The End of The Year

It's time for resolutions again.

I've decided to keep it simple this year. My new years resolution is to stay focused with medicine and keep working hard. Only 18 months to go and it's getting harder and harder as I have to know more and more stuff. As well as knowing stuff I also have to be able to do all kinds of things with sharp needles and rubber gloves.

Thankfully I'm really enjoying it still. I had a bit of a wobble in Sept/Oct where I thought I wasn't good enough and would never be able to do it, but sticking with it paid off.

We'll see if I'm still saying that when I get my last exam results on the 4th of Jan. Scarily they're putting all our exam results up before our "welcome back" lecture, where you can usually just check them online. Fingers crossed this won't be the first exam I've failed.

My only other resolution is to stick with the blog. It's amazing how much writing about silly day to day things helps sort out my thoughts about things. I also love the fact that whenever I'm feeling down or have a dilemma I get lots of lovely comments offering advice and kind words.

I hope everyone who's reading this has something nice planned for this evening and has a wonderful New Year celebration, with an even better year to follow.

Lily xXx

The House That Lily Built

I've decided to make the most of the boyf having all of betwixmas off of work.

For a while my Dad has been suggesting I should retile my bathroom properly, as opposed to the few tiles around the bath.

Last month we bought all the tiles and other bits and bobs you need for tiling (which is a lot of stuff... loads of trips from the car to the flat). We've since been waiting for spare time, and now we've got it.

Unfortunately it's not that simple.

The woman who owned the flat before me is the person who tiled the bathroom last. She seems to have stuck the adhesive onto bare crumbling plaster and used it a little like polyfiller. This essentially means that now the bathroom is crumbling in around us. What should have been a day of stripping tiles has so far been 2 days and the walls are still covered in adhesive which is not going to budge without taking most of the plaster with it. Joy.

I also have sinusitis. This means I'm extra grumpy and snore like nothing anyone has heard before. I bet you all envy the boyf having to spend time with me :-p

Lily xXx

Las Vegas

I never know the best way to tell people about a holiday. Do they want to know more or less? Well as this is my blog, you'll all be getting the more treatment....

Tuesday :

We were staying at the boyf's Grandparent's the night before we went away as they live nice and near to the airport. We got to start the morning with a yummy cooked breakfast and then we went to leave for the airport. Disaster struck and the car had a flat tyre, but thankfully we managed to swap cars and off we went. The airport was the usual thing. Queues weren't too large but getting a fish finger sandwich was about £10!! Food on the flight was shocking, I had a beef cobbler that I'm still convinced was warmed up cat food, but the 10 hours went suprisingly quickly.

We landed just after 6pm Vegas time and had a pretty quick cab ride to our hotel... the MGM grand. Check-in was quick, and we found out we'd been upgraded to a suite with a HUGE jacuzzi tub. Fantastic!

After that we wandered up the strip and sat outside the Paris hotel, watching the Belaggio fountains with delicious steak for dinner.

Wednesday:

The day started off with a huge buffet breakfast. Not only did I have the usual yoghurt, bacon, eggs, sausage etc that one would expect... I also had sushi.

We had a nice long walk up the strip wandering into lots of the big hotels. We managed to see the worlds biggest chocolate fountain at the Belaggio. Om nom nom...

We then bumped into some reps for a timeshare in Vegas and in return for sitting listening to their proposal (total rip off by the way), we got a pair of amazing seats at Phantom of the Opera for the next night.

As we'd been walking all over the place so much we went for dinner in the hotel at a restaurant called Wolfgang Puck's. Cue lots of rude mispronounciations from the other half all night.

Thursday:

Thursday was dedicated into looking around all the big hotel's that we hadn't yet seen. I had achy feet but a big smiley face by the end of the day.

Friday:

More sight-seeing during the day and then a very special evening.

We decided to have a really special evening. We booked a table at Top of the World. It's a huge revolving restaurant at the top of the Stratosphere which overlooks the whole of Las Vegas. We had a 5-course dinner that was immense. One of the courses was a 16oz steak. That is practically the size of my head. It was delicious.

Saturday:

We rented a car the day before. A big car by my standards, but small by American ones. An Hyundai Santa Fe. We drove to the Hoover Dam, less than an hour away from Las Vegas. We got to go down into the power station and I didn't even freak out although it was squishy full of people.

