Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic FDK: Breaking Up is Hard to Do (20/30ish)

Interesting... so what Clark and Rachel weren't going to try Chad and Lois will now do... I wonder how Rachel will feel about that (if she shows up) And I wonder how this will affect Lois and Chad... besides the warning Clark gave them...

This chapter feels like it's moving the plot along. I'm interested. The question with any fic is, Do I want to know what happens next?

And the answer to this fic is, yes, I do.

Please post more soon!

Not a swift clean break. Oh this will be painful.

Sadly with the belief that a change of geography will solve his work problems, that living in a small town will be less painful because he will be able to spend more time with patients, Chad is taking a very common maladaptive response to the problems in healthcare today.

Ken has a point over two hours!. Still this is what one expects of residents. Chad has not yet figured out that he needs to organize resources to help these parents not do it all himself.

Did he bother to calmly discuss with Ken those feelings? Did he say to him exactly what he is telling Lois?

From his prior behavior towards Lois when she tried to talk to him about Clark's secret I think it is unlikely.

If Chad did talk with Ken odds are he would NOT react like Doctors on TV by ranting at Chad. Since this is a very very common problem he'd likely give Chad a spiel about learning to prioritize his time better and to lean on his team.

A large city Hospital Oncology department will have a full "professional team" that "works closely with physicians to provide patient teaching, emotional support, symptom management, and coordination of care." Such a team will include nurses, aides, social workers, dietitians, chaplains, and others.

I can go on and on but we are seeing the cracks in the oh so perfect Chad.

And yeah I know I should have said that last part but reading this part with the ever so supportive Mr. Kent made me go back and review the end of the last part.

So how many of us think Mr. Kent broke up with rachel due to the long distance thing?

How many of us think it is because he let Lois push Rachel aside?

Yeah, and now Mr. Kent has found a way to put his arms around Lois for a great deal of time on a regular basis.

I really don't think Clark is that devious. He's just doing his best to help out his friends. He's maybe a little naive, and he does seem concerned for their relationship.

But Lois and Chad are not Clark and Rachel -- I mean, their situations are different. Lois and Chad are married, they have a much stronger, more binding commitment than Clark and Rachel did.

As for Chad, I agree that the girl with cancer story was not very realistic, but it was just an illustration of the types of things that bother him in a "treat 'em and street 'em" operation. I don't think Chad is a bad guy at all.

And I actually know people -- well, my brother and sister-in-law -- who burned out on that kind of medicine, and joined the Indian Health Service. Now they live on a Reservation in Oregon, and practice real live family medicine, anything and everything. They've never been happier. And it's not just a honeymoon high; they've been IHS for something like 9 or 10 years by now.

Anyway, I think this is an interesting set of conflicting priorities you've set up here, and I look forward to seeing how they get resolved.

Just BTW, I don't know what happened to my registration but I'm not a first time poster. I have posted a number of times as CarolynK, but can no longer access that registration. Anyway, same person.

Carolyn

This is the first time I've not entirely liked Chad. I thought he was being a bit selfish. He can work as a doctor almost everywhere, but Lois can only be a star reporter for the Daily Planet in Metropolis, and yet Chad has his heart set on leaving Metropolis. Oh, I could understand him too. Lois was right about this:

Yes, Chad has been in Metropolis for years for Lois's sake. He really has done that for Lois. Now, though, he wants something more for himself. So therefore...



I was a little irritated at Clark for helping Chad to find work and lodgings in Smallville. Does he want to break up Chad and Lois?

I think Clark was very right about this:

When I was a kid, we lived next to a family where the husband and wife did the long distance relationship thing. He was a sea captain, and he was away for months at a time. (This was in the 1960s.) Then he would come back for brief, intense periods of togetherness with his wife. They seemed happy enough, until the husband lost his job or needed to change jobs or something. Suddenly he was back home all the time, and the two of them were constantly around each other. They started fighting quite badly, and after a few months they got divorced. I remember I was shocked, because this was the first married couple I knew of that got divorced.

I can't help thinking that long distance relationships have a really bad outlook. I have rooted for Chad and Lois up until now, but if Chad insists on moving to Smallville, then I don't know. Will this fic too be one where the natural order in the world of LnC fics is restored, that is, where Lois and Clark are together?

Ann

P.S. The first time I read this passage, I thought you talked about Vitamin E:

Did you know that in all recent scientific studies on vitamins, increased levels of Vitamin E have been linked to health hazards, but increased levels of Vitamin D have been linked to health benefits? So don't eat any extra Vitamin E, whatever you do. Have some Vitamin D instead! And if indeed you changed the vitamin in your fic from E to D, then that was the right thing to do!

