(a picture is worth a thousand words)

This basically sums up how I was (am still kind of) feeling yesterday after I failed something for the first time in med school ever. Theoretically, low point, but after going through what in hindsight seems a lot like my own brand of the five stages of grief (30s denial, 5mins anger, 30s bargaining, 5mins depression, + hour of mania) I got over it.

Plus two of my best friends/flatmates, aka my parents, knew I wasn't feeling that great so insisted we go for a drive to the beach this morning. Despite the weather predictions of horribleness and snow, it is unbelievably gorgeous today and there was not a cloud in sight; and the newly discovered walk they took me on was just... paradise. It surely put things -- life, this not so good week -- into ridiculously awesome, gloriously eternal perspective.

In the grand scheme of life, death and the stretch of Time, yesterday doesn't even factor in as a micro-blip. So that's that.

it's official

I can't stomach ortho.

I'm sick.

I especially can't stomach ortho when I'm sick.

Frothy bone marrow mixed with blood looks scary-like the Korean spicy noodles I had for lunch... and the tofu soup I had for dinner...

I think I'm gonna go puke up both now.

Sickness = BAD timing.

procrastination part II

With my ortho test Friday I have been procrastinating like crazy this weekend. I've had the house to myself and have been baking so much it's ridiculous. But I've had fun. :) A friend came over Friday night and we watched Nights In Rodanthe then baked banana cake and three batches of chocolate chip cookies, and last night I hosted a MedCF pizza night which was great fun. I have so much food leftover though (I always overestimate to be safe) and no one to eat it all! Baking I can give away, but the pizza?? Oi...

This morning I have been procrastinating even more online -- it's crazy how much time you can spend just with completely insignificant things. BUT I have discovered this awesome pianist by the name of Jon Schmidt. Really great stuff! Below is "Love Story meets Viva la Vida," and if you go to his website he's got heaps of other pretty original pieces.

Now... I really should go do some ortho study... *sigh*... I've been so tired lately, generally quite run down. I'm really looking forward to my break in a couple weeks time. Maybe I should take a year off next year...? *sigh* Who knows...

"like sand in an hour-glass..."

Today was a good day.

Boy, was it a mission getting out of bed at six this morning, lemme tell you! The combination of the utterly freezing temperatures outside and the 5.30 - 7pm tutorial the night before. But I am so glad I didn't give in to the overwhelming desire to stay wrapped up in bed for another hour or two.

There were no other students at the ortho trauma meeting at 7.30am this morning except for the three who were on-call last night, in particular, neither of the other two guys on my team, so it was just me and my ortho reg for the morning. And what a morning it turned out to be. An old, frail lady was admitted late last night with a truly ugly periprosthetic hip fracture; unfortunately she was most definitely not fit for surgery. And by 10am I had done an ABG (I still hold they're much easier than IV lines, for sure!), witnessed a DNR discussion, performed a supervised femoral nerve block (step two of see one-do one-teach one), and assisted (on the ward!) in the insertion of a Steinmann pin through the proximal tibial bone -- old-school orthopaedics.

It was a pretty intense morning, not just the medicine part of it all, but some of the emotional stuff because this absolutely precious lady really isn't doing too well right now... So it may sound counterintuitive when I say it was a good day, but I guess what I mean by it is that it was one of those days that felt like Real Medicine; it was one of those days that made me truly excited to become a doctor in a year and a half's time; it was one of those days that reminded me what a privilege it is to be learning what I'm learning, doing what I'm doing every day of the year.

Real Medicine.

Today was a good day. Long, but good.

not-so-urban-legend Urban Legends

You always seem to hear urban-legend-esque stories leading up to fifth year, the "big" exams, the culmination of two years of daily lectures and labs followed by two years of hospital ward work. You hear these stories about how everyone subtly (or not so subtly) begins to get more competitive, or in the very least, starts to bring their game more and more.

I don't know if it's because I've started with the two most intense rotations of the year or if it's just the people in my group (because we certainly seem to have an extra extra intense group of students), but those urban-legend-esque stories are beginning to feel less and less urban legend-y and more and more... reality. And I'm just tired. That change, I know, is most likely due to the fact that ALL med students have this undeniable fear of failure (excuse the generalised statement, but this one I'm fairly sure is true across the board, albeit to varying degrees of manifestation), whether that's feeling completely unprepared and insecure for these exams until a week after they're over when we FINALLY get the "You've Passed" email or always being a bit paranoid that we're going to royally screw up one day by missing a SERIOUS diagnosis.

