Two days and we're up to our eyeballs in information we have to know, projects we have to complete and tests we have to plan for. Wow.
If feels a little less stressful, but I think I'll be just as competitive and stressed about the tests this quarter. Maybe it's my nature or maybe it's the fact that I'm scared sh**less about the residency match. I don't know what I want to get into at this point, but staying here in AZ is looking better and better - if I have the option.
Well, time to review today's lectures and preview tomorrow's Phys. lecture. Hopefully I can get to bed in time to be able to run before class. Even though the temperature has dropped a lot (in the 40's in the morning) I'm trying to wear shorts still because they fit better. My jeans and pants are either stained and ratty or uncomfortably tight :(.
Tuesday, November 30, 2004
Saturday, November 27, 2004
What happened to my break??
Two weeks since my last post? Boy did that go fast. It started out as expected. I got in a couple runs with my dog, caught up on sleep and met a couple classmates at the anatomy lab. We divided up sutures and starting trying to act like surgeons on our cadavers, but quickly realized we had no idea what we were doing. We planned to meet again after reading a guide or manual but events kind of took over for me.
My grandfather's prognosis worsened dramatically when we learned that his bowels were dead around the 14th. No one expected him to regain consciousness. So I booked a flight to Chicago for Thursday the 18th. My brother flew in late that night after I had a chance to see our family patriarch, Papa, in the hospital. I guess I missed the worst of it, when the gout was so bad that even unconscious he would just about sit up in pain at the slightest touch. By the time I got there, he was heavily sedated with Fentanyl. At that point it was just a matter of time, so the goal was to make him comfortable.
Friday I basically said goodbye to him and agreed with the family that we should disconnect his ventilator. Friday night I followed family tradition and got blitzed a bar near the hospital with a cousin and my brother. I spend time with my uncles, aunts and cousins Saturday and we all saw Papa one last time. He passed away early Sunday morning.
Becky and the kids flew in Sunday for the wake on Tuesday and funeral on Wednesday. We visited lots of my relatives (mostly a good thing :-) and showed the boys Sue (the largest T. Rex in the world) at the Natural History Museum. The wake was really a showing of Papa body in the funeral home. No memorabilia, no cheers or old stories. Papa looked horrible (totally unlike himself) and the boys were bored for the seven hours from 2pm to 9pm. I think he would have liked something much celebratory, even if it required some libations. We are a fairly typical Irish Catholic family :-).
The snow storm started Wednesday so it was a cold. As a pallbearer from Arizona, I was underdressed. A black suit with a parka didn't cut it. The procession was at least 30 cars long from the funeral home to the church and then to the cemetary. The Mass was ok except that the priest was new didn't seem to know anything about Papa (who had been an active member for more than 40 yrs) or how to do his job. The boys were gems in their new black suits and my dad, Papa's first son, did a nice talk on Papa's organization skills benefitting the church's Octoberfest's for many years.
At the cemetary we had to have a short ceremony indoors the weather was so bad. Two soldiers dedicated a flag to Papa in a nice ceremony that recognized his service to the country in WWII. In fact he was buried with his Purple Heart which he received over the Pacific in a B-25. He lost most of the muscle and flesh on his upper thighs from a flac shell exploding close to the plane, but managed to fly the plane another 380 miles back to base with his arms (the pilot had lost use of his arms but could operate the petals). We then met at Casey's, his favorite restuarant in Lombard. It was nice but hard to talk to anyone not at your table. And people left pretty quickly because the storm was dumping snow on the roads.
I got in trouble that evening with Becky for taking Dan to my cousins (and leaving here with the kids) to decompress as I like to call it. We played some dice games, had a couple drinks and then I returned to the hotel.
We spent Thanksgiving with my Dad and his wife. First we had a meal at Casey's and then went to my cousins to return her car. Talk about over-eating! But it was intersting for Becky and my parents to see Colleen's house. She's done VERY well in mortgages and has a 6800sf mansion beautifully decorated.
Yesterday we flew home after snowball fighting, one last "world's best" Ever Hotdog at Portillo's and a boring 4-5 hours at the airport. All-in-all we had enough Chicago hotdogs, chicago pizza and alcohol for many months (so much for losing weight over the break). But Papa would be happy that the family he anchored got together and shared many of our memories with him and created some new ones along the way. It will interesting to see how we do keeping in touch and getting together for family reunions now that he's gone.
Time to rush off to do some Xmas decoration and present shopping before Winter gets into full swing on Monday.
