Thoughts

Everyday there are certain things that I think about on an almost clock like cycle: eating, homework/school, ways to regrow nerves, eating, biking, eating, and homework. You would think that my mind would be constantly focused and consumed by the pain I am in every minute of every day, but its not, I rarely think about the pain. Yes, I perceive agonizing pain every waking and sometimes sleeping minute of my life, but I don't actively think about it. I find that odd, that I am somehow able to block out my ability to reason why I am in pain. I figured it was because I have just come to terms with the fact that my leg will feel like its being cut open by a scalpel forever, but I don't think that is true. Lately I have been thinking about one thing more than I have been thinking about food (which might explain the weight loss),  amputation.

I know my options for treatment are running out, and I don't want to spend the rest of my life in pain knowing that there might have been a solution to end my pain, even if it means hacking off my leg. Every time I think about it, (which has been a lot seeing as it have now surpassed my thoughts about food) I weigh the positives with the negatives. They always end up cancelling each other out, leaving me at a net score of zero. Then I forget about for a few hours, and then come back to it trying to approach the idea at some sort of new angle, trying to add in pros and cons to maybe tip the scales. So far, I end up with a score of 5 for hacking and 5 for keeping, which is a tie.

Unfortunately, we don't have shootouts in decision making.

Settling In?

I'm starting to settle into my class schedule and with that comes a new study schedule, which has already involved a lot of time in the library. I really like being able to just walk across the street to get to class because I can come home for lunch when I have time or come home for dinner and then head back to the library.

I'm really trying to stay on top of all of my work this year, and not letting myself put off learning and solidifying topics until the week before a midterm. A lot of my tests and major assignments coincide together, so I won't have time to prepare for them adequately if I only start really learning the material right before the test.

The prof that we currently have for physiology (thankfully he only has a total of 3 lectures) doesn't really speak English. I believe he is Chinese (but I could be wrong) and undoubtly really knows his stuff, but his accent is super thick and he literally doesn't move his jaw when he talks (his teeth never separate) so he his insanely difficult to understand. Even more unfortunately, he is teaching part of the neurophysiology unit, which has some pretty complex concepts to understand and very specific terminology. Afferent and Efferent sound exactly the same when he say them...unfortunately they are exact opposites and it is pretty crucial that you understand which one he is talking about. As a result, I spent a total of 4 hours yesterday teaching myself the material from Wednesday's lecture. It is incredibly unfortunate that we also have him for today's lecture and one next week (so I'm looking at 8 hours of teaching myself the material).

Even though I am settling in to my condo, and now have some friends to sit with in all of my classes I have this incredible urge to just run away and go somewhere. I want to go back to Africa so badly, I also really want to go to Nepal and I honestly wouldn't mind hiking through the mountains in my own backyard. I feel restless, and I have only been here 3 weeks.

I wish I could take the summer off, and just travel, but I also want to spend the summer doing research. I always feel like I am being pulled in two directions, to the right is school and my aspirations of getting into medschool and to the left is my desire to go back to Africa and to see the world. I don't know which way to go, but I always find myself saying that someday I will have the time and the money to travel and right now is the time for school. But will I have time someday? They say your life is the most simple right now, and tomorrow it will only be more complicated.

Things I miss

I'm really enjoying all of my classes here at uCalgary, and I am starting to make some friends (at least I think and hope). People in my program are a bit stuck up and a little bit clicky, so its not the easiest task. I feel like I made a dozen good friends in Guelph in a week back in first year.

Today it really hit me that I miss Guelph. As I was desperately running around and trying to complete my research award application before the 4pm deadline today, all I could think about were my friends back in Guelph.

So, here is a list of things that I miss about Guelph:
1. Friends, especially my twin KH
2. The abundance of Gluten Free food on campus
3. The Bullring (which is an extension of #2)
4. The Guelph Transit system and the bus drivers that were oh so nice
5. Proximity of grocery stores and grocery stores that had an abundance of Gluten Free products
6. The Bookshelf
7. Seeing familiar faces everywhere I go
8. UGC (University of Guelph Cycling Team)
9. The UOG campus in general, both the atmosphere and the people
10. The idea that I am missing out on sharing moments in lives of the people that I love, that I am missing out on those stairwell conversations with my room-mates and that we will all slowly grow apart.

Thing I like about Calgary:
1. Smaller class sizes
2. I feel like profs actually want to get to know me, and some of them already do
3. I am being presented with countless opportunities that I would have never gotten had I stayed in Guelph, such as research, research funding, amazing mentors and awesome volunteer opportunities
4. Being closer to home and especially my Grandmother who is still coping with the loss of my Grandpa
5. My condo's proximity to my classes

As you can see, so far there are more things that I miss about Guelph than things that I like about Calgary. I almost feel like I made the wrong decision to go to Guelph in the first place, not because it was a horrible experience or that I regret spending two years there, its that I didn't realize how much I would miss it and miss people. This move turned out to be harder than I thought...

Pause for a listen

When I was in the 11th grade, I was completely amazed by our Head Girl - Emily Reid. Check out her new album to find out why:

Its an amazing song and the rest of her album is pretty great too.

Coming Together

It seems like everything in my life is coming together nicely now that I am in Calgary. I feel less panicky, I don't feel like there is constantly something that I need to be doing all the time in order to shape me into the perfect med-school applicant.

My research position is all set up, I know what my project is and I have completed my portion of the research award application.

I have met and spoken with my program coordinator, and he seems confident that I will do well in the Biomed program here. I was a bit worried about his class, but I didn't know that it involved a lot of lab time and hands on research. I very excited about it because I would have never gotten the opportunity to do a hands on research class like this in Guelph. I will be learning cloning techniques, experimental design, tissue culture and basically all of the lab techniques that I will need to use.

