Insanity

I can't even begin to describe the past two weeks. Two weeks ago today my computer crashed. That week, I had 3 midterms, a lab report, a presentation, all of my summer studentship funding applications were due, mice habituation and nerve conduction training. Like most university students, my life is on my computer and no, it wasn't backed up.

I made it through all of my midterms even though I was missing all of my notes. I majorly crammed for everything, and I wish I knew how I did on my stats exam...but some of the questions didn't have any correct answers...

 I spent 6 hours on Feb 17th doing baseline functional behavior testing on my mice, and then this past week was reading week. Usually people take some much needed time to fulfill Canadian stereotypes by going skiing, playing pickup hockey, sledding, or chilling with friends during reading week. I wrote an organic chem final on the 20th, then spent all day on Friday operating on my mice, and finally, after 12 days without a computer go my laptop back. I was at school by 8 am yesterday to inject my mice, then I went to training, then I wrote an essay...then I discovered my computer is not fully fixed. Today, I was at school by 7:45 am to inject my mice, then I had get over to grandmother's house by 10 to take her to church, then after church I discovered her car had a flat tire, and I had to deal with that, then it was back to injecting mice, and then back to calling Dell about my computer and then back to essay writing.

I'm so exhausted...reading break was not a break.

The good news is that I am less afraid of mice now, and my suturing skills have improved. By the time I get to medschool I will be a needle driver rock star. Speaking of which, this weekend was MMI interviews at my school, I have never been around so many nervous people before. I had to walk by their little gathering in the medical school before their interview to get to my locker and I felt I was the only one who had missed seeing the headless horseman. I hope I don't look that next year...

Medical Extremes

I think this is my 4th  Medical Monday blog post, and thought I would write about an interesting medical contrast that I experienced today, which I feel really reflects on my own personal experience as a patient. If you are thinking I'm going to tell you about some really cool medical condition, then you should probably navigate yourself away from this page and check this out instead.

This afternoon I spent time in the emergency department of our city's children's hospital as part of the Pediatric Emergency Medicine Research Team, but prior to that I spent the morning volunteering in the palliative/respite care area of the very same hospital. I went from an area that was focused on ensuring that kids who have terminal illness have the best times of their lives while they still can, to an area that was focused on getting kids in and out of the department as fast as possible.

The energy between the two places was extremely different, and while you may not expect this, the doctors, nurses and parents who are taking care of kids in respite care (none of the kids currently under palliative care are actively dying) were way more cheerful, happy, fun loving and honestly just more kid friendly. People were focused on enjoying life, and making sure the kids laughed more than they cried. But in emerg, it is the exact opposite. Nobody is focused on making a kid smile, rather just figuring out what is wrong with them, treating them and moving on to the next patient. We expect that when we set foot in an ER, a doctor will asses us, treat us with modern medicine and then send us home cured of what ever aliment brought us to the door.

As I stood and waited for the bus to take me back to school today (by waiting I mean pacing, I'm a pacer) I began to think about these comparisons and how I have started to shift my own expectations of what medicine can do for me. I'm palliative, not in the dying sense, but in the sense that there is basically nothing anybody can do that will "fix" me, only make the pain a little less intense. Yet, I still expect that a doctor will be able to "fix" me, on the outside I portray that what I am looking for is a diagnosis and curative treatment. But deep down, I'm not. There isn't a cure, there isn't away to fix the pain I have all night and all day. The only thing I require from medicine now is for it to help me live the best life that I can, for it to help me give everyday %110. 

Highs and Lows

In my first year of university I was part of a bible study that we called "DG" (discipleship group), and its where I met most of my really good friends, and a few of them became my room-mates in second year. We met once a week, tucked our selves away in a corner, ate a lot of candy, and talked about God. At the beginning of our meetings we always did "Highs and Lows" where we would each say what a high was for the week and what a low was for the week. It really helped to put things into perspective when you were having a bad week because it forced you to also find the good things that happened.

So, I'm linking up with "happies and crappies" again this week, because I feel like this a helpful exercise when I am feeling a bit glum.

Happies:

- I met with my PI to discuss summer studentship funding, and I am almost done my applications

- I made it to all of my training sessions this week

- I finally got an MRI of my ankle on Monday

- I went home last weekend (because of said MRI) and got to spend some time with my family. Because I went to boarding school when I was in the 10th grade, and then did my first 2 year of  university thousands of km from home, it was the first time I had gone home on a non-holiday weekend since the 9th grade.

- I made my grandmother very happy on Monday when I brought her flowers, which in turn made me happy to see her so happy (and surprised).

Crappies:

- I haven't slept very well in a few weeks. I keep waking up throughout the night (usually at 1 am, 2:30 am, 3:30 am and 4 am) because my leg hurts. I wake up after I have a dream about something happening to my leg, like it gets cut off or like last night, when I dreamed I was shot in the leg. 

- I'm super tired of doing spin pyramids at training

- I almost died driving to my MRI on Monday due to black ice and a freak snow storm, thankfully the big guy was looking out for me.

- Because I went home I got less work done on the weekend

- While this probably doesn't seem like a "crappie," I was disappointed that I only got 91% on my cardiovascular exam in physiology. One question that was marked wrong, is in fact correct based on our lecture notes, so now I have to argue with my prof which I hate doing. I don't like grade grubbers, but when things are marked incorrect when they are actually correct, it makes me upset. 

That is all! Have a good weekend!