Exam Rant #2

It’s official; I am four days away from my summatives (finals). I begin with Molecular Medicine and Patient’s Safety and Quality in Healthcare, a day off and then Genitourinary and Endocrine systems along with Histology on the same day. After that we have a 5 days break and then the awaited lovely CardioResp/Upper Limb and then a day off and to finish it off we have the Anatomy Oral exam *insert all the broken heart emoticons in the world*.

None of my friends seem to understand why I fear the oral exam more than the written, even though the oral is only 12 % with the rest of the grade summing up the written exam. I’m not an Anatomy person at all; it bores me to death, and to stand there getting questions thrown at me without the comfort of a paper, a pen and an ID number for the examiner to judge not my face, just makes me feel extremely vulnerable; also everything I know just evaporates from my head the second someone asks me something out loud. Oh well, nothing can be done about it now. Maybe a beta-blocker *wink*?

This is the time of the year where I usually tend to start getting reflective and I start listing all the books I wanted to read, the movies I wanted to watch but couldn’t since this semester was extremely short and we basically had to cram everything and the time that was not spent cramming, was spent stressing over cramming.

Truth be told, it’s not med school’s fault. My friends and I are a lazy bunch of people who are very inefficient and we always repeat the same sentence “Next semester is going to be different, I’m going to go to the gym, get my lectures done every day, go to the lab more, start going to yoga, join this club and that club.” And we end up doing nothing obviously. Plus we’re dramatic and we’re always having whats app conversations that include 101 ways of killing ourselves at 6 am, right before the exam. Healthy behaviour? I didn’t think so.

I really want to do well this semester, I wish I could blink all my anxiety away and stop myself from stressing over a 12 % exam. Last semester I had two of them, the lower limb anatomy oral was the first exam and the alimentary systems oral was the last, during both occasions I not only kept throwing up the entire day before the exam and ended up going to the exam dehydrated, but I also couldn’t stop sweating, my heart felt like it was going to explode and I cried 5 seconds before entering the exam stations. Can I please extract the anxiety/drama gene out of my entire system please?

And now to go on my joyous ride of cancer pharma and fun molecular medicine stuff. Here’s to hoping my next post includes all the beauty and joy of acing my exams.

Insomnia

I’ve moved an entire decade forward, how can I go back? If I were to apologise, what would I say? Could I bring back every person, I lost along the way?

How do I explain; a departure with no goodbyes, a broken heart and a bunch of lies?

I begin to replay my speech in my head, my explanations, my lamenting, my pain and my regret. I stop as the silence thickly fills the air, I can’t go back to the mindset of a person who is no longer me, I can’t apologise for mistakes I don’t want to believe and I can’t make amends with people I no longer know. If I were to allow myself to step back, I would fall in a rabbit hole filled with unopened doors and secrets I can’t admit.

Late at night I’m left alone to face all that I know and can’t share; the heaviest burden I’ve ever had to bear.

Surprise #1

This post is a part of four surprises I’ve planned for a very special person to my heart.

On my first day of university in RCSI, I was not only completely unhappy to be there but I was also
quite disappointed as the only part of me that was excited about medical school was the part that thought
I was going to meet the nerdiest, quackiest people. Boy was I wrong, but maybe it serves me right for believing the stereotypical generalisation that only mature, smart people would get into a profession that involved saving people’s lives.

Moving on, I saw this girl that I knew was related to me and in my head I thought “Oh great, this is exactly what I didn’t want. Someone from my judgemental community circle who was going to broadcast every one of my moves to the entire family.”
I didn’t go say hi, the very next day she came along and talked to me. Then and there I regretted my judgemental thoughts, because not only was she super sweet but we instantly clicked and talked like we’d been raised together.
Days passed by and we became a bit closer but as usual I did the obvious by mixing with the wrong people during my first year in uni and I only got to see this person every once in a while, when we updated each other on our lives. She was also quite hung up on her high school friends so we had separate circles and lives. By the end of my first year I viewed her as a friend but I still hadn’t let her in my life completely and though we were great friends, my emotional connection to her wasn’t that strong. But the way I viewed her had changed 100 %, we actually had a lot in common.

Came in second year, I had re-evaluated my entire life in summer and changed a lot. I suddenly found myself sharing bits and pieces of my life with her and I think for the very first time in a long time, I felt like I had a true friend. Our strong bond began when I’d had a rough day and I went to her place and cried my eyes out. I expected her to sit there and pass snarky judgements but she threw me back by her support and sensibility. I discovered that not only was this girl the kind of best friend that I had always hoped for but she actually contributed a lot to who I am today. And that’s how I met my best friend.
Our friendship grew stronger day by day and I made the best memories of my life with her. I just realised that this post turned into another rant about me, but I was trying to say that this is the story of a girl who not only proved me wrong and threw all the judgemental views I had aside, but she also held my hands when I needed her, offered me a shoulder to cry on, taught me so much, shared with me parts and bits of her that she didn’t show others and we spend by each day laughing at stupid things, understanding things without saying them out loud and dreaming together. People always ask us if we are sisters or cousins and are always surprised when we say we’re such distant relatives that there’s no way we could look like each other. I’m not going to rant about how kind and sweet she is but she truly is a person who spreads smiles everyday with her positivity and I am so thankful to have her in my life; I’m truly blessed. May it be her love for Korean movies or the fact that she understands Bollywood like I do or the fact that she’s the only person who would walk in to watch Breaking Dawn with me just so we could laugh at the movie; I know at heart I could never find someone like her.

