I really don't have a huge excuse for the giant and obvious lack of documentation of the last three months of my life, other than to say that, as the last post probably makes obvious, surgery was an incredibly difficult two months for me--mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, medically...you get the idea. The place I found myself in at the end of the rotation was not a pretty one, and while I expected to bounce back quickly with a celebratory end-of-surgery Royal Wedding Watch Party, getting back to normal was not as easy as I'd thought. In fact, I found myself to be, for lack of a better word, lost. For quite some time. I spent much of my family medicine rotation attempting to find the part of myself that surgery had someone beaten out of me, but in the end it was not something that could be forced. Instead, the defeated and sad little humanist, joy-in-medicine and champion-of-underdogs that lives in my head came crawling back slowly over time and, with the help of excellent friends, a husband with the patience of Job, a lighter rotation that allowed for some restoration of sanity, and a week at the beach, and a little help from Harry Potter, I seem to have found myself again.
So. Enough of all that depressing stuff.
A quick wrap-up of the past three months: I finished surgery and survived all of that. I spent a week in the PICU doing career exploration (saw some neat stuff), six weeks on family medicine (4 weeks out in rural areas in a private practice, where I had a minor career crisis thinking I liked it and was then reminded that day-in/day-out cholesterol checks are NOT. MY. THING.), and a week at the beach restoring my soul. It all went by too quickly. Now I'm officially a fourth year (!!!!), but unfortunately it doesn't feel like it very much yet because I start on neurology, one of the only two "required" rotations of the year. So really, because I'm still rotating through with only my class, we get no senior standing about other students, no special privileges, and aren't doing anything fun or new or interesting like many of my classmates who began the year with electives or Acting Internships. Add to that the fact that we still have to take a test at the end of the month (something practically unheard of in fourth year), and it feels like an extension of junior year. Luckily it's only four weeks, one of which is already over. I'm currently on the stroke service at our hospital, and after this week I get to switch to child neurology which I'm hoping will be much more exciting (or at least a lot cuter).
I'm also in the process of beginning residency applications, which I'm sure will be the source of many more posts in the near future. I've filled out the "Resume" portion of the application already--we can basically start entering everything now but can't turn it in until September 1. The big issue at this point is working on my personal statement--why I want to be a pediatrician/would be awesome at your institution/what I want from you/please accept me I'm awesome in 1 page or less. Woot. In fact, that's what I should be working on right now, but obviously procrastinating here is a much more desirable use of my time. Ah, well...perhaps if I go actually get it done, I can come back here and explain the insane process that is the residency application or something later.
Til' then, it's good to be back.
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