Did I even write reflections last year? I feel as if this is an important exercise that should not be neglected. I often do a poor job of living in the present, but reviewing the recent past can help us learn about who we currently are, who we previously were, and who we should try to be.
The year began with the last month of my last core rotation. General Surgery was nice in that, because of the other student present, I often seemed fairly capable. It was a lot of time in the hospital, feeling very entrenched in what we were doing. Then came my elective rotations. My nephrology rotation had me with the best dressed doctor with whom I have had the pleasure to have worked, and also the only doctor who skipped the small talk and filled any extra time with having me present medical topics to him. With him, I got to see a deep vein thrombosis. My emergency medicine rotation was neat, and it made me consider going into that specialty, but then the doctor got tired of me after a few overnights, and my desire for that sleep-deprived, stressful life similarly exhausted itself.
Then I moved back to my hometown and began studying in addition to completing an online research rotation. Unfortunately, I had been studying and working for over a year, and was therefore overdue for time off. Instead, I doubled down on studying, and in need of some form of relief, I started my podcast, which has turned out to be a wonderful creative relief for me despite a complete lack of financial success. Then I took the Step 2 Clinical Skills exam, which I failed despite what I will maintain was a perfectly adequate performance. Days later, I went to Disney World for my birthday because I wanted any sort of relief, but as the only child at heart in that company of siblings, it was actually fairly stressful.
Then I again through myself into studying over the summer. And just as with the Step 1 exam, I became burned out and stopped taking practice tests. Then ten days before the Step 2 Clinical Knowledge exam, I learned that I had failed the Step 2 CS, and days before the CK, my friend told me that if I passed this test, he could still likely get me into his residency program. Unfortunately, under the stress and anxiety associated with that kind of pressure, along with the procurement of a doctorate suddenly becoming emphatically important to family, I failed the exam by 12 points (not scored out of 100 by the way).
So in September, I worked as a medical student at the neurology clinic where I had previously worked as a medical assistant. It was nice, despite the fact that I learned about my failing grade during this time. A bright spot in there was that on September 28, not that I just looked up the times, I got to hang out with a girl I have been liking. We had drinks and largely because I thought at the time that she had a boyfriend, I was charming without being intimidated by her looks. And though she had to leave for birthday party, she was emphatic that she wanted to stay because we really were enjoying each other's company so much. She texted me the next day to reiterate how much she enjoyed it, and I replied in kind.
After that rotation ended, my plan was to get right back to studying. But I could not. Years of stress and anxiety became a collective suppressing blanket and any efforts at studying resulted in my staring at my computer screen for hours, simply unable. Thus I spent October first attempting to study, and then resigning myself to recovering and, to an extent, existing. The clinical rotation that I had planned for that month fell through, which meant that I would not be finished by the end of the year as previously planned. I felt quite hopeless as it became clear that my school and the rotation booking agency I had used for the previous year were not coordinating well, so my transcript was not coming together for my residency application. Even if I managed to get a date to retake exams in time, I would still be unable to get that application in without my transcript. And then I was unable to register for exams for a stupid complication leftover from my transferring schools, a complication that should not have existed at this point and yet still has not been resolved to this day.
In November, I flew to Florida to do a clinical rotation with my sister's doctor because another clinical rotation had fallen through, and it was nice to have a change of setting. Physicians there held in high esteem my desire to do medical missionary work in far-flung places that lacked modern conveniences. I stayed with my sister, who similarly felt burned out with her job, but her company caused me to remember that I am a far more active and outgoing person than most of my siblings. I could not relate to my sister's dreams of retirement. I have given up doing so much in my 20's for the sake of medicine, so the desire of doing even less is unthinkable to me.
I flew back home for Thanksgiving and got to spend time with family, a privilege which I am sure will be a luxury in years to come. That weekend, on November 30, I had the privilege of meeting that girl for drinks while she was in town. It was hurried but still nice to see her. She complained that I had met some of her family, but she had not met mine. That night, I went to my friend Cameron's 30th birthday party, where our mutual friends celebrated him with a surprise theme of very Cameron things. It naturally brought to mind my own journey to 30 years of age which would occur roughly six months later. It just so happens to fall upon my birthday, but we have tentative family plans to potentially be in my current favorite city in the world, Edinburgh, possibly in the company of our British relatives. In any case, the age of thirty is fast approaching and I am wary.