I also just got a volunteer position at the Rotary Flames House at the Alberta Children's Hospital. This isn't your average gift hospital gift shop position. I get to interact with palliative care patients and their families as well as children in respite care. I'm pretty excited about it.

I also have a meeting with the head coach at the National Cycling Centre Calgary tomorrow morning to discuss the possibility of me going through classification to become a para-cyclist. If I am able to be classified, that would be simply amazing. I'm at a huge disadvantage competing against able bodied cyclists, which at times can be very frustrating because I know that no matter how hard I train my body won't let me be at that level.

I think everything is working out in my life now that I am in Calgary. Maybe it was a bad decision not to start out here in first year, but I don't regret my time in Guelph. I am glad that I am here now, and I intend to make the most of it.

Canadian Style

As you know, I wrote the MCAT yesterday, and lets just say it the organization on the part of the testing centre wasn't too awesome.

I don't think my score will be "top"

Like the AAMC said, I arrived 30 min prior to my start time. When I walked up to the building at 7:25 am there was a group of about 15 students standing around outside in the 5 degree morning light. After a while we all started to get anxious because it was almost 8 and the doors were still not open. Eventully, a jolly man came out and said "Oh, the doors are locked. We were starting to wonder where all of you were..."

And if that doesn't set the stage for the morning, let me continue.

We all gathered inside a smallish room that only had 5 chairs, in which the jolly man told us they were having computer troubles and that number 16 wasn't working at all, and that they couldn't find the cord to set up the Prometric registration. Because there were only 20 computers and 20 test takers, one computer going down meant that one person wouldn't get to write.

Slowly, they called us in groups of three out of another computer lab to get registered, and we were all hoping that we wouldn't randomly be assigned computer number 16. There were only 3 people left in the room when my name was called, so my chances of getting number 16 was increasing every minute. Once I left the holding room and walked into the room where we originally started I found the 6 people who were called 15 minutes prior to me just sitting there, still waiting to be registered. At this point, it was 8:30.  A few people had already started writing and we all began to realize that it was going to be a very long day.

Once I eventually made into the registration room, myself along with 4 others were sat down at table next to the Prometric registration. The jolly man who looked a bit like Santa Clause walked in: "We only have 4 working computers left not including number 16 which has already been assigned to an unfortunate sole."

So, my first reaction and verbal vomit was "But there are 5 of us..." The man just nodded in agreement. So, you have 5 premeds in a tiny room, all stressed out and already over 1.5hrs behind schedule being told that one of them wouldn't get to write. Eventually, one of the others volunteered to wait until a computer was fixed by somebody in Baltimore or write at a later date. I was shocked by the civility that we all displayed under such circumstance, but we had already spent 2 hours talking with each other by that point and were on our way to becoming pretty good friends. I must add that I am very thankful to have had other pre-meds to talk to while I waited. If I was all alone going through that, I might have had a nervous breakdown. Everybody was pretty chill, maybe that's the Canadian way of handling stressful situations, just let it ride.

Eventually, I was in the hot seat going through the Prometric registration. For some reason, my right hand finger prints kept coming up as belonging to a member of the British Army. So, after sorting that out, which to took a considerable amount of time, my finger prints, drivers license, and photo were all registered. I was assigned computer number 12, which was thankfully working.

By 10 am I was registered and ready to write, but the guy beside me was more than 2 sections ahead of me. I was moderately flustered starting the Physical Sci section because of everything that had happened earlier. So when I encountered a difficult question, it threw me off more than it usually does. The end result I believe will be that I did not achieve a 10 on the PS section. It was hard, really, really hard and it didn't seem to reflect any of the practice tests in any way.

I thought that VR was actually reasonable and very similar to the AAMC verbal. I finished with 7 extra minutes and was able to go back over the time consuming questions that required going back to the passage and I think (and hope) that I was able to correct some mistakes before the time limit. By the time I fnished VR, it was already past noon. I didn't bring enough food to be there past 1:30 and I was starting to get really hungry. I only brought a few pieces of fruit, 4 granola bars, 1 chocolate bar and a can of vinalla coke. I wasn't planning on eating all of that, but I was down to only 2 granola bars, a chocolate bar and my coke after VR. Needless to say, my next biggest concern was running out of food.

Thankfully, the writing sample prompts were manageable, but for me, the writing section is exhausting. Also, the guy beside me was completely finished before I got half way through my first writing prompt. And by the time I finished the second, my stomach was literally growling.

So, before the Biosci section I scarfed down the remaining food that I had and drank half a can of Vanilla Coke (which I would like to point out is not sold in Canada, so I reserve it for special occasions only). Halfway through Biosci I stated to get a headache. I eat a lot on a normal basis, and my body doesn't respond well to not having enough calories, so basically, I bonked halfway through Biosci. Also, it seemed like all the questions in Biosci did not require any background knowledge in biology and it was really just based on interpreting the passages, which is nothing like the practice AAMC exams so I have no ability to predict how well I did.

At 3pm, I walked out the testing centre into a rain and hail storm, 2 hours behind schedule, shaking from hunger. As you may have guessed, it was not the best day of my life. I am fairly certain that I did not get a 30, I'm predicting a 28 at best. Which is very disappointing because I really don't want to have to write it again. Maybe I would have done better if the morning had gone smoother, maybe not, one thing for sure is that I was pretty flustered starting the test and completely bonkered ending it.

Next time I write, maybe I will do it Montana, and just submit to the metal detector and body pat down that goes against privacy laws in Canada. I appreciate the relaxed atmosphere that the testing centre and staff had, but it was a bit stressful.

Peace Like a River