One Down

I did it! One year successfully under my belt, and only a zillion more to go! (If only I could live that long). Monday was the last exam of the year, and the most challenging (of course), since it was the first cumulative final we have had thus far. Usually we are tested on information that we learn over a two or three week period, and then we wipe the slate clean, and begin to learn thousands of new details and concepts for the next exam. This time, not only did we have to learn two weeks of new information, but we also had to recall all the information from the previous three exams, which amounted to 10 weeks of information!

It was quite the challenge to review that much information, but it's done now, and it is setting the stage for next year. We are finally reaching a point where it is absolutely necessary for us to have long term memory of the concepts we are learning. We will not be good physicians if we can only remember the last two weeks of information we have been taught. We need to start building a constant foundation of knowledge that we can turn to when needed, and this last exam was the first step in assuring that we can retain enough information to make crucial clinical decisions. Plus, it sets the stage for next year, where all the classes have cumulative exams, as well as for the big bad board exam, which happens next summer, and is a test of the whole first two years of medical school! That is something I am not looking forward to (who really wants to study for 12 hours a day for 3 or 4 weeks in a row?), but at the same time, I am looking forward to the challenge (I think I said before I am a masochist).

The thing that I find most fascinating about the changes that have occurred within me in the last year, is that the knowledge I have can be both a blessing and a curse. That is, when I am trying to help a patient, or explain to a friend or family member something about the body, my new knowledge is a blessing. On the other hand, when I am trying to have a "normal" life or a "normal" conversation about anything in particular, I cannot stop myself from going down these mental imaginary paths in my head....that usually lead to some horrible death. For example, as I sit and listen to a friend tell me about the raccoon that visits her yard every night, I cannot forget what I know - that raccoons are a carrier of the rabies virus, and what exactly the virus does once it relocates from the saliva of the infected animal to the nerves of the bitten victim. (If you don't want to hear the gory details, skip ahead). So the virus gets into your muscle, replicates like crazy by infecting your muscle cells and using the cells machinery to copy itself, then it explodes out of the cells, and infects the nerves, moving retrograde up the nerve arms to the nerve cell body. Then the virus replicates some more, explodes out of the cell, and infects more nerve cells in your central nervous system (YOUR BRAIN!!). Needless to say, it leads to a nasty death, and only a very few people who have been bitten have ever survived.

And of course, every time I eat, I wonder if there is some Salmonella, or Shigella, or E. Coli bacteria waiting with eagerness to infect my GI, and send me to the hospital with nausea, vomiting, and bloody diarrhea. Even though I have survived thus far in my life without too many infections and attacks from microbes, now that I KNOW all the microbes that are out there, with the will to survive just as strong as my own, I feel as though I am in a constant fight for my survival! How our bodies do it - grow, heal, and continuously protect ourselves against the onslaught of other life forces that would love to call us home - is truly a miracle and is proof, to me, of a divine power.

No worries though, I haven't become so obsessive compulsive that I am holing myself up inside my house, not eating, not exposing my skin to the sun, not letting anyone else breath their microbe filled breath on me. No, what I am doing is sitting in constant wonder, and thanks, that I am alive, and healthy, and so incredibly fortunate to be in medical school, to be learning all that I am, and to be surrounded by family and friends that love me. I live a truly blessed life, and I can only hope that you all do to. Ho.