My past month at school has been pretty heavy. No, I'm not having "Maybe I should leave..." thoughts, but I am having "My life would be so much easier if I just did commerce studies or something..." thoughts. It's probably a very ungrateful thought to have but everybody has them. When this happens, you need some inspiration. When it doesn't come to you, you have to go out and sieze it by the horns. Force your way into an operating room, clock in some extra clinic hours (I don't even think we're allowed to do this.)... Or something.
Or if you're me, you just throw lots of money at the problem and hope it goes away. I've been reading Catharsis: On the Art of Medicine by some cardiologist guy with a really complicated name. (No disrespect intended, Andrzej.) It's slow and reads like prose fiction, but it's not bad. I'm too lateral-thinking and stupid to appreciate poetry, philosophy or history of medicine, but I sort of get the rough idea. (I'm the girl who falls asleep in art galleries.) Point is, it did nothing to inspire me. Kind of pointless. Like giving aspirin to a schizophrenic.
A week or so ago, I had a physiology lab class on CVS microcirculation. Once our toads were distributed and anaesthetised, chopped open and mounted on dissecting microscopes, we had to study the circulation. (My toad seemed intent on staying awake; it took about ten minutes of dousing with MS-222, pulling its leg and poking its eye before I was satisfied the little bugger was under.) I realise this is a really stupid sounding post but it was INTERESTING TO ME. I'd never seen blood moving through vessels before. Everything up until then was static images and text.
Watching single erythrocytes squeeze themselves through capillaries and two rushing streams of blood converge at a vein--fastslowfast--is hypnotic. I'm not going to get all "river of life" on you, but anyone whose seen it probably understands what I'm talking about. You can't help but stand back for a small moment and simply marvel at the biological complexity of life. (I'm deliberately ommitting the part where I had to induce a hemorrhage by cutting the femoral artery and finished up by cutting out the BEATING HEART! which was STILL BEATING ALL OVER THE DISSECTION PLATE! and dumped the lot in the bin. DAMN YOU, FRIGHTENING PURKINJE FIBRES!)
On another note, I had a formative exam on Friday. ("Formative exam" means "If you fail this exam, chances are, you'll fail the real one! So we're watching you!") I'm pretty happy with how I went. The histology component went much better than I expected. What jerked my chain though was the physiology. I put in so many hours (MANY, MANY HOURS.) but still managed to stuff up a three of the questions. All the MCQs were "Choose the BEST answer," or "Choose the MOST correct answer," which made me want to shoot myself in the eye. Oh yeah, and I said prenatal erythropoiesis occurs in the yolk sac. And I labelled periostum as perichondrium. Clearly, I am going to be surgeon general. So hands up! Who wants me as their doctor?!
And now, for something completely different, I'll leave you with a labelled photo of my handbag before I go back to my study hole.
Click for larger image
3 comments:
Love the nerd rainbow. I heart both post it notes and triplus fineliner 10 packs. Yay.
Med school and education and genetics in general make me almost blind. Like, labrador before 30 sort of thing.
Might check that book out if the public library has it..
Hey, great to meet another Med Student victim around these parts :)) I totally know what you're talking about in the first paragraph. Sometimes I wish I was a commerce student too :P
And thank you for the comment on my blog. Secret smokers unite ;)
I thought the yolk sac then the liver took care of haematopoiesis in the embryo / foetus prior to the long bones.
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