My grandfather's prognosis worsened dramatically when we learned that his bowels were dead around the 14th. No one expected him to regain consciousness. So I booked a flight to Chicago for Thursday the 18th. My brother flew in late that night after I had a chance to see our family patriarch, Papa, in the hospital. I guess I missed the worst of it, when the gout was so bad that even unconscious he would just about sit up in pain at the slightest touch. By the time I got there, he was heavily sedated with Fentanyl. At that point it was just a matter of time, so the goal was to make him comfortable.
Friday I basically said goodbye to him and agreed with the family that we should disconnect his ventilator. Friday night I followed family tradition and got blitzed a bar near the hospital with a cousin and my brother. I spend time with my uncles, aunts and cousins Saturday and we all saw Papa one last time. He passed away early Sunday morning.
Becky and the kids flew in Sunday for the wake on Tuesday and funeral on Wednesday. We visited lots of my relatives (mostly a good thing :-) and showed the boys Sue (the largest T. Rex in the world) at the Natural History Museum. The wake was really a showing of Papa body in the funeral home. No memorabilia, no cheers or old stories. Papa looked horrible (totally unlike himself) and the boys were bored for the seven hours from 2pm to 9pm. I think he would have liked something much celebratory, even if it required some libations. We are a fairly typical Irish Catholic family :-).
The snow storm started Wednesday so it was a cold. As a pallbearer from Arizona, I was underdressed. A black suit with a parka didn't cut it. The procession was at least 30 cars long from the funeral home to the church and then to the cemetary. The Mass was ok except that the priest was new didn't seem to know anything about Papa (who had been an active member for more than 40 yrs) or how to do his job. The boys were gems in their new black suits and my dad, Papa's first son, did a nice talk on Papa's organization skills benefitting the church's Octoberfest's for many years.
At the cemetary we had to have a short ceremony indoors the weather was so bad. Two soldiers dedicated a flag to Papa in a nice ceremony that recognized his service to the country in WWII. In fact he was buried with his Purple Heart which he received over the Pacific in a B-25. He lost most of the muscle and flesh on his upper thighs from a flac shell exploding close to the plane, but managed to fly the plane another 380 miles back to base with his arms (the pilot had lost use of his arms but could operate the petals). We then met at Casey's, his favorite restuarant in Lombard. It was nice but hard to talk to anyone not at your table. And people left pretty quickly because the storm was dumping snow on the roads.
I got in trouble that evening with Becky for taking Dan to my cousins (and leaving here with the kids) to decompress as I like to call it. We played some dice games, had a couple drinks and then I returned to the hotel.
We spent Thanksgiving with my Dad and his wife. First we had a meal at Casey's and then went to my cousins to return her car. Talk about over-eating! But it was intersting for Becky and my parents to see Colleen's house. She's done VERY well in mortgages and has a 6800sf mansion beautifully decorated.
Yesterday we flew home after snowball fighting, one last "world's best" Ever Hotdog at Portillo's and a boring 4-5 hours at the airport. All-in-all we had enough Chicago hotdogs, chicago pizza and alcohol for many months (so much for losing weight over the break). But Papa would be happy that the family he anchored got together and shared many of our memories with him and created some new ones along the way. It will interesting to see how we do keeping in touch and getting together for family reunions now that he's gone.
Time to rush off to do some Xmas decoration and present shopping before Winter gets into full swing on Monday.
Saturday, November 13, 2004
First Quarter done!!
I meant to write earlier but I've been in recovery mode since noon yesterday. I didn't do as well as I hoped on Biochem but the 88% was enough to squeak a 90% out of the class; 90.17% based on my calcs. (Amazingly they had our results back in about two hours. No wonder there wasn't any multiple choice!)
Anatomy and Histo/Embryo were similar. I had 88-89% on the finals and barely managed to stay in "A" territory, 92 and 90.8% respectively. OMM was pretty easy and I got a 95% even though I blew a rotation dx on L5. My partner got inominates and the Prof gave me L5 :(. I can hardly move L5 and probably should have just guessed a normal Type II dysfunction but NO, I had to go with what I felt :).
So that leaves Friday. After Biochem I studied a straight 12-13 hours with three classmates (gunners wouldn't be an inaccurate description). We seemed to clicking pretty well on Biochem, and this session seemed to confirm that we work well together. I just hope they help me pull my scores up a bit :). Most of the time was spent on ICM with about two hours on Human Behavior. Then I got up early and studied two more hours on the 8am Human Behavior final. Those 25 questions took me all of 15 minutes! It was such a joke that I didn't even review my answers. I found out later that 5 of the 25 questions had been thrown out. It's only 1 credit and I just don't care.