And the plot thickens!

Wow, in two days, Lois and Chad start discussing the subject and now are in the making plans stage. I know Clark kind of moved those plans along with his Smallville suggestion, but I'm sure Lois is thinking that her world is turning upside down kind of fast.

I wouldn't describe Chad as being selfish. I would describe as a person who has sacrificed for his other half, and now wishes to do something for himself. He has an idealistic view of small towns, and I agree a move to one, may either burst his perfect scenario bubble or it may actually reinforce his ideas. We'll have to wait and see. A relationship is give-and-take. So far, it seems Chad has done a lot of giving. With the situations reversed, we'll now see how Lois takes on this role.

I thought it was sweet for Clark to volunteer to help Lois and Chad out. They've certainly helped him, and I thought it was very in character, for Clark to want to help them back.

That being said, Smallville to Metropolis is quite a commute. So, even with Superman Express at their disposal, I'm curious to see how often Lois and Chad can meet up and still keep up with their respective positions. I can imagine at the beginning, they'd want to see each other as often as they can, but slowly they may begin to drift apart from each other, and find that they have less and less in common.

The dynamic between Lois and Chad and Clark and Rachel will also be interesting. If Lois and Chad are willing to do the long distance thing, it may give Clark motivation to do the same, or it may cause Rachel to think Clark didn't want to fight for her. Should be interesting to see how things play out.

Lastly, the test discussion seemed a bit out of place here. I know you used it as an ice-breaker to the meatier relationship discussion. Are the tests actually producing anything worthy? From what I understood, the results are interesting, but nothing that Clark would NEED to know to better understand why he is different.

Can't wait till Monday.

grinch

Hmm, I expressed myself poorly. I did not find a resident spending two hours with the family unrealistic. I'd have found it unrealistic if it happen and he was not called on the carpet for it.

I found it telling that instead of applying the counsel he simply whined to his wife and looked for a geographical fix.

I understand about your relatives, indeed more power to them. But they are seasoned professionals. Chad at this point is a resident, he is supposed to be learning. Instead he rejects reasonable counsel and whines to his wife.

I did not say Chad is a bad guy just that the chinks in his white knighthood are beginning to show.

However that said, if we don't hate Chad by the end of this tale how are any of us going to be alright with Clark Kent stealing his wife?

Hmm... Hmm... Nancy, I have to hand it to you. You DID only say that commuting EVERYDAY would be out...

My head is spinning and while I can see all sorts of cheesy situations, where Clark and Lois do the Clark and Lois thing and Chad gets to find a new woman in his life and the complete alternative where the remaining three Musketeers will also fall apart completely, I have no idea what middle ground you're shooting at.

Michael

PS: You're a very different form of evil from Carol.

I can definitely attest to how much of a pain it is for the rest of the staff when a doctor takes too long with a patient... I work as a receptionist in a private pediatric practice... and we go by 10 minute appointments... sometimes there is an emergency or a kid that needs more attention... sometimes our bosses (the two doctors) just get chatty and end up having us work through lunch because they fall an hour behind on their schedule little by little... and they don't have anyone to call them on it because they are the bosses...

Another point to consider in all of this, though, is that we are not privy to Chad's thought processes... just like we never saw Clark and Rachel's private moments... we only know what he ranted to Lois... there may be more to the story... or this was just the incident that was the last straw... we don't know...

And for the tests.... since Clark is an alien it's VERY interesting that his initial tests are nearly indistinguishable from humans. Sometimes the most interesting result is no result at all, =D Since he, supposedly, evolved on a different world with a totally separate biological starting point (as far as he knows) his biochemistry should be completely different from anything on earth... he should have totally different proteins and probably unique cell structure... but his blood tests were normal... that's huge! And what it means for Clark is that he fits it more...

It feeds in to the idea that is often presented: Kryptonians are a transplanted human race.

Thanks for the feedback everyone! I started to type up a response yesterday, but didn't have much time, so never got around to posting it. Sorry about that.

As the comments had a lot of common elements, I'm sort of responding to everyone at once. Sorry about that.

First – Chad's response to the patient discussion. While I think Chad did want to spend an inordinate amount of time with patients and I would imagine that a large hospital does have other resources so Chad could have pointed them in a different direction and not have to do it himself, there are two reasons I put this in here. The first is that it doesn't strike me as too unrealistic – I spend large quantities of time listening to doctors talk (it's about 30% of my job – and these are doctors that have been in practice for at least 5 years) and there is a common theme among doctors of all specialties that those in large cities complain that there is not enough time to really talk to patients while in smaller settings, that complaint rarely comes up.