A new hotel complex opened in Las Vegas, including a hotel called Aria, where a new Cirque de Soleil show was playing. Viva Elvis. We managed to get tickets and it was amazing. Unfortunately the boyf is petrified of heights and we were right at the front of the balcony. I thought he was going to puke on the people below us, but in the end even he enjoyed it.


Sunday:

This was the big driving day. We drove all the way to the Grand Canyon and back. I drove over 100 miles of it even though I haven't driven for ages and was pretty nervous at first. Turns out driving big cars isn't actually any harder than driving small ones.

The Grand Canyon was breathtaking. Unfortunately I had a major ear ache/headache/face ache and was a big baby and burst into tears about a mile into walking around it. But it was worth feeling like death for.

Monday:

Home day is always the saddest day. We had a good morning of picking up a few presents for family we'd not got Christmas presents for. After that we went to the airport. At the airport we queued for hours to check in. Seems that as the flight was SIX HOURS delayed, check-in staff thought they could work at half speed.

On the plus side I got a free Burger King. On the not so plus side I had to sleep on the airport floor. Then unfortunately it was time to go home, but I had an AMAZING holiday, and I don't think I'll stop smiling until the next one.

Lily xXx

Guess Who's Back?

... it's me!!

I'm finally back from Vegas, after a really delayed flight and a nice cosy sleep on the airport floor.

I had an AMAZING time. Not only did we do all the Vegas stuff, we also went to the Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon.

It seems I have lots and lots of blog posts to catch up with and still some presents to buy for xmas (eek!!), so I'm going to do that and then I'll give you guys a supersized post or two on how amazing the holiday was.

Lily xXx

Holiday Time!

After GP today my holiday officially starts.

Unfortunately for some reason my body thought it was only having a nap last night so wouldn't let me sleep more than 3 hours, so GP might be harder than first thought.

Once I finish GP about 4, I have a 1hr journey back to my flat. I'm already packed. I just have to pack up the ferrets (into a carrier, not my suitcase) and then trek down to my Dad's. My big sister (who I only see about twice a year) is also visiting with my niece and her husband which should be lovely. I get to spend all weekend with them and then Monday I get to visit one of my school friends who had a very very cute looking baby boy a fortnight ago.

After I'm back from baby-visiting, it's back in the car and to the Boyf's Gran's house (not to be confused with Nan, as I so often do). She lives really near the airport so it means we can have a lie in and get her to drop us off at the airport without having to pay extortion for parking...

After that it's VEGAS! Wooooooo! I'm so excited.

Needless to say I won't be posting until I get back, so hold tight until the 23rd!

Hope everyone has an amazing Xmas if I don't get around to posting before then.

Lily xXx

Cleaning Frenzy

I had my exam yesterday.

It went OK. As always there were a few of those annoying questions where I knew I'd learnt the answers but couldn't remember them, but otherwise it wasn't too bad. A good mixture of easy, medium and downright impossible questions.

Anyway, I'm glad it's out of the way now, and the only uni thing that I have to do before breaking up for xmas is my GP visit. Unfortunately my partner and I can't get hold of the woman we're supposed to be visiting first. I hope we get hold of her by Friday.

I really need to tidy the flat today. Later some girly friends are coming over for a couple of hours. It still resembles some kind of revision squat at the moment. It doesn't help that I'm not a naturally tidy person. Fingers crossed there won't be more than a couple of hours cleaning or I'll die inside.

Lily xXx

Different Term, Same Problems.

As per usual I'm getting to the point where I can't really revise.

I try but then I get distracted. Even if I sit in a quiet room and read my notes after about 20 minutes I realise I've been thinking about something else while "reading" and haven't actually properly read any of the revision cards.

This year is strange too, a bit like 3rd year I don't really know what to put on my revision cards. In all fairness for 3rd year this meant I made no notes and just stressed myself out even more, so at least I'm making notes this time. Excitingly they're on different coloured record cards this time. Ooooooh.

I've made all my notes for everything except rheumatology, which I've been avoiding as it's boring and long. I've also had the most teaching on it, so I reckoned it was more important to learn the stuff I've had less teaching on.

I'm actually looking forward to the exam on Monday. It'll be so good once it's over and I can concentrate on enjoying the xmas holidays (and having my GP placement on the Friday).

I have a game-plan for the week.

Monday: Exam then drinkies.

Tuesday: Tidy the flat, pop to the shops, have the girls over.

Wednesday: Into town, get my dollars, have my eyebrows threaded. Do any little bits of shopping I need to do.

