Remediation

I've been preparing for my anatomy remediation exam these past couple of weeks. The material was actually easier (less boring) this time around because I was able to put it in physiologic context.  It still sucked having to memorize random useless shit:  "the plantaris m. is a vestigial structure" "septum transverserum becomes the liver and diaphram"

Is it necessary to use limited neural connections on these things?  I do understand the importance of having a strong anatomy foundation -like knowing the arcuate line- it would be disastrous to sew up the wrong layers- they showed us the photographs. But foundations are usually made of large bricks/slabs and mortar not itty-bitty pebbles. Jeez.

I met with the course director on Monday.  I had described him before as being funny, over-the-top and somewhat misogynistic ( I use that term carefully w/ the updated 2012 definition: entrenched prejudices against women.  I don't think he hates us).  He obviously had his favorites among the male students, rarely called on women and his anatomical examples were always skewed to more represent the masculine anatomy.

During our meeting though, he was really gentle, helpful and understanding. I had gone in with shaking knees and an underlying deep mortification with being in this situation (never again!)  but he put me at ease.  He made me feel as if this wasn't a great deal and even shared stories of his own graduate school struggles with failing a course.  He asked me how the other courses had gone and nodded knowingly when I confessed that I had a much easier time with physiology and immunology.  "You have an analytical mind" he told me. He even confessed that he was the same, liking concepts more than memorization and how ironic it was that he ended up an anatomy professor.

He then flipped open a manila file, riffled through the pages and began rattling off advice:

Know the anastomoses around the stomach
Know the course of the gonadal vessels
Understand straddle injuries, the cremasteric reflex, portal varices, I 8 10 eggs AT 12, water under the bridge, this is going to be leg and pelvis heavy, 2 radiology questions- think Dr. Y (I knew this meant one was an abdominal ultrasound), 6 cardiac, 2 lung, an adrenal, the unhappy triad, exceptions to para/sympathetic....

Realizing that he was looking at the exam questions, I started scribbling notes trying to keep up with his rapid fire proclamations then went home and studied specifics.

I sat for the exam this morning and he had been right: it was very leg and pelvis heavy. It was also foot heavy and neck heavy. I didn't do very well on it but I passed.

When I was notified about my medical school acceptance, the joy I felt far outweighed the relief. That was a great feeling. Because the powers that determine who gets invited for interview/acceptance are behind closed doors with ambiguous criteria (beyond grades/MCAT), it didn't feel like an anticipated failure, my fear of being denied. So the joy at hearing the "we want you" was pretty pure.

The joy I felt today having heard (read- I was notified via email) that I passed was pretty gritty. My fear of failure far outweighed the anticipation of the news. There has been times that life has been pretty tough: deciding to take both parents off life support (different times), grieving, recovering from an abusive relationship, feeling unlovable, getting laid off, the stress of living in a house I couldn't afford... etc etc. 

I'm pretty familiar with the grit life throws at you like rice at a wedding.  Today though, today, I felt a gritty joy. And it was fucking awesome.

Cheers.

I Live in a Forest

I had a meeting on Friday with a Dean about my summer remediation of anatomy. I'm not worried about the big test; I know that my struggles in the fall were mostly due to depression/loneliness/dislike of the course director. I'm much more focused now than I was then.

It sucks that I failed but to bastardize Cressida "Things failed are finished, joy's soul lies in the doing".  In all honesty, though it's really embarrassing and a pain that I'm going through this (I still haven't told a soul- besides you lovely blog readers), I could care less, maybe because I've experienced real loss and real regret (parents dying, words that can't be unspoken etc). I've gotten into the habit of looking at something and, if it'll stick to my soul twenty years into the future, then I'll give a shit. But having a P* instead of a P on my transcript, bullocks.

I won't fail another class if only to avoid the endless meetings with people who want to advise me, both my faculty mentors, a Dean of student affairs, a Dean of the study center, the advising center, the course director.  They all want to reassure me that it's okay, that I'll do alright in the remediation and that this won't affect my overall standing, that despite this, because of my performance in other classes, I'm actually towards the top of the class.

One positive aside, throughout the endless meetings, people have told me that with my hospital experience and people skills (apparently, I have great people skills) I'm going sail through 3rd year. Huh.

Anyhow: Here's my living room evolution. I'm too lazy to break down the cost factor. If you want to know just ask. Suffice to say, most of the money went to the plants. I used a clearance shower curtain (with sequins!) in the window treatment.

Evolution of South View Living Room

Current Manifestation: 

Evolution posts:

north living room & sunroom
west living room
east living room
east bedroom
west bedroom 

Evolution of a Bedroom, East View

I realized that I never mentioned how final exams went. A.W.E.S.O.M.E.  Both the (cumulative-ugh) physiology and immuno finals were insanely challenging. I wanted to cry when I finished because I was certain that I failed but I ended up doing really well. Huh.

Now that the semester is over, I can actually reflect on how I like the type of material that has complicated convoluted interconnections (immuno, metabolism, endocrine etc).  It's more interesting to learn and it's actually fun to apply- kind of like in Orgo when 'making' a certain molecule- being able to choose different paths to get to the same place.   I can't wait until patho next year when it gets really interesting.

As for the promised bedroom photos:

Here ya go.  Again, mostly rearrangements of my already owned stuff. I'll mark the cost of new things (mostly plants) in the photo captions.  I put the curtain up on the one side because I only had the one curtain rod left (& I was too cheap to buy another..) and I wanted to hide the ugly little AC unit.