The funny thing is that I've always found med school relatively do-able; never too tiring, never too stressful, never too worrisome. Four years of chugging along with a baseline level of what I thought was hard-work, manageable, with some free-time amidst it all to relax, rest, sleep, "recuperate." So when I heard those urban-legend-esque stories during my time leading up to fifth year I used to think to myself surely there's a degree of exaggeration there?? Surely it's just an issue of personal perception?

But man, it was NOT exaggeration. The baseline intensity HAS suddenly been taken up three plus ten notches. Those days of kicking back and relaxing for the weekend with no worries in the world have thus far been nonexistent this year.

When did this happen? Is it just a fifth year phenomenon, a blip that will cease with November exams? Or, as I suspect, is this just the beginning of... well, you know, LIFE?

458 Days

458 Days left until elective...

Just thought I'd remind myself. LoL. Cos I really need the reminder, right? Man, I love that Countdown clock.

Okay, off to bake some cookies instead of... well, you know, LIFE.

May 12... Unfreakin'believable!

I've definitely hit a lull, study-wise; a real case of "senioritis" though I'm neither a senior, nor nearing the end of a year. I hit the video store recently and got out waaaaay too many dvds, but what's worse, Once and Michael Collins has given me a bad case of travel-fever. (Or, more specifically, Irish fever!)

I am currently lacking any desire to study. I am currently lacking any fear of failing (which should be worrying in and of itself as one needs a certain degree of "healthy" fear). I am currently utterly lacking in motivation, full stop.

This is not good.

I've got three weeks left of orthopaedics.

(I am secretly hoping I'm sick because then at least I'd have an infallible excuse to do nothing.)

On another note, the orthopaedic surgeon I'm attached to for this run is a spinal specialist and scrubbing in on his surgeries is pretty freakin' unbelievable. Monday I was in theatre for five hours for a Scoliosis case which was, there is no other way to describe it but, EPIC. We did a posterior fusion all the way from T3 - L3 and the whole thing was utterly SURREAL. I wish I had time to sit down and write it all down, to commit it to paper, it was that kind of experience. But for now suffice it to say it was most definitely one for the record books!

living life on purpose, with purpose

The New Zealand Medical Students Association (NZMSA)'s national Conference '09 was this weekend and I had an incredible time. The theme was "The Art of Medicine" and 130 medical students from all around the country came together in Christchurch. For us NZMSA Exec members it was a working weekend so we had a bit of a different experience to the normal conference delegates but regardless, I had a fantastic weekend. I loved getting to know some of the other Exec members better (particularly my roomies!), met heaps of new med students from all around the country, and I found the Conference sessions really interesting and worthwhile, in particular the theme of our personal Wellbeing, as students and in the future as doctors.

Most of all, it was refreshing once again to be able to take a step back and be reminded of the fact that there is a whole world out there, that life isn't limited to the sixteen people in my group who I see for eight hours a day, five days a week, that life isn't limited to this hospital or this med school, and that there is more to life than just studying and "clinical medicine." I met so many incredible doctors who have been able to combine their passions outside of Medicine with their jobs, who haven't been afraid to pave their own way in life, who have used medicine to have the life they want, not allowing medicine to dictate and/or define their lives; doctors who have travelled, who have had families, who have run successful businesses, who have accomplished so much on an international stage all the while being the intelligent, lovely, generous doctors and human beings that they are. Furthermore meeting and getting to know a bunch of similar-minded medical students was so damn refreshing -- life isn't limited to the sixteen people in my group (thank goodness).

I flew home Sunday evening completely exhausted but satisfied. I only had one tutorial on Monday so I took the day off, slept-in, went for a good run during the day when it was still bright and warm(ish), splurged on a perfect smoothie from Reload and rented a few dvds. It turned out to be a very chilled out day, and just what the doctor ordered!

Despite being run off my feet most days with a seemingly endless "to-do" list, despite knowing I'm not doing as well academically, I shudder to imagine what my year would have been like had I not run for NZMSA.

This year I am finding that I have an increasing clarity and confidence in the med student I am, the doctor I am becoming, and the person I want to strive to be.

Live life on purpose, with purpose. That has always been my ethos, and I'm happy that I'm truly doing it justice this year.