DR . WHO Celia O ’ Brien , MD by KATHRYN VANCE
Dr . Celia O ’ Brien ’ s mother , local family medicine physician Dr . Susan Johns , often tells the story of her as a feisty young child putting naysayers in their place at an early age .
“ Someone was talking about how boys are doctors and girls are nurses and I corrected them and said ‘ No , girls are doctors , too !’”
Growing up in Louisville with a physician mother and engineer father , Dr . O ’ Brien and her two younger brothers saw the value of education but were never pushed into following their parent ’ s career footsteps . She found during her time at Assumption High School that she loved science , especially biology , but had varied interests . She considered a future in CSI forensics or broadcast journalism before ultimately deciding on medicine . While in high school , she spent a weekend with a friend up north in South Bend , Indiana to see a Fighting Irish football game .
“ I fell in love with it . It ruined every other college tour after that . I loved everything about it . I knew they had a strong premed program , but I also felt pretty confident that I ’ d be set up for anything I wanted to do after college ,” she said . “ They actually have an outstanding pre-med program , but I didn ’ t realize how strong it was until after I got to med school and talked with people who came from other schools who had a lot less support and had to do so much on their own .”
There , she majored in biology with minors in Science , Technology & Values and Catholic Social Tradition , which she said helped show her the “ people side ” in contrast to her other science-heavy courses . While at Notre Dame , she met Trevor , now her husband , during her sophomore and his junior year . They were both involved with the campus ministry program and met while leading freshman retreats .
Out of undergrad , she knew she wanted to do some kind of service and visited the campus service fair ( like a career fair ) looking for a summer gig before entering medical school . That ’ s where she found a middle school in New Bedford , Massachusetts .
“ It kind of fell into my lap . It ’ s like it was what I was supposed to do . I visited and interviewed and realized I liked it , and it was a great chance to have a different experience .”
That kind of “ meant to be ” feeling would continue throughout her years and training . She deferred medical school for a year and taught math and science at an all-boys middle school . The teaching experience was actually quite the learning experience of its own .
“ It was hugely helpful to enter medical school having some other kind of world and life experience outside of just school . It helped me have a really good perspective on things . I think teaching was a great experience for learning about communication , leadership skills , how to manage a room of people , picking up on non-verbal cues , things like that .”
After that year , she moved back to Louisville to attend the Uni-
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