I also picture Ken being something of a nightmare boss. I don't think that's related to being in a big city, so much as random, but certainly one of my friends who is finishing her residency has had this problem. So I can see him reaming Chad out, but not doing it in a productive way that makes Chad feel like he can explain what he was trying to do and then Ken explaining how to prioritize his time, etc. Basically, Ken is hard to work for and so Chad has developed the (bad) habit of not really working with him, just listening to Ken yell at him and then coming home and whining to Lois.

Lastly, the idea of this chapter and the last (or maybe chapter 18, I can't recall) was that this is not Chad's only issue with Metropolis General. He didn't get yelled at one day for spending too much time with a patient and so wants to leave – he has been slowly coming to hate working in the city – both the types of things he sees (like the multiple shooting) and the way the city hospital is run.

One last thing on Chad – I agree that he comes across as less “white knightish” here. But that's sort of intentional. I don't view Chad in my head as a bad guy, but he is human and so he isn't perfect. Thus he doesn't deal well with Ken, he isn't happy to sacrifice for Lois forever, etc. But he isn't saying he needs to move to a small town and Lois just needs to deal with it. He's saying he wants to try to move to a small town and see if he likes it. If he does, then they'll decide as a couple what to do. He's not committing to anything yet (and he's sort of hoping that he'll hate the small town experience so he's happy to come back to Metropolis). (And, by the way, I hope no one ends this fic hating Chad. He's not perfect, but that doesn't mean he's awful either. I mean, neither Lois nor Clark are perfect, but presumably most of the people here like them anyway.)

As for the long distance thing: After we'd been married about six years, my husband got a job in California while I was going to school in New York. My husband's career is in academia where job offers are scarce and so rather than a normal job search where you search the area you want to live in, in academia, you tend to go where the job is. As I was halfway done with my masters, moving wasn't much of an option for me, so we lived apart for two years.

It was a miserable decision, but clearly preferable to not being married to him anymore, so we did it. A lot of Lois' views on Chad's leaving (and some of the things – both good and bad - in upcoming chapters as well) are semi-autobiographical. Similarly, Clark's words about what it's like to live apart came from my experience, too. To be fair, there used to be a lot of people where I worked whose spouse lived apart from them (not sure why), and my experience was somewhat unique, but I'm drawing on it for two reasons – I know it best and it's most similar to Chad and Lois. The other couples I knew who were doing the long distance thing did it from the time they met. I think being married beforehand (or together for long time) makes a big difference. There was no question that my husband and I fought more when we lived apart. But we had been together long enough to know what was “normal” for us and thus know it was the living apart that was causing the problem rather than wondering if we had made a mistake in being married (as many of the couples I knew did since what else would you think if you fought with your new spouse every time you saw them and lots of times when you didn't?).

I think it will be important for Lois and Chad to be able to tell the difference between legitimate arguments that crop up because you sometimes argue with someone you share your life with, those that are because living apart is stressful and you fight more when you're stressed, and those that are “real” but are solely related to the logistics of living apart.

As for Clark moving them along – I agree he did do that (although I tend to agree with CJ that he isn't being devious so much as trying to be helpful), and I can imagine it's all a bit sudden for Lois, but I also think in some ways that's better. It took years after we got married for my husband and me to be settled in one place – first he was in grad school, then I was, then we were living apart, etc. The not knowing exactly where you and your spouse will be in a year thing is what always bothered me and so I was trying to spare Lois that. Living in limbo – knowing Chad is likely to try living apart at some point but not sure when, would be hard, I think. This way she knows. He's going to do it soon. And then they can see what he thinks and move on towards their future from there.

Ann – I didn't know that about Vitamin E, but I picked Vitamin D as I believe it is linked to exposure to the sun, so it made sense to me that Clark would have high levels of it given his reaction to our sun.

As for Clark's tests – I have to say they are not essential to the plot and I agree that there is nothing he is learning that Clark NEEDS to know (but then he didn't really need to know he was from Krypton either, right?). The point of the result of the blood test, though, is exactly what Lieta said – this lets Clark know that he is not that different (which is something Clark wants to know, even if he doesn't need to know it). I'm not planning to get into what this means for him and if it means he is really distantly related to humans (although my basic understanding of biology makes it seem unlikely that he's not given the test results I have used), and since this fic is Lois-focused, we also won't see much of what he thinks about it, but I think it will make him feel more connected to Earth and we may see some evidence of that in later chapters.

Okay, I've had to come out of Lurkdom to beg, "Where is it?"

ethnica - Glad you came out of lurkdom! I'll be posting soon (in the next hour or so). I just need to polish the next chapter up a bit.