Moving day. You can see that there's absolutely no privacy without the blinds. I hate blinds.

I switched the chairs out for the bench when I rearranged the bed.  The laundry basket is new: It was the cheapest wicker @ Bed Bath & Beyond. I don't remember how much it cost... under $20, I think.

The window film (and applicator) was apprx $15 at Home Depot. I didn't want to spend the $30+ on the decorative films so I got the cheap stuff and carved waves at the top to make it more interesting. I found a piece of scrap wood in the basement and the shelf brackets were about a dollar each at HD. Plants: orchids $8.99, aloe $3.99  at Trader Joes. The Ponytail Palm was $7.99 and the jade (RIP) was $5.99 @ HD. The jade was my first final exam fatality.

 FINAL (for now) result....

I love how glowy the room looks with all the mirrors (see west view). I really tried to position them to maximize light and minimize people reflection. I do NOT want to stare at my own sorry self all the time. I actually have to bend and crane to see myself in any of the mirrors. Phew. 
 

I picked up the shelf ($5) and the Sheepskin ($9) from Ikea. The Dracaena was $6 @HD.

The shelf & brackets were about $7.00 at HD.

So all in all, I spent less than $25/month deuglifying my bedroom (east/west). I've convinced myself that that's okay because I'm saving 3x that by not having cable TV. 

Sucky Happiness

It's been some time since I've been here!

I stumbled and tripped and eventually failed anatomy by 3 (three!!!!) points.  Out of 550.  That SUCKED. SUCKED. SUCKED. It still sucks.  I'll need to remediate over the summer.  Sucky.

I've spoken with a dean of student affairs and have contacted our learning center peeps for advice but haven't told anyone else (like family).  I'm too embarrassed. 

It was so frustrating; I honored every other course and even scored perfectly on the radiology final. I'm not stupid. I'm not. I swear. Three points!

I'm so happy to be in physiology. It's amazing how much easier it is for me to study. It's like a never-ending fountain of really cool, useful information. I can seriously lose hours chasing down information...

This semester is also bunches less isolating than last. I've finally found a small group of like-minded dedicated, irreverent and curious study partners.  One of our assignments for the 'doctoring' course was to take a personality test. It turns out everyone in my study group is an INTJ.  We're basically rational curious and pedantic people who don't do feelings.  It's an awesome experience to meet up after lecture to argue with people about the role, if any, that plasma skimming has in the delineation of pulmonary zones. (you know... zones 1-3 and their ventilation efficiency).  It reminds me of my high school physics class and the arguments of black hole gravitational forces that I'd have with my friends while playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (I was always a tree-climbing elf- FYI)... completely irrelevant to the required class material but so interesting...

So.. despite my sucky sucky nightmare of having to repeat anatomy... life is pretty awesome. And I'm happy.

Cheers. :D

Homestretch with a Limp

I hate anatomy and I hate how my instructors are teaching it.  Their personalities are fun and their talks can be really entertaining but they're incredibly sexist: 64 slides on the male lower abdomen and sexual organs, ONE slide on the female anatomy, not a single female specific anatomy part on our 'to find' list but 18 male specific anatomy parts and yes we do have female cadavers.  I could go on and on with other examples***. I worry that it's not preparing us enough for the boards and clinical but more so I worry that this sort of sexism is pervasive throughout medicine and the course teaches for that.

This block has been tortuous. I've struggled to keep my motivation and bombed my first two exams. I need an 85% on our final to pass the course. I've been gunning the last couple of weeks because the idea of having to repeat this is about the worst nightmare I can think of right now. Besides, if I fail, I lose my scholarship thus costing me 60K. How's that for a perspective?

Last Friday, we had our 1st year radiology final. It was an independent study course that paralleled topics that we covered in our other classes.  The game of identifying different structures on different films was awesome.  I did well on it and it gave me some much needed confidence and motivation. Anatomy isn't medicine... Anatomy isn't medicine...

I have 4 more exams, including anatomy, in the next two weeks. Then, absolute, no guilt for not studying freedom.


*** Ok, one more example: 'fun' slides demonstrating aging included before/after photographs. For the male examples, we were given various faculty members and politicians. As women, we're expected to age like Sophia Loren and Madonna. ARGGHHHH! Seriously?????

Exams, Here and Gone

There are a couple of folks in my small group section who 'know everything and are always right'. Ahem. Cough. Cough.

It drives me crazy when they come to a conclusion and then stop without considering another idea.  Several times now, an alternative answer has been dismissed or an inconsistency has been pointed out and then ignored. It's not that big of a deal; we're all pretty respectful of each other and, most of the time, we listen to the others' contributions. It's just that, maybe because we're being overwhelmed with new information, there lies a thread of intellectual laziness, an 'I don't understand why- I just memorize the correct answer' attitude.

It's just that I tend to want to look really deeply and make things more complicated. It's a study habit I've had since high school. Wondering "what if?" helps me to really incorporate the material, see it from all angles and prepare for scenarios that may be presented on exams.  I know that it's probably annoying when I seem to make mountains out of anthills but there have been several occasions when I've been completely on the mark of what the profs are looking for. (sometimes I'm totally off-base- but we'll disregard that as it doesn't support my point :) )

Anyway, it happened again on 3 of the problems today. Huzzah! I feel so smugly validated at being right.  (I'm sure my classmates never noticed, in hindsight, that I gave the correct answer, but I sure did!)

I also honored my first exam!