. I work the in pediatric cardiac intensive care unit. I have 6 partners and we rotate service weeks and calls with two people covering the unit during the day and one person covering it at night. Therefore, my schedule changes on a daily basis. Some weeks I only take overnight calls and those days I spend at home with my 6 year old daughter attempting/failing home schooling and trying to be productive on zoom meetings etc. I go from discussing a patient's clinical status to putting the phone on mute and trying to explain why the monster on prodigy wasn't defeated because when the question states "less than before" you have to subtract not add. This has been a very humbling experience to say the least and I definitely did not miss my calling as a teacher lol. Other weeks I am on service and Im in the unit. Those days range from 9-10 hour days to 30 hour days when I have to stay overnight and into the next day. These are the weeks that I am especially grateful for nourish! I bring it for lunch at work. Then I come home, grab a meal out of the refrigerator and its ready to eat in 2 minutes for dinner. My daughter loves the meals too, so we will usually split one or two and occasionally supplement it with a salad etc. I love to cook, but on my service weeks I just dont have the time. I already feel pulled in many directions and time with my daughter is limited. its so wonderful to have a home cooked meal and not have to sacrifice time with my daughter.3) What are the things that you invest in yourself to better your week?Yoga, tennis (before covid), walking the dogs. Grocery delivery is my sanity! On weekends I love to go hiking at Oak Mountain or red mountain. My daughter has boundless energy, so she loves those hikes too.