I often feeling like I'm a fake medical student. All the other medical students are so excited about hands on training and getting to do procedures and all that jazz. I enjoy the occasional procedure. But really, I'd rather just listen to hearts and lungs and people's problems all day. If I could be a psychiatrist and cardiologist at the same time, I would. but I can't be a psychiatrist because I don't deal well with other crazies and I like my stethoscope too much.
What I do not like, is blood. I used to have all kinds of ways of justifying it. we'd be watching a gory movie and I would just say I didn't like the way it was portrayed, or that it was different in real life, or something. But when it comes right down to it, I'm just kinda squeamish. And I feel that that does not bode well for my future as a physician. I literally turn my head any time a television show or movie shows blood and guts. I do not think it is cool. I do not enjoy looking at it. But somehow I want to be a doctor. Hmmmm.
I thought I was getting over my crazy dislike of blood. when I lived in Jordan I almost passed out one day in the ER because there was this person with a huge gash in his hand and the doctor was like digging a probe in it to show me the tendons and everything. But I hadn't had a similar episode since starting school. Turns out that is probably because I haven't been around bleeding people since starting school. Sounds strange, since I work in hospitals. But except for the occasional blood draw, I really didnt have that much contact with blood. So I foolishly convinced myself I'd gotten over that fear.
Wrong. Monday I was watching a skin biopsy, again of the hand, of this little old lady. The doc was taking a chunk of her skin to send to pathology to see if it was cancer. I was going find until he was done, and she was spewing blood (or just leaking a little) and he was showing me the tendon again (maybe it's the tendon I'm scared of?) and then felt like I was going to pass out. I managed to play it off pretty well, he didn't notice, but I felt sick the rest of the day.
Then the next day, when I'm finally starting to feel better, he tells me that another patient is coming in for a skin biopsy of her nose the next day and I could do it. Any other medical student would have been so excited to get that chance. Not this one. My first thought was "holy crap how do I get out of this?" But throughout the day I slowly resigned myself to the fact that unless I wanted to be unfairly judged, I had better pretned to be excited about this. So this morning, full of terror at 1) mangling some poor old woman's face and 2) passing out, I brought a tomato to work to practice, under the direct supervision of the doctor.
After watching me work my magic on the tomato, the doc said "I think for this one I'm just going to let you see one." Awesome shot to the self esteem. But, I was happy, although I will admit slightly bummed, that I didn't have to do it. I just watched. And for some reason, the blood didn't bother me today, good news. And just as I'm getting out of there thinking how lucky I am, the doc tells me someone else needs a biospy later and that one will be all mine.
Who was it? A nurse at the doc's office who had WATCHED ME DESTROY THE TOMATO. Apparently she has no fear, and really believes in teaching students, because she let me go to town with her skin. Hacked off a nice slice of it, and it bled like crazy, and my hands were shaking, but I didn't pass out. But, I honestly don't want to do another one, ever again in my whole life.
What can I say? I don't like procedures. I think that makes me weird, abnormal, not cut out to be a doctor, but that's just the way I am. I have no interest in sticking people or cutting them up or removing things from them or inserting things into them. My personal nightmare: knowing one day I may have to remove someone's toe nail. I might vomit all over them, that shit is gross. I would rather a patient vomit on me, to be honest, that doesn't bother me at all.
Eventually I'll be able to find a career that involves only those things I like: my stethoscope, looking in people's ears, looking in their eyes, talking to them about their problems. I don't think I'm going to be in a position that involves a lot of cutting, blood, guts, etc. But until I get to that point, I have to put on my brave face and pretend I really enjoy making other people bleed so that I can stop their bleeding. It's going to be a long couple of years...
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Saturday, September 25, 2010
I know exactly how you feel
I have found, during my months of soul searching, the the thing that helps most is having someone who feels the same way you do. It helps to normalize feelings and make you think that you are not as crazy or messed up or horrible as you seem. For instance, it really helped me to know that other students struggle in medical school. It always helps me when my best friend says "man I hate that bitch" whenever we find out one of our friends is engaged. Because I'm not the only person who deep down inside hates everyone for being happier than I am. It's comforting, in it's own sick way. It makes me feel like I'm not as horrible of a person to hear other people say that they know how I feel, and actually do. At first I thought it was just because then I didn't feel like such a bad person. and it is still kind of like that, but there is more to it I think. It's comforting to know that other people feel the same way I do because it makes my feelings seem somewhat rational. It doesn't always take the feelings away, but then I at least don't have to worry about also feeling bad about the way I feel.
