Back in the Saddle Again

It’s been a while. The week of Feb 21st to the 25th was finals. I was nonstop studying. I had Biochemistry on Monday, Psych and Clinical on Tuesday, Physiology on Wednesday, and Anatomy and Histology on Friday. It was a rough week. The worst of the exams were Friday’s. I walked out of the exams genuinely concerned that I might have failed the courses. Unfortunately, since there were written portions to the exams, they would take a few days to grade. Then, to cap off an already long day Friday, we had our memorial ceremony for the cadavers following the exam. We had to work an additional hour after finishing the exam. Part of the wrap-up process was a literal “wrap-up” of the cadavers. We had to package the bodies for return shipment into body bags. We left the brains out because we will use them this (3rd) quarter. We finally finished and were ale to leave. You wouldn’t believe the uses we found for duct tape!

The week after finals was spring break. We had planned a trip to Legoland and Disneyland. I had 2 days for work around the house and then we left on Wednesday. I got a lot done. We got our spring/summer garden planted, car maintenance, landscaping maintenance, cleaning, etc. Oddly enough, I actually enjoyed doing those chores. Anything but studying! Wednesday rolled around, and still I had no word on my results. I had all of my grades except for the two that I was most concerned about. I checked our online reporting system about ½ hour before we left. Anatomy had a line displaying for the grades, but it was not populated yet. But Histology was there. Something is wrong when you walk out of an exam thinking you might have failed, and you end up with an A in the class. I checked back with Anatomy. Still there was nothing. I kept refreshing the screen. After about 5 minutes, there it was. My B. After all of that worrying, I got an A and a B. It just reinforces my feeling that I am the worst assessor of my own performance on an exam.

The trip was fun. We invited my in-laws to go with us. Legoland was better that I expected it to be. The kids really enjoyed it. There were lots of rids and activities geared for their ages. Disneyland was fun, too. But the crowds were larger and there was more walking. By Saturday night, we were all ready to go home. But that meant that I had to drive all night to get there. We pulled in at 3:00 AZ time. Sunday was restful.

Monday was back to school. My courses do not appear to be too difficult except for Neuroscience. I am taking Physiology, Immunology, OMM, Psychiatry, Clinical Medicine, and a couple of general medical lectures. I have spent about 3 hours per night on just Neuroscience. More than all of my other classes combined. I hope it pays off. We have our first exam on Friday.

The blog hiatus was unfortunately necessary due to a lack of time. As it is, I have much to do tonight before bed, so it’s off to the brain vasculature…