Happy Twentieth Birthday Sara. I hope someone brings you as much happiness as you bring me every day and I have absolute faith in all your dreams. You taught me how to treat people righteously, to always have faith in myself and people around me, that unconditional love was impossible but that didn’t mean we should stop believing in miracles and these are things I couldn’t have learned from someone else. You’ve got a certain way of thinking that could change a nation someday and you are perfect in every imperfection. I love you.

Cracks and Peeves

I am sensitive, I always have been.

I hate putting myself in situations where I might get yelled at simply because I know I take things to heart and cry easily. Over the past years I’ve heard many things like “Oh you’re spoiled” or “you need to grow up” because I cry easily and maybe I do need to grow out of it, at least I know I have tried. I don’t really enjoy getting offended so easily or finding myself crying when I’m actually supposed to be standing up for myself. I might as well take the liberty of saying I actually am getting sick of how I feel every time I’m with a group of friends and I somehow find myself being the centre of all their jokes. It shouldn’t offend me or annoy me but somehow along the lines I always do end up finding myself peeved by it. And over all these years how come it’s mostly me that gets poked fun at, I’m pretty sure this should indicate something. I mean the harmless jokes are different we all throw them around; I do too. But it’s the things that we originally are insecure of that hit us the most and I know that this is my case, which is why I avoid doing it to others most of the time. It’s also a matter of acceptance like for instance I can accept certain things from certain people; two people might say that same thing but I would end up feeling very differently in both situations. I’m twenty years old and it still feels embarrassing that I am the way I am, I feel like a child who can’t take a joke and it really gets to me sometimes.

Why can’t I just bring myself to not feel the things I feel and think the way I think? Or maybe I should just filter out the people that make me feel bad because I’m not good at snarky comebacks or poking fun.

Maybe I’m just going crazy from the exam stress.

Exam Rant #1

I don’t understand optimistic people, especially during exams. I mean I would love to be optimistic, after all wouldn’t it be great and dandy if I could simply think “Oh, I have Molecular Medicine and Patient’s Safety & Quality in Healthcare on the same day, which is great because I still don’t understand exactly how I’m going to remember every single cancer drug and of course the unnecessary slides in the psych lectures that are only there to waste the time that I obviously can afford to waste, all of this is amazing because you know what, I still haven’t covered half of the Cardio/Resp physiology and pharmacology and let’s not even touch upon the anatomy and beautiful “Genitourinary
and Endocrine Systems” because I’m quite sure I’m going to get above 75 in all of these modules, do you know why my pretty little inner brain? Because I’m super woman and the examiners are secretly fairies.”

I’m not exactly sure how this is going to help really, because my inner brain may seem dumb enough to not store pharmacology but I’m quite sure it’s not going to buy a bunch of crap like “Oh! Exams are going to be fabulous!”

I think I’m jumping on the crazy wagon with my 15 year old cousin who wants to breed cats for a living. Seems legit.

 

Attempt at Motivation

The best way out is always through – Robert Frost

Sometimes goodbye is a second chance

One thing at the expense of the other, you sacrifice pieces of your life for what you think is the most important of all. You try your best to bring joy and happiness to the ones you love and you stay back; putting all your ambitions and dreams aside because right now, in this moment you’ve got to be there for them. And as time passes by you find yourself yearning to leave, your unpacked bags calling you. You turn to the ones you love and find that they are oblivious to what you’ve given up and you begin to wonder if your life means anything at all.
Every time you hear a story of someone who left and fulfilled their dream, your heart breaks a little bit more and when you’re asked about yours, you try to say “This isn’t my dream, this isn’t me. I did it for them.”, but the words don’t come out. You can’t really blame anyone because it’s your choice, it always was. You thought you could be the one who loves unconditionally. But you’ve forgotten that the dreamer within you wouldn’t be able to remain caged, you can feel the urge banging in your heart; a tiny voice whispers “It’s not too late to leave, you can go.” And for one moment, you’re tempted. But you look back at whom you’d be leaving behind. Then and there you know that you’re torn and you always will be; between an eager fantasist and a loyal child.

My escape

The line between reality and illusion is rather thin, we throw ourselves into deep seas; indulging in the art of dreaming. A place where we can be fearless, we are kings and queens and the entire world serves as one big canvas for us to paint. We allow our hearts to beat and the crisp freshness of this life transforms us. We’re in a place where regret isn’t permitted and our youth is evergreen. We indulge ourselves in the thought of this vision until we discover that the secret door that takes us back; has melted in the everlasting skies of our personal paradise.

Positive Friday

Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the  attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.

– Gibran Khalil Gibran