Case in point. When I failed the boards, the best part of that day was when a friend of mine called and said she also failed the boards. At first I felt like a horrible person for thinking that way. Because my immediate reaction to her failing wasn't "oh I wish that hadn't happened to her" or "that sucks" but rather "YES! Someone else failed." I didn't necessarily want it to be her, I'm very sorry she failed, but it was comforting to have someone else who I knew and got along with and felt on par with also fail the boards. But then I felt guilty and like a horrible person because I was glad she also failed. Part of it was, I'll admit, vindictive. Yes, someone else failed. Someone else has to go through what I'm going through. But mostly it was just comfort at not being alone. And when she told me that the only thing that got her through finding out she'd failed the boards was knowing that I had failed too and there was someone else going through what she was going through, I was finally able to at least let go of the guilt of having those feelings. One less feeling to have.
That same friend and I were talking the other day about all the other crazy feelings that we have that we are ashamed of, but that the two of us share so hopefully everyone has those feelings. It made me feel better at least to hear that she also felt the same way about certain things. Like how we've gotten to the point where we get mad at other people in class for being curious. Ask a question of someone and you are sure to have earned my scorn. Why? Is it because you asking a question makes me feel dumb? Or like I should be more interested? Why is it that when you ask a question about something I have no interest in finding out the answer? Then I just feel bad because I no longer care to know about things. And I can justify this all I want- oh I have so much to learn already, I can't take in anymore, whatever-but when it comes down to it I still feel bad for the feeling. Until someone else comes along and says "yeah, I totally feel that way. When someone asks a question I get frustrated that I'm going to have to sit and listen through an answer instead of being excited/interested to know what the answer is." A breath of fresh air. Because now I can convince myself that everyone feels this way.
Normalizing the feelings at least helps me to not feel bad for the way I feel or react to things. And I think that it may be the secret to really helping other people get through hard times. I mean, it won't always work. Because you can't really normalize murdering someone or stealing or stuff like that. But you can normalize wanted to throw a rock at a window for no good reason (also known as a compulsion) or your immediate reaction to your friend telling you she is engaged being "that bitch I hate her!" instead of feeling joy for another person's joy. Having someone else tell me they went through the same problems I'm going through helps me not feel so alone in the world all the time, no matter what it is I'm going through. Someone else failing a test, someone else wondering every day why they are doing what they are doing, someone else feeling envious or infuriated at friends just because they are smarter, someone else hating every second of the past two years. It's a sense of camaraderie with other people, something to tether you back to the world of others.
So really all I can say is I know how you feel. And I hope that knowing someone else is feeling the same way comforts you as it has managed to comfort me
Case in point. When I failed the boards, the best part of that day was when a friend of mine called and said she also failed the boards. At first I felt like a horrible person for thinking that way. Because my immediate reaction to her failing wasn't "oh I wish that hadn't happened to her" or "that sucks" but rather "YES! Someone else failed." I didn't necessarily want it to be her, I'm very sorry she failed, but it was comforting to have someone else who I knew and got along with and felt on par with also fail the boards. But then I felt guilty and like a horrible person because I was glad she also failed. Part of it was, I'll admit, vindictive. Yes, someone else failed. Someone else has to go through what I'm going through. But mostly it was just comfort at not being alone. And when she told me that the only thing that got her through finding out she'd failed the boards was knowing that I had failed too and there was someone else going through what she was going through, I was finally able to at least let go of the guilt of having those feelings. One less feeling to have.
That same friend and I were talking the other day about all the other crazy feelings that we have that we are ashamed of, but that the two of us share so hopefully everyone has those feelings. It made me feel better at least to hear that she also felt the same way about certain things. Like how we've gotten to the point where we get mad at other people in class for being curious. Ask a question of someone and you are sure to have earned my scorn. Why? Is it because you asking a question makes me feel dumb? Or like I should be more interested? Why is it that when you ask a question about something I have no interest in finding out the answer? Then I just feel bad because I no longer care to know about things. And I can justify this all I want- oh I have so much to learn already, I can't take in anymore, whatever-but when it comes down to it I still feel bad for the feeling. Until someone else comes along and says "yeah, I totally feel that way. When someone asks a question I get frustrated that I'm going to have to sit and listen through an answer instead of being excited/interested to know what the answer is." A breath of fresh air. Because now I can convince myself that everyone feels this way.