Thursday: Pack. 2 bags. 1 weekend bag for home, 1 big bag for my week in vegas.

Friday: GP placement and home visits all day!!! Then pick up the ferrets, get in the car, go home!

Saturday: My sister is also visiting home, take the ferrets for walkies, maybe cinema.

Sunday: Family lunch (om nom nom...), bake cupcakes for my friend who had a baby on Friday.

Monday: Visit friend who had baby on Monday. Go to the boyf's Gran's house which is near the airport.

Tuesday: Fly on holiday!!!!!

What an exciting time to look forward to. Thankfully the boyf's sister has also said she'll look after the ferrets. I don't think she knows what she's letting herself in for!

Lily xXx

Assorted Ramblings

I don't really have anything to write a whole post about, but I have lots of small things I want to share.

Firstly... this time next week I'll have just about finished my exam. Although I have a GP visit on the 11th of December, finishing the exams will almost be as if I'm starting my Xmas holidays.

Secondly... H&M is giving away really nice free gift boxes with every purchase. This is amazing... I'm hoarding them so I don't have to wrap presents. On another exciting note Terry's Chocolate Orange now have a flavour with popping candy added to it. I LOVE popping candy. It is definitely mine and not Terry's.

Thirdly... some annoying redecoration company that are trying to make my horrible block of flats look less like a council rubbish dump say they NEED access to my flat while I'm on holiday, and that I HAVE to be there. I've tried sending a nice email saying that unfortunately I'm on holiday and would be willing for them to come either side of my week away. They want to hang out of the windows to paint them on the outside I think. Hope they like ferrets.

I better start revision for the evening as I just had my second to last day at uni. I have no idea where to start with revising orthopaedics. Anyone know any good online resources for orthopaedics aimed at medical student level?!

Lily xXx

More Exams

It's that time of year again. Exam time. Although more and more it's feeling like every time of year is exam time.

I've got written exams 2 weeks today. In fact this time in 2 weeks I'll be sitting in an exam hall, ticking boxes like my life depends on it.

Unfortunately we don't have any time off for revision, so tonight after uni I have to kick into gear. As I've found with exams in clinics I'm not really sure what I should be learning. I'm a little worried that for orthopaedics I'm going to have to relearn all my anatomy from second year.... ARGH!!!

Lily xXx

Tea For Two

Today, after my presentation, I went for a cup of tea (or two...) with Madsadgirl. I had a great time. We had a good chat. Well I mainly ranted about some annoying man I encountered today (more about that some other time), and she gave me a sneaky preview of what to expect from her up and coming posts, which I can't wait to read!

She's the first blog-friend I've met up with and if everyone is as nice and friendly as her I'll have no problems with meeting up with others in the future. Fingers crossed we get to go for another cup of tea and chat some time soon.

Lily xXx

Presentation Time... Again

Yes it's that time of year again... presentation time. Towards the end of term there are always presentations to be done.

This time thankfully my presentation is quite fluffy. There is very little fact and a lot of self reflection. Unfortunately I'm not quite sure what the guy marking it wants, so I've had to make it up a bit as I've gone along. I've got to the point now where the number of presentations I've done mean I'm a lot more confident, I just dread the couple of minutes before the presentation where I get overwhelmed with fear, my hands start shaking and my mouth feels dry.

I've got one more night after tonight to prepare myself. Unusually for me, I've already made the presentation, so now I can concentrate on getting my essay finished and tweaked in time for the Friday hand-in date.

Lily xXx

Something Tasty....

Mmmmm... Ferret!

I weighed my ferrets and Archie is now 1.4kg and teeny tiny baby Hugo (in the pic) is a whopping 1.8kg!

Lily xXx

The Aberdeen Story...

...The Interview From Hell

As AberdeenMedStudent commented on my blog, I thought now was a good time to share my mentally scarring experience of Aberdeen.

For some reason I applied to Aberdeen even though I come from Kent. In face there were a lot of reasons...

1. Easyjet to Aberdeen is cheaper than a train from where I live to the midlands or up north
2. I know people from there who love it
3. Entry was only ABB the year I applied
4. The boys have cute accents
5. Why not?!

Anyway, so I applied and got an interview. My Dad and I decided to make a little trip out of it, fly up the morning before, stay in a hotel and have wander around.

On the day we left we drove the hour and a half to the airport, pretty early in the morning. At the airport we had breakfast and chilled out until we got on the flight.