For the next month, I did a rotation that was just for fun, plastic surgery. I learned to be much more critical of peoples' appearances. This surgeon claimed to love his job, which I thought might be sarcastic at first, but I think he was serious. This is the first doctor I have worked with who said it in a genuine manner. Thanks to him, I was also able to go to the best steakhouse in Dallas for a pharm rep dinner, which was something that I had very much been hoping for since starting clinical rotations.
During this time, I auditioned for America's Got Talent. I should probably have just sent in a video because I messed up a little for the live performance, but it was still a good experience. I think that they are supposed to tell us whether we made it in a month or so, and that could have an effect on my dates for Southeast Asia, so we will see.
I also got to be home for Christmas, which is an opportunity that I had missed the year before. First it was Christmas with family, then we flew to Florida to have a few days of heavy drinking with a few more relatives. I learned on this trip from my grandfather that we stand to gain a significant inheritance from him because of his frugality, a trait that I and much of my family has inherited. He also expressed details of his relationship to our deceased grandmother that I very much appreciated hearing. He credits many of his critical decisions to her, saying that when his answers were "maybe", hers were "yes" and "no" and I thought about how wonderful it would be to have such a reliable Christ-loving presence in life. And he had previously shared that he had proposed to her via post because life and work got in the way, but they still managed to have that devoted connection. That has stuck with me as such an inspiring thing. He also shared tales of driving around in Uganda and coming across an elephant that had been rejected from its herd, and proceeded to chase him. In his attempt to escape, his car stopped as the elephant continued its angry approach. Fortunately, the car started again and they managed their liberation. Another story he shared was that for most creatures, you could see them coming and manage them, but this was not the case for snakes. One day, he was coming home and before entering the house, he happened to glance down. There were two snakes. He took care of that problem, but noted that if he had not glanced down, those snakes could have slithered right inside where his wife and children happened to be at that particular moment. When asked about his New Years Resolutions, this grandfather simply said that he considered himself to be "in the waiting room" to finally go home to Jesus, and until then, he is trying to remain fit to avoid the doctor and to continue to live frugally.
Then we flew back from Florida on New Years Eve and I went to a party with some dear friends. At this party, I foolishly drank a lesser alcohol and subsequently paid the price for such a decision. The fireball hangover was potent and my plans to write these blogs yesterday were postponed, in part because owing to the actions of a past me who forgot to mention it to present me, the ibuprofen had been relocated.
In the posts about the previous year in years past, I had written of my spiritual struggles, of lessons learned about God and myself and beliefs and theology. Now, I mostly use this blog to write out my frustrations. This is deeply related to my time spent entrenched in medical things and away from church communities, but I was able to keep up with spiritual development in college even when the ministry involvement was lacking. Maybe the problem is that I intellectualize so much, but at the same time, I have always had a similar approach. It is just that my wealth of knowledge had previously only been in the Bible, and has since expanded to include the Bible as well as science and medicine, as well as an ever-growing resentment toward the abuse of the Christian faith in the name of wealth or power.
I have seen Christian leaders who I previously respected and whose ministries I trusted begin to post about political things, taking sides. I learned from this that I cannot fully trust their ministries, but more importantly, that I should continue to refrain from publicly taking sides like this on any public forum. Like myself, people will render judgments based on their knowledge and reasoning. If I advocate for the right to an abortion, some people will only hear that I want to kill babies. If I advocate in the opposite manner, as I once did in previous years, some people will think that I am narrow-minded and do not respect women. I cannot explain my full reasoning to every person that sees what I am saying, and even if I do, only so many will be open to hearing me out rather than blurting out their pre-formed opinion. You cannot please everyone but with regard to these issues, silence and wisdom go hand in hand.
