Editor’s Note: Despite not receiving the training she was promised, this woman adjusted and created a successful and satisfying career for herself.
“There has not been a woman in this practice facility for 100 years during football season and there won’t be one now!” By report, those were the words uttered by the coach of a high-profile collegiate football team where I had been accepted as the first female sports medicine fellow. My attending was the head team physician, and I was to help him care for the team. Sadly, he capitulated to the coach.
I was stunned and extremely disappointed as a restriction of this sort was not discussed during my fellowship interview. I was pleased to have been treated like everyone else during the application and selection process. My attending and I seemed to accept each other without any apparent problems. Nothing would have foreshadowed this.
The reality was that I was not allowed to see any of the football players outside of his office. This excluded my presence in the training room, the locker room, and the football sidelines. This literally meant I had almost no involvement with the team. How was I supposed to learn how to care for my own future football teams?
My husband moved with me to the site of my fellowship after graduating from one of the top law schools in the country. He met on my behalf with the Dean of the Law School in our new city and progressed on to the President of the University. I was a sports medicine fellow who was being excluded from the education I had been selected for. Even the residents, who were all male, were allowed in the places where I was banned.
A decision was eventually made that I must be included. Being near the end of the season, I got to stand on the sideline during one football game and made three visits to the training room. I was not invited to the playoff games which were an expected part of the team’s season. During this time-frame my husband and I also adopted our first child.
I made it through the rest of the fellowship year and went on to take a job in a private practice located in another state. There I was really a general orthopaedist as there was not enough business to support specialization. My male partners and I got along well. We adopted two more children during this time.
Since sports was no longer compatible with my lifestyle of caring for three small children, I decided to do another abbreviated fellowship in foot and ankle surgery with a high-profile surgeon. Afterwards, he offered me a job, so I stayed on and assisted with the care of the metropolitan ballet. After the practice broke up, I moved to a local large orthopaedics group where I remained for many years. I eventually joined an employed hospital practice in the same city which had become our home.
Toward the end of my career, I stopped operating and started an osteoporosis clinic at the hospital. This work was also very gratifying.
When I was ready to say good-bye to orthopaedics and my husband had retired, we moved to a lake home we had purchased several years before. It was our “happy place,” and we finally got to live there!
What did I learn from my fellowship experience? To speak up, to fight for my rights, and to not take “no” for an answer.
Also, that fellowship programs are obligated to provide the training promised. Thankfully, I had “in-house legal counsel” who helped me convince the fellowship program of their responsibilities. If my husband had not been an attorney, I would have hired my own.
Would I do my career over in the same way? Yes, I loved sports medicine after having been a physical education teacher and a coach myself. The bit of sports practice I got to do was pleasing. And I enjoyed the foot and ankle work as well. It allowed me to participate with my husband in the raising of our children.
Being adaptable to the situations at hand led to an unanticipated and gratifying career. I was able to capture joy from my work and from my life.
Looking back, despite a rocky start, I got to do just what I wanted to do, and I loved it all.