My Dad and I fly a fair bit so aren't nervous about it and comfortably settled into our seats on the plane.

About 5 minutes after take off my Dad started to say he felt "funny", "sleepy" and "not well". In the space of 10 minutes he went from being quite coherant to slurring, resting his head onto my shoulder and moaning in discomfort. I didn't really know what to do. My Dad is NEVER ill.

Next thing before I knew it he was leaning back in his seat, grunting, shaking and struggling to breath. I completely paniced. I shouted for help and the air stewards came running. Thankfully there was one who spoke my Dad's mother-tongue which made things a little easier for him. By now he's stopped shaking and was moaning and vomitting. He couldn't even hold himself upright in the seat.

The air crew made an announcement for doctors on the plane. There were none. There was only someone who had just started to train as a paramedic and although they offered to help, felt out of their depth.

By this point I was trying so hard to stay strong, and not cry. I knew that showing I was worried would make things worse. I ended up shouting at half the other customers on the flight because people were standing up and leaning over their seats to get a look. Vultures.

We got landed as quickly as possible at Aberdeen as it was the nearest airport at the time (lucky for everyone) and met by an ambulance crew.

This is where it all went even more wrong.

By this point my Dad was visably better, but still shaken and weak. The ambulance crew completely ignored me. Hating hospitals my Dad insisted to them that he just fainted and I was actually told to be quiet by them when I tried to describe what I saw.

When we got to the hospital I had to give my Dad's details to the reception at A&E. Once I'd done that they said someone would get me when I could see my Dad. An hour later and I'm sitting crying in the reception area as noone will tell me where he is or what's happening. I ended up so distraught a randomer bought me a cup of tea and made a fuss at reception for me. After a good 10 minutes of bargaining with reception, the receptionist took me into A&E where my Dad was sitting up in a cubicle looking almost as right as rain. Noone could tell me why I hadn't been taken to see him before that, or at least told where he was. Yet again noone was interested in hearing my story... shocking now that I know an eyewitness account of any funny turn is important.

After that we got in a taxi and checked in at our hotel. I tucked my Dad up in bed for a couple of hours and once he was feeling a little better we took a stroll up the street and had a pizza. I spent all night in the bed beside my Dad's bed listening to him breathing, unable to sleep because I was so worried something would happen. He's all I've got. He's not only my Dad but he's my best friend. Since my Mum died he's done everything to try and give me the best life I can and I couldn't imagine what I'd do without him.

The next morning was interview day. It started with a tour. The student who did the tour was lovely. In fact my Dad still goes on about how nice she was now. The uni was lovely and everything was looking better. In fact I didn't even feel too bad about the fact I'd had no sleep.

I went into my interview and things started okay. I didn't panic. I felt alright. Then I yawned. I couldn't help it. After that horrible interview man made some sarcastic comment along the lines of "Are you bored or tired? Maybe you should have got an early night and not gone out partying before an interview." .... I flipped. I completely lost my temper and snapped, "Actually, I couldn't sleep last night because on the way here my Dad had a fit, I had to spend hours in your hospital being ignored and then funnily enough I couldn't sleep." Eek. Not good. The interviewers went quiet, but carried on with the interview looking at me like I was a little unstable.

I left the interview and told my Dad it had gone well.

Surprisingly I didn't get an offer.

Nice place though.

Anyone else have any interview nightmare stories?!

Lily xXx

Home or Away?

Until now I've been 100% that I want to do my elective in the South Pacific, somewhere laid back that I can spend a lot of time on the beach chilling out and recovering in time for my final year, full of hard work.

The group of islands myself and a couple of friends had our eye on is very expensive to travel to. This is only made worse by the fact our elective starts on the last weekend of July.

Because of this I'm making a back-up plan just in case flight prices don't come down and I can't afford it.

I'm trying two things for this. Firstly I'd like a tabloid media placement to do with medicine, such as a woman's magazine or with the health editor of a tabloid newspaper. Managing this is proving near impossible as it's so hard to get in contact with anyone. The second (and still quite exciting) option is to work with an ambulance service, looking at prehospital care and how the control room works.

Part of me is now thinking that these back-up ideas sound so fun that is it worth spending thousands of pounds for a beach holiday with a bit of medicine, or should I just stay in the UK?

Any thoughts?

