Well, I have my first (and almost second) round of exams done, and the results are in: so far, I'm rocking this semester.
(I mean, I SHOULD be - I really only have a few classes, so I better be acing them.)
Biochemistry I'm the most proud of. After suffering through it last year, it's finally making sense this year. Granted, I think this year's exam was written MUCH more fairly (big idea issues instead of nitty-gritty detail hidden within the coursepack), but I got a 97% on the first exam, and have been doing pretty well on the quizzes as well. The 2nd exam is coming up in a week - the topics for this section are the ones that gave me the most trouble last year, so we'll see what happens, but at the very least I have a nice little grade buffer in case things don't go as well as I want.
However, since I'm sticking to my main goal of "sticking to the man", I foresee the exam going well :)
Ethics and Physiology are going well too. Physiology I'm not really attending classes; just reorganizing my notes in prep for the exams, but I'm remember things more and some of the more complex ideas are easier to understand the second time around. I got a 94% on the first exam, and am waiting on the results of the 2nd exam from today, but I felt pretty good about it.
I really enjoy my ethics group. Our preceptor is a geneticist and very laid back, so she just lets us TALK, instead of leading us down one path or another. I subbed in on another group last week, and their group was not nearly as good as mine.
Which brings me to the other cool thing I did last week: I got to speak at the Willed Body Memorial for MSU. See, my great-grandmother donated her body to a similar program, so I was able to talk about her love of teaching and why donating her body to a medical school was so important to her. I got a lot of compliments on my speech, and - small world- got to speak to the Zussmans afterward. J's brother in law donated his body and was honored that year, so it was just another funny way of things coming full circle.
I also (in news of my own health) have started running again and am signed up for the Ugly Sweater Run on December 1st. That seems like a long ways away, but since I can barely run more than 6 minutes without having to stop for a walk, I think it will give me JUST enough time to be able to run the full distance.
Wish me luck!
Monday, September 30, 2013
Sunday, September 8, 2013
Death
An older brother of a high school friend was tragically killed this last week, and it's left me with some psychological grumblings. I hadn't actually talked to this friend in quite a while - we went to the same university after high school, but ended up on very different tracks and had just naturally grown apart. We kept in contact on facebook, but that was about it.
I think the reason his brother's death is hitting me so hard (besides my own issues with death) is that I had been sort of gossiping about him just a few days before his brother died. I was out drinking with another high school friend, and we were talking about everyone who had gotten married, who had kids, who had kids and didn't get married, who was already divorced - the usual small town gossip. The aforementioned friend had just had a kid, and we were commenting on how....(not unlikely....surprising?) that was.
And then his brother died.
Can you imagine how awful that must be, to be celebrating the birth of your child one day, and mourning the loss of your sibling the next?
I sent a short message to my friend, and am planning on going to the funeral, but the whole thing is leaving me feeling just a little bit guilty. And of course, my own issues are resurfacing a bit more.
I'm still dealing with my depression and PTSD regarding Tori's death. Thankfully, the PTSD symptoms have mostly lessened over the past 2 years - the "wake up in the middle of the night screaming because she is drowning and just out of reach" nightmares happen only a few times a year now, and I don't get panic attacks from discussing pediatric death cases. I still have "triggers" of course, but I think they're more related to the general depression.
We talked a lot about death in my ethics class this week - specifically, if patients have the right to refuse treatment and consequently, the right to die. We watched and discussed the infamous Dax case - to be quite frank, it made me ANGRY. For me, death can be awful, but not nearly as awful as some other outcomes. I think there's a very important reason we wish our dead to "rest in peace".
It's also not helping that my grandfather is in the hospital again, and my mother doesn't seem to feel the need to tell me until several days after the fact. This is now the 3rd time he's had to go in for various reasons, and I've asked her to tell me when it happens, and she didn't bother to tell me until 3 days after the fact - and at my brother's football game.
My issues with my family right now are a whole other story, but I'm just at a bit of a loss right now. Thankfully school is going well and I've got some fun projects coming up to keep me distracted. I just really hope death doesn't come in threes this time.
I think the reason his brother's death is hitting me so hard (besides my own issues with death) is that I had been sort of gossiping about him just a few days before his brother died. I was out drinking with another high school friend, and we were talking about everyone who had gotten married, who had kids, who had kids and didn't get married, who was already divorced - the usual small town gossip. The aforementioned friend had just had a kid, and we were commenting on how....(not unlikely....surprising?) that was.
And then his brother died.
Can you imagine how awful that must be, to be celebrating the birth of your child one day, and mourning the loss of your sibling the next?
I sent a short message to my friend, and am planning on going to the funeral, but the whole thing is leaving me feeling just a little bit guilty. And of course, my own issues are resurfacing a bit more.
I'm still dealing with my depression and PTSD regarding Tori's death. Thankfully, the PTSD symptoms have mostly lessened over the past 2 years - the "wake up in the middle of the night screaming because she is drowning and just out of reach" nightmares happen only a few times a year now, and I don't get panic attacks from discussing pediatric death cases. I still have "triggers" of course, but I think they're more related to the general depression.
We talked a lot about death in my ethics class this week - specifically, if patients have the right to refuse treatment and consequently, the right to die. We watched and discussed the infamous Dax case - to be quite frank, it made me ANGRY. For me, death can be awful, but not nearly as awful as some other outcomes. I think there's a very important reason we wish our dead to "rest in peace".
It's also not helping that my grandfather is in the hospital again, and my mother doesn't seem to feel the need to tell me until several days after the fact. This is now the 3rd time he's had to go in for various reasons, and I've asked her to tell me when it happens, and she didn't bother to tell me until 3 days after the fact - and at my brother's football game.
My issues with my family right now are a whole other story, but I'm just at a bit of a loss right now. Thankfully school is going well and I've got some fun projects coming up to keep me distracted. I just really hope death doesn't come in threes this time.
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