Day 736: You don't even know

An undergraduate co-intern (from the summer of 2009 and now he's back this quarter) here at the lab said something of interest to me yesterday.

"You don't even recognize how much your status has changed here in the lab. April is asking you to do cell cultures. Patrick's asking you to show him how to use the imaging machine."

...huh. Granted, the general productivity of my everyday lab life is low, but I suppose I have gained some knowledge here. All in all, that was a nice comment to receive.

Day 731: All feelings are fleeting

I am like an excited atom in an orbital way above my energy level. I am getting all of my essays written and they still feel fresh. I wanted to tell you this because I know how ephemeral this feeling is. After three months of writing, writing, writing, I will be fraying at the seams, utterly sick of selling myself and thinking of original ways to say the same thing.

Be warned.

Day 729: Control issues

These are the many websites I have to deal with.

Applying is a long, draining, annoying process. The things I can control--such as filling in my coursework, writing my personal statement, describing my activities--I have. Things I can't--when my transcripts arrive and getting my recommendations from the recommenders--are what's troubling me. I have done everything on my part to call registrars and remind my recommenders, but ultimately, it's a waiting game. Let me tell you how much I abhor waiting.

Day 726: More shadowing

With the help of my best friend (and her parents), I had the opportunity to shadow a pediatric neurologist. I shadowed him on two occasions. The first was, honestly, a bit boring. It was liking attending a doctor's appoint, except I wasn't the patient. The doctor was still very gracious and kind and the experience was still good overall -- just not what I thought it would be.

The second instance was a better. I mainly shadowed the resident who was super sweet. She talked me through a lot of things and listened to all of my application troubles. The second shadowing was at a degenerative neurological diseases clinic and it was quite sad. Or rather the idea of it. The kids all looked super healthy and like normal kids. Unfortunately, normal won't last very long. Which is just plain depressing to think about.

Overall, the whole experience was fantastic. It gave me more clinical experience, which I think is imperative for my impending applications.

Thank you BFFFH!

Day 719: Classes, Shadows and Recognition

Classes...

...are o-v-e-r! I am officially done taking classes for medical school. I could probably keep taking courses (more advanced ones to a) show I still want to learn, and b) further improve/maintain my GPA) but I'm going to pass.

...in medical school.

I partook in a child psychiatry rotation at a medical school. It was actually pretty interesting. Apparently, students take tests all the time (shocker) in med school and clinical rotations aren't any different. The doctor teaching the course is a friend-of-a-friend and he is crazyawesome. We have similar personalities and beliefs so we chat very comfortably. Chatting with him actually got me back in the mindset to re-apply and sell, sell, sell (me)!

Shadows...

...aren't always creepy. I shadowed said-child-psychiatrist at his place of work and that was fascinating. The children there are all sorts of different and behaviorally...unstable. It wasn't a bad thing. It was really interesting to see how the environment was structured (meaning a lot of structure) because of the lack of structure (and stability) in the children's lives.

Recognition...

...comes when you least expect it. Long story short, my boss at my internship (Dr. Z) has not disdained my presence as of late and actually told a researcher to make sure he put my name on a manuscript! What?! Oh I know. That's how I felt.

Day 718: Apologies

I know, I know. My attempts at blogging regularly have fallen absurdly short.

I also tend to write a lot, which is really boring. People want pictures! Visuals! Ooh! Ahh!

Since I'm a people-pleaser...

This was my life as of late (lots of biochem studying and very recently, med school applications!):

I've also been baking a bit:

Rather than picture-spam you all.  I'm going to leave it there.

A post of substance, coming up soon. Really.

P.S. The belated buns pictures are up.

Day 687: A trend

As I'm sure some of you have noticed, 2010 has not been my year for blogging. A lot of it has to do with my feelings of ineptitude, which really aren't that big of a deal. I want to thank those of you who took the time out to check in with me and make sure I wasn't in terrible shape. I'm not. I just needed to get those feelings out there (in the blogosphere) so they wouldn't be in here (points to my stomach). I have to make room for food, not feelings :P

Anyway, to be more true to the subtitle of this blog, things that are happening that are med-school related...

• Still interning. Lately there has been a lull in my duties, which was fine when I had exams but is currently not-so-fine now that I'm feeling rather useless in my life.
  
  
• With the help of the most amazing best friend in the entire universe, I'm going to shadow a physician in the upcoming month(s).
  
  
• I have a new biochem professor who I liken to the devil. She is very different from my first professor (who went and had a baby boy) and not in a good way. She's rather Socratic about her teaching style, asking the students lots of questions and expecting responses, which works for liberal arts subjects but not for science. We're not a chatty class, so I don't enjoy wasting time waiting for someone to answer, then having students guess incorrectly, then have Professor #2 pseudo-admonish us for guessing/not-knowing, then she moves on, and then the entire cycle repeats itself. She's going to be a, pardon my French, hard-ass, which sucks because Professor #1 was the most laid-back professor ever. So, all in all, crappy change.

I have more to say, but I feel like this post is text-heavy as it is. I'll save it for another post and try to be as regular about updating as I have been in the past.