Lily xXx

Poor Little Fuzzy

One of my ferrets has been really ill this past week. I think it's flu (they can catch the same flu types as humans). He's lost lots of weight and was all shakey whenever I gave him a cuddle.

Thankfully my doctoring skills came to use and now he's fattening up again, looking healthier, not sneezing and shaking. If only people could be made better by lots of cuddles and kitten milk.

Since I've had my pet ferrets I've realised how scarily alike humans and animals are in illnesses. On ferret forums people talk about insulinoma, which is treated the same way in ferrets as it is in humans. The drugs are even the same!

More and more I wonder how vets actually treat animals though? I've learnt that fluids can be given subcutaneously so that takes away the need to find a vein... but what about when they do blood tests? It's hard enough finding a good vein on something that isn't covered in fur.

I might ask the vet next time I go.

Lily xXx

Eggsplanation

Sorry for the bad title... but it had to be done.

The Manchester Medic asked why do I hate eggs and why not mention scrambled eggs, commenting on my last post. These questions are far too long to answer just as a comment so I thought they deserved a post of their own.

I think eggs white is horrible! As far as I know I've always thought this. I didn't eat eggs willingly ever, and I've always thrown up if forced to eat egg white. It's partially the texture, but mostly the really sulpherous stench they give off. However I do think they look quite pretty and if they smelt better I could possibly bring myself to eat them.

Strangely enough I've never had a problem with scrambled eggs. I LOVE scrambled eggs. I don't love all scrambled eggs though, they have to be done properly. Eggs mixed up and put in the microwave are not scrambled eggs, they are a treat for ferrets. Scrambled eggs involve melting butter in a pan and cooking well seasoned mixed up egg until it is still gooey and runny. I can eat omlettes done like this too. Mmmmmm.

Also rather strangely I'll dip buttered french bread in well seasoned mixed up raw egg. Om nom nom...

Lily xXx

Ewwwww!!!

I hate people who spit.

Today at the bus stop some man just spat out a huge globule of saliva. I felt like punching him in the nose. It made me feel all queasy. I also hate getting in the lift in my block of flats in the morning and seeing the blobs of spit on the floor. I don't understand why it's so cool.

I also hate people who don't take the time to say please or thankyou.

On my hate list are also fried/boiled/poached eggs, back ache, people who hate ferrets without giving them a chance and shutting my fingers/toes in doors.

Lily xXx

Anatomy Overload

There are a lot of bones and muscles in the body. To make it worse they're innervated by different nerves, with various vessels passing around them. Unfortunately I still can't manage to absorb it all.

Over the next couple of days I am going to get myself reaquainted with my old friend... the anatomy colouring book. I'm also going to drag out my anatomy DVDs. Fingers crossed, by Christmas it'll have all sunk in, and perhaps this time I'll have a chance of remembering it a bit more for next year. I'm going to try learning things a little more visually this time around and rather than trying to memorise lists of muscles and nerves etc, I'm planning to look it up and then actively link it with surface anatomy and have a scribble over the boyf with some marker pens.

The boyf has started his OU degree this month now, so I'm not the only one pouring over books. It makes me realise how lucky I am to have tutors I can just walk up to and ask questions. Distance learning looks really difficult!

Medical Machine

This weekend I have been on form.

An essay writing, medical machine.

I've got my drafts for my special study module already done. Hurrah!

As well as being an essay writing machine I've also got some bits and bobs in the flat done. I've chosen the tiles I'm going to retile the bathroom with and have had a bit of a tidy. However my flat still looks like a bomb site, so if anyone really likes tidying please feel free to come and tidy up for me.

The next 6 weeks of my placement are in locomotion. This means I'm going to have to learn some anatomy :-s

Anatomy has never been my strong point. I try and try and try to remember it, and I still fail miserably. I need to spend the next 6 weeks working out a way to retain some anatomy knowledge.

Lily xXx

Marmite

My clinical partner and I had a horrible realisation today.

Maybe it's us and not them?

We must be like marmite. Sometimes we meet people on new firms and get on amazingly, and other times no matter how much we try certain people always seem to be stand-offish?! It would be so nice to get along with everybody.

Lily xXx

Time Flies

I can't believe how quickly the weeks are rushing by. By the end of this week I'll have finished A&E, finished anaesthetics and be halfway through this placement block.

This has kind of kick-started me into properly organising my elective. This week I need to actually get in touch with the place. I want to go to the south pacific. There seems to be a good mixture of third world medicine, very low HIV risk and a good social life.