From 8:15 until 10am I studied ICM. I really feel like I got the information from lectures down pretty well. Some questions seemed out of the blue, but they were probably from the reading we were supposed to do. I think I did ok on it. It was the first test where we got to keep the questions so after reviewing them with fellow students I'm sure I got two wrong, which means I probably got 4-5 wrong total out of 40 questions. I passed.
Afterwards I hooked with a few of my old study partners at a bar in Scottsdale. We had a fun time as I unwinded with delicious Dos Gringos tacos and three marguaritas. They are a really nice group of people but just study at the level I like to. Unfortunately two of them will be decelerating, which I understand to mean retaking a few classes next year and doing Med school in 5 years. One guy is a really neat person with a great attitude that had to work through school to maintain healthcare coverage for his family. They have several serious and chronic problems so it's sad and amazing that he manages to keep his positive attitude. I really hope he finds a way to get out of work so he focus on his studies.
I got home in time to pick up the boys from school, take a quick nap, clean the house with the family and then greet my Mom as she arrived from Seattle. I also had the pleasure of reading the latest issue of Wired magazine. It's my favorite (SciAm is a distant 2nd) and it's been sitting on my desk for about two weeks.
Today I took two naps and walked/ran the dog for about 4 miles. It felt great. Man do I need to find a way to fit exercise into my schedule. If nothing else, it really helps me reduce the stress. I then went grocery shopping so we could host dinner for my mom, brother and his "girlfriend". Mom loved her and agrees he's crazy to hold out. She an adorable Japanese girl that he lived with in Japan for a year. It's obvious she came here for him and they still have feelings for eachother. He's driving her home at this moment, hopefully asking her to caravan with us to my dad's house for Thanksgiving. Then she'll have met the whole family - and I can get really be relentless about going ring shopping with him!
Anatomy and Histo/Embryo were similar. I had 88-89% on the finals and barely managed to stay in "A" territory, 92 and 90.8% respectively. OMM was pretty easy and I got a 95% even though I blew a rotation dx on L5. My partner got inominates and the Prof gave me L5 :(. I can hardly move L5 and probably should have just guessed a normal Type II dysfunction but NO, I had to go with what I felt :).
So that leaves Friday. After Biochem I studied a straight 12-13 hours with three classmates (gunners wouldn't be an inaccurate description). We seemed to clicking pretty well on Biochem, and this session seemed to confirm that we work well together. I just hope they help me pull my scores up a bit :). Most of the time was spent on ICM with about two hours on Human Behavior. Then I got up early and studied two more hours on the 8am Human Behavior final. Those 25 questions took me all of 15 minutes! It was such a joke that I didn't even review my answers. I found out later that 5 of the 25 questions had been thrown out. It's only 1 credit and I just don't care.
From 8:15 until 10am I studied ICM. I really feel like I got the information from lectures down pretty well. Some questions seemed out of the blue, but they were probably from the reading we were supposed to do. I think I did ok on it. It was the first test where we got to keep the questions so after reviewing them with fellow students I'm sure I got two wrong, which means I probably got 4-5 wrong total out of 40 questions. I passed.
Afterwards I hooked with a few of my old study partners at a bar in Scottsdale. We had a fun time as I unwinded with delicious Dos Gringos tacos and three marguaritas. They are a really nice group of people but just study at the level I like to. Unfortunately two of them will be decelerating, which I understand to mean retaking a few classes next year and doing Med school in 5 years. One guy is a really neat person with a great attitude that had to work through school to maintain healthcare coverage for his family. They have several serious and chronic problems so it's sad and amazing that he manages to keep his positive attitude. I really hope he finds a way to get out of work so he focus on his studies.
I got home in time to pick up the boys from school, take a quick nap, clean the house with the family and then greet my Mom as she arrived from Seattle. I also had the pleasure of reading the latest issue of Wired magazine. It's my favorite (SciAm is a distant 2nd) and it's been sitting on my desk for about two weeks.
Today I took two naps and walked/ran the dog for about 4 miles. It felt great. Man do I need to find a way to fit exercise into my schedule. If nothing else, it really helps me reduce the stress. I then went grocery shopping so we could host dinner for my mom, brother and his "girlfriend". Mom loved her and agrees he's crazy to hold out. She an adorable Japanese girl that he lived with in Japan for a year. It's obvious she came here for him and they still have feelings for eachother. He's driving her home at this moment, hopefully asking her to caravan with us to my dad's house for Thanksgiving. Then she'll have met the whole family - and I can get really be relentless about going ring shopping with him!
Monday, November 08, 2004
Two finals down...
These were pretty darn hard. I studied long and (I believe) productively for them, but as one of my smart study buddies said; "this was one of those tests where I never got into a groove".
I think I probably missed a couple on the practicals, but they didn't seem too hard. (Of course I'm knocking on wood as I write this) The writtens though, both (Gross and Histo/Embryo) kept me off balance the whole time. I never could get comfortable in a section feeling that I really knew the material. I'm not sure what that means for my grades, but at least everyone else seemed to feel the same way.
I passed. And I've recovered from getting way too stressed about the whole thing. I keep forgetting not to stress out about getting high grades. I want to do my best, but it's more than that. Maybe it's my competitive nature, or my fear that is my last chance at a career choice (Residency).
I celebrated by taking Cedar, my golden retriever, on a long walk. We explored unpaved areas (washes as they are called in AZ) so that I can try to start running again over the break. I desperately need to start exercising regularly again. I want to shed the few pounds I've gained this quarter, but more importantly, work off the stress this Med School thing generates.
On to Biochem for the next 60 or so hours. Then 24 hours of ICM and Human Behavior fun.
I think I probably missed a couple on the practicals, but they didn't seem too hard. (Of course I'm knocking on wood as I write this) The writtens though, both (Gross and Histo/Embryo) kept me off balance the whole time. I never could get comfortable in a section feeling that I really knew the material. I'm not sure what that means for my grades, but at least everyone else seemed to feel the same way.
I passed. And I've recovered from getting way too stressed about the whole thing. I keep forgetting not to stress out about getting high grades. I want to do my best, but it's more than that. Maybe it's my competitive nature, or my fear that is my last chance at a career choice (Residency).
I celebrated by taking Cedar, my golden retriever, on a long walk. We explored unpaved areas (washes as they are called in AZ) so that I can try to start running again over the break. I desperately need to start exercising regularly again. I want to shed the few pounds I've gained this quarter, but more importantly, work off the stress this Med School thing generates.
On to Biochem for the next 60 or so hours. Then 24 hours of ICM and Human Behavior fun.
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Goodbye First Quarter...
Tomorrow is the last day of my first quarter of medical school. Well, I still have finals next week, but instruction and week 10 are just about over. Wow!
It has gone so fast. And I've learned so much. And the next week of finals I had better learn a bunch more :). As part of a group of 10 MSIs MSIIs I went to AZ State U. (ASU) last night. We were representing AZCOM to the pre-med chapter of AMSA. Unfortunately there were only about 209 of them but they sure were jazzed about Osteopathy and AZCOM by the time we left. They want to meet again on the AZCOM campus and see the school and I expect word will get around and we'll have a lot bigger crowd.
Before we started a transplant surgeon from the local Mayo hospital talked and it was incredible. He was supportive of DOs which was cool, but his presentation on live donor liver transplants was awe inspiring. Their rejection rate is 3% (vs. 17% for cadaveric), 0% of donors have died and it only takes 2-4 weeks for both the recipient's and donor's livers to regenerate to full size! I hope we can get him to come to AZCOM and give his presentation to the SOSA club (including the video of one operation).
I also had lunch today with a couple PhDs Profs, a journal club they are starting up. I'm hoping to help with research one is doing this Spring (part-time) and Summer (full-time). I will be experimenting on PARC, an enzyme I know almost nothing about. However, it is crucial to managing P53 (and hence apoptosis), telomeres (aging) and several other pathways with huge pathological and pharmaceutical relevance. Sounds like we'll use UV energy to mutate specific regions of the enzyme. Bottom line is I make a few bucks, get some great bench time, hopefully get published and add some great experience to my CV for residency applications in a couple years (I've never done real research). Working with DNA and protein tools and technologies will be cool too.
Anyway, time to put the kids down and drive to the student lounge. I haven't gotten much studying this week so it's time to really hit the books. After the AMSA thing last night I crashed at 10:30pm and got a great night's sleep. I also did pretty well on my first OMM practical. I should add that I'm thinking more and more about family practice/primary care with some OMM. There are some real benefits - besides less stress in medical school.
Enough for now. We'll see how I'm doing after finals, while I'm enjoying two weeks of R&R.
It has gone so fast. And I've learned so much. And the next week of finals I had better learn a bunch more :). As part of a group of 10 MSIs MSIIs I went to AZ State U. (ASU) last night. We were representing AZCOM to the pre-med chapter of AMSA. Unfortunately there were only about 209 of them but they sure were jazzed about Osteopathy and AZCOM by the time we left. They want to meet again on the AZCOM campus and see the school and I expect word will get around and we'll have a lot bigger crowd.
Before we started a transplant surgeon from the local Mayo hospital talked and it was incredible. He was supportive of DOs which was cool, but his presentation on live donor liver transplants was awe inspiring. Their rejection rate is 3% (vs. 17% for cadaveric), 0% of donors have died and it only takes 2-4 weeks for both the recipient's and donor's livers to regenerate to full size! I hope we can get him to come to AZCOM and give his presentation to the SOSA club (including the video of one operation).
I also had lunch today with a couple PhDs Profs, a journal club they are starting up. I'm hoping to help with research one is doing this Spring (part-time) and Summer (full-time). I will be experimenting on PARC, an enzyme I know almost nothing about. However, it is crucial to managing P53 (and hence apoptosis), telomeres (aging) and several other pathways with huge pathological and pharmaceutical relevance. Sounds like we'll use UV energy to mutate specific regions of the enzyme. Bottom line is I make a few bucks, get some great bench time, hopefully get published and add some great experience to my CV for residency applications in a couple years (I've never done real research). Working with DNA and protein tools and technologies will be cool too.
Anyway, time to put the kids down and drive to the student lounge. I haven't gotten much studying this week so it's time to really hit the books. After the AMSA thing last night I crashed at 10:30pm and got a great night's sleep. I also did pretty well on my first OMM practical. I should add that I'm thinking more and more about family practice/primary care with some OMM. There are some real benefits - besides less stress in medical school.
Enough for now. We'll see how I'm doing after finals, while I'm enjoying two weeks of R&R.
Tuesday, November 02, 2004
First OMM Practical Tomorrow
The written test Monday was pretty easy. I got 94%, about 1/2% higher than the class LOL. Tomorrow is the Practical and that is a little more stressful. A complete structural run-down in 5 minutes and then a diagnosis for two of the four regions (cervical, thoracic, lumbar and inominates). On the latter you do a region survey, then they give you two joints to diagnose. It sounds like there's lots of subjective points and being our first Practical they won't be too hard, but it's still stressful.
This is the beginning of the end of the quarter. After this it's deep study mode for Anatomy on Monday, Biochem Thursday and then both Human Behavior and ICM on Friday. Luckily I've had a couple relatively easy days to rest up.
Saturday was traffic school all day which sucked as a way to spend my "free" time. Sunday I got a few good hours in on both OMM and Histo. Last night I got almost caught up on Histo. The plan is to get Histo done tonight and then spend the next two nights reviewing the last weeks of Biochem lectures. I'm not sure if that's going to happen though since I have to put the kids down and then practice for the OMM Practical. Plus I need more than 6 hours of sleep tonight.
Last thought, I went to a Family Practice lunch meeting today with three AZCOM graduates doing their residencies here in town at John C. Lincoln. It sounded pretty cool. I also got my first Hep B shot for my preceptorship required immunizations. This gave me more exposure to Family Practice at Midwestern's clinic. I am certainly not writing off primary care at this point. Even with managed care, it has a lot going for it.
Time to rock some sacrums!
This is the beginning of the end of the quarter. After this it's deep study mode for Anatomy on Monday, Biochem Thursday and then both Human Behavior and ICM on Friday. Luckily I've had a couple relatively easy days to rest up.
Saturday was traffic school all day which sucked as a way to spend my "free" time. Sunday I got a few good hours in on both OMM and Histo. Last night I got almost caught up on Histo. The plan is to get Histo done tonight and then spend the next two nights reviewing the last weeks of Biochem lectures. I'm not sure if that's going to happen though since I have to put the kids down and then practice for the OMM Practical. Plus I need more than 6 hours of sleep tonight.
Last thought, I went to a Family Practice lunch meeting today with three AZCOM graduates doing their residencies here in town at John C. Lincoln. It sounded pretty cool. I also got my first Hep B shot for my preceptorship required immunizations. This gave me more exposure to Family Practice at Midwestern's clinic. I am certainly not writing off primary care at this point. Even with managed care, it has a lot going for it.
Time to rock some sacrums!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)