Normalizing the feelings at least helps me to not feel bad for the way I feel or react to things. And I think that it may be the secret to really helping other people get through hard times. I mean, it won't always work. Because you can't really normalize murdering someone or stealing or stuff like that. But you can normalize wanted to throw a rock at a window for no good reason (also known as a compulsion) or your immediate reaction to your friend telling you she is engaged being "that bitch I hate her!" instead of feeling joy for another person's joy. Having someone else tell me they went through the same problems I'm going through helps me not feel so alone in the world all the time, no matter what it is I'm going through. Someone else failing a test, someone else wondering every day why they are doing what they are doing, someone else feeling envious or infuriated at friends just because they are smarter, someone else hating every second of the past two years. It's a sense of camaraderie with other people, something to tether you back to the world of others.
So really all I can say is I know how you feel. And I hope that knowing someone else is feeling the same way comforts you as it has managed to comfort me
Friday, September 17, 2010
I actually don't like other medical students
Don't get me wrong, I have some AMAZING friends in my class and within the school. But outside of them, if I don't have to spend time with other students, my life is actually much happier.
This is a new finding for me. I had always enjoyed the pack mentality in the past. Working together, having someone else to feed off of, having someone to cover me if I didn't know what was going on, having someone to bitch too when things weren't going right. And it worked great in things like anatomy, where I sure as hell didn't want to be doing all that work by myself. I didn't want to be doing ANY of the work, so I needed a team. And when I first started volunteering for elective clinic sites, I never wanted to go alone. I needed someone there smarter than me who could show me the ropes so that I wasn't the dumb medical student always asking questions.
When did this realization that I really just don't enjoy being around others of my kind come in? In retrospect, it really started when I was studying for the boards the first time around. I started realizng that while I was dependent on other students being around so I didn't feel like I was suffering alone, really they made me suffer more. By constantly telling me what THEY were doing to study and how many hours they put in and how well they scored on practice tests really kinda made me want to kill myself. Self esteem dropped more and more by the day. Anxiety increased. Heart raced. And the amount of time I spent in the bathroom crying definitely increased. And then I fucking failed the boards anyway, so what good were those other students?
But I didn't really understand I didn't want to be around other medical students. I was very excited that I was doing my internal medicine rotation with other people in my class so I wouldn't be alone at Denver Health trying to survive each day without looking like a complete idiot. I even remember looking at the list and seeing I was on a team by myself but two of the students were on a team together and I was jealous that I wasn't on a team with someone else, that it was just me, fending for myself.
Now I thank God every day that He didn't put me on a team with anyone else. Why? Because medical students are evil, evil, backstabbing people. In the medical school situation that is. In general we are all very nice, well meaning people. But put us together and grade us against each other, and oooohhhh will we turn on each other. Sometimes you don't even realize that you've just been stabbed in the back. Example: another student bringing in an article FOR YOU because you guys had been talking baout it the day before. Seems friendly right? But no, it's really just a way for other student to show she is better than you. They were paying attention, they did some research, they showed that YOU didn't do the research but they did. Look at me look at me! Bitchslapped, that's what just happened.
But, I thought it was just the way of the world. The nature of the beast, so to speak, something you had to deal with. Then, I was sent to west side clinic. And at first, even with my hatred of other students, I was scared to be off on my own. I didn't want to! I needed someone! I needed a crutch. Maybe just a nice medical student? Maybe? Why must I go alone? I was terrified.
But then...oh then I realized the magical magical world of being the only medical student in a practice. It is amazing. Every day, I show up, and I don't have to worry about whether another medical student got there earlier than I did. Because God forbid I be the last medical student to show up. It'll look like I don't care. Even if I can get all my notes done in thirty minutes and pre-round on all my patients,so I dont NEED to be there at 5am, the fact that another student got there at 5am makes ME look bad! Even though I'm waymore efficient! The resident/attending won't necessarily see that. They'll see me meandering in all late and stuff while other medical students are diligently and happily there working before I am. It's a no win situation!
But at West Side, I could just show up, no worries. And then, when patients came, I just got to have them. I didn't have to fight for them with another student. They were just mine. I could spend all the time I wanted with one, and do my job, and actually learn things, instead of spending all my time worrying that the other medical students were doing better than me and were working harder than me and were sucking up more than me. I didn't have to impress people by being better than everyone else, I just had to impress them by doing my thing, which is good enough. I am a good student. I am going to be a good doctor. but I am not THE BEST, and I don't care to be THE BEST, and I don't do well in competition because I spend more time thinking about competing than I do working. So that cut the anxiety and stress of competing out, of constantly worrying that othermedical students were smarter than me.I could just be me, and do my job, and I realized that it was good enough. And I realized that it wasn't just that I was stuck with some gunners in myother rotation. I realized that it is just the way we are when we are together.
Because wednesday mornings when we get together for didactics, it's the same thing. Everyone trying to impress everyone else with their knowledge and how much they care about things. And being a medical student, I can' help being competitive even though I hate being competitive. I have to shout out the answer if I know it. So that everyone knows I know the answer. Why? Because that is what we do. and it SUCKS.
So now, I want to do all my rotations where I am the only medical student. I don't know that I can manage to do so, but if I can, I will. Because I have finally realized, I don't like other medical students...
This is a new finding for me. I had always enjoyed the pack mentality in the past. Working together, having someone else to feed off of, having someone to cover me if I didn't know what was going on, having someone to bitch too when things weren't going right. And it worked great in things like anatomy, where I sure as hell didn't want to be doing all that work by myself. I didn't want to be doing ANY of the work, so I needed a team. And when I first started volunteering for elective clinic sites, I never wanted to go alone. I needed someone there smarter than me who could show me the ropes so that I wasn't the dumb medical student always asking questions.
When did this realization that I really just don't enjoy being around others of my kind come in? In retrospect, it really started when I was studying for the boards the first time around. I started realizng that while I was dependent on other students being around so I didn't feel like I was suffering alone, really they made me suffer more. By constantly telling me what THEY were doing to study and how many hours they put in and how well they scored on practice tests really kinda made me want to kill myself. Self esteem dropped more and more by the day. Anxiety increased. Heart raced. And the amount of time I spent in the bathroom crying definitely increased. And then I fucking failed the boards anyway, so what good were those other students?
But I didn't really understand I didn't want to be around other medical students. I was very excited that I was doing my internal medicine rotation with other people in my class so I wouldn't be alone at Denver Health trying to survive each day without looking like a complete idiot. I even remember looking at the list and seeing I was on a team by myself but two of the students were on a team together and I was jealous that I wasn't on a team with someone else, that it was just me, fending for myself.
Now I thank God every day that He didn't put me on a team with anyone else. Why? Because medical students are evil, evil, backstabbing people. In the medical school situation that is. In general we are all very nice, well meaning people. But put us together and grade us against each other, and oooohhhh will we turn on each other. Sometimes you don't even realize that you've just been stabbed in the back. Example: another student bringing in an article FOR YOU because you guys had been talking baout it the day before. Seems friendly right? But no, it's really just a way for other student to show she is better than you. They were paying attention, they did some research, they showed that YOU didn't do the research but they did. Look at me look at me! Bitchslapped, that's what just happened.
But, I thought it was just the way of the world. The nature of the beast, so to speak, something you had to deal with. Then, I was sent to west side clinic. And at first, even with my hatred of other students, I was scared to be off on my own. I didn't want to! I needed someone! I needed a crutch. Maybe just a nice medical student? Maybe? Why must I go alone? I was terrified.
But then...oh then I realized the magical magical world of being the only medical student in a practice. It is amazing. Every day, I show up, and I don't have to worry about whether another medical student got there earlier than I did. Because God forbid I be the last medical student to show up. It'll look like I don't care. Even if I can get all my notes done in thirty minutes and pre-round on all my patients,so I dont NEED to be there at 5am, the fact that another student got there at 5am makes ME look bad! Even though I'm waymore efficient! The resident/attending won't necessarily see that. They'll see me meandering in all late and stuff while other medical students are diligently and happily there working before I am. It's a no win situation!
But at West Side, I could just show up, no worries. And then, when patients came, I just got to have them. I didn't have to fight for them with another student. They were just mine. I could spend all the time I wanted with one, and do my job, and actually learn things, instead of spending all my time worrying that the other medical students were doing better than me and were working harder than me and were sucking up more than me. I didn't have to impress people by being better than everyone else, I just had to impress them by doing my thing, which is good enough. I am a good student. I am going to be a good doctor. but I am not THE BEST, and I don't care to be THE BEST, and I don't do well in competition because I spend more time thinking about competing than I do working. So that cut the anxiety and stress of competing out, of constantly worrying that othermedical students were smarter than me.I could just be me, and do my job, and I realized that it was good enough. And I realized that it wasn't just that I was stuck with some gunners in myother rotation. I realized that it is just the way we are when we are together.
Because wednesday mornings when we get together for didactics, it's the same thing. Everyone trying to impress everyone else with their knowledge and how much they care about things. And being a medical student, I can' help being competitive even though I hate being competitive. I have to shout out the answer if I know it. So that everyone knows I know the answer. Why? Because that is what we do. and it SUCKS.
So now, I want to do all my rotations where I am the only medical student. I don't know that I can manage to do so, but if I can, I will. Because I have finally realized, I don't like other medical students...
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