Now I just need to get my bm in gear.

I also want to finish an essay this week and start stripping the wallpaper from my hallway. Doing the washing up could also be a start.

Lily xXx

Sleep Mumbles

For quite a while now I've been having problems sleeping. Most of that has been resolved now that I have a super comfy pillow and I make sure the doors to the room the ferrets are in is shut at night so I can't hear them.

Over the last 2 weeks I've been woken up by a new problem. Sleep shouting. I've always mumbled in my sleep which has never been a problem. It doesn't usually wake up whoever is in the room with me and I only know about it because I've been told. More recently I've been waking both myself and the boyf up, shouting out things in my sleep, more than once a night. Sometimes it's just silly things like saying hello to imaginary people, but other times it's quite long sentences at the top of my voice.

Anyone know any good ways to stop this or is it just going to be something I'm stuck with?!

Lily xXx

Afternoon Person

I've found out that I'm most certainly not a morning person, afternoon shifts in A&E even though they are much busier are so much easier to deal with. Being able to go to bed at 10 and get up at 9 or 10 instead of 6 means I'm finally catching up on all the sleep I miss.

Every weekend seems to be a drama at the moment, meaning I get even less sleep than I get when busy in the week. I'm absolutely fuming over some things that revealed themselves this weekend, it was possibly the most dramatic weekend I've had in a while. On top of all the drama I can't really talk about at the moment the boyf's niece was poorly and projectile vomitted both times we went to see her. As well as that a friend from work at home got beaten up for a bag of chips as he walked home from work. Shows what a kind of place I'm from.

Lily xXx

First Week of A&E

So it's been about a week since my last clumsy injury and *touch wood* I haven't done anything else too stupid yet. Here's to hoping that I don't get run over or something on the way to uni today.

I've started my A&E placement now. I really enjoy the variety of it, but yet again I have that horrible feeling where none of the doctors actually want you following them around. The consultant has said he doesn't want us wasting all our time taking histories and examining patients on our own as we've done over a year of that and the point of A&E is to see proceedures and how the A&E doctors tailor their histories and examination depending on the cases they see.

Embarassingly after our first tutorial the consultant pulled me to the side and told me that I was very bright and to make the most of the rotation and not let the rest of the group pull me down. I think it may have been luck and common sense that made me do well in the tutorial, but now I feel so much pressure to keep on doing well. I know next teaching session he holds I'll probably freeze up in fear.

On a non-hospital note it's been about 4 weeks since I had my hair cut and it's already grown loads. I was going to leave it until xmas to have it cut again, but I think I'll have to have it done sooner.

Lily xXx

Cursed.

Everything has been going wrong for me the past 2 days. In fact I'm a bit scared to touch the laptop incase I get electrocuted.

Wednesday I slammed the tip of my finger in the door and it's still painful now. Straight after that, in my pain filled haze, I whacked my head on a cupboard and then stubbed my toe on a toolbox the boyf left in the hallway.

Yesterday I thought my bad luck would have come in 3's so I was okay. I was so very wrong. I was knitting socks, or trying to, on quite small needles. Then I went to get a drink, stupidly leaving the knitting on the sofa (can you see where this is going?...). I sat down and then I got a text message, so I half sat up to get the phone and then flopped back down. On the knitting needle. Next thing I was in unbelievable pain and the knitting needle was a good 5cm in my left bum/hip/top of leg area. I paniced and pulled it out and then there was blood everywhere. All over my PJ's, the boyf's dressing gown that I'd stolen and the sofa. Thankfully my sofa is red. Today there's a huge bruise and it hurts to sit down. Clearly knitting is too extreme for me!

Now to make my day worse the water company have shut off the water until 4pm. Because of all of my injuries I haven't washed up for 2 days and wanted to get it done now. I also could really do with washing my hair, I hate not being able to shower when I get up.

Lily xXx

A Valuable Lesson

Tomorrow is my last day of anaesthetics. That may not even be my last day of anaesthetics just in medical school, if I don't choose to persue it any further it could be my last day of anaesthetics ever.

Practically I've learnt a lot. Putting in a cannula isn't that scary, in fact most of the time as long as there's a visable vein and you're not shy about it, it goes in eventually. LMA's are even less scary, easy as long as you're not too shy or gentle about it.

The most valuable lesson I've learn in anaesthetics so far hasn't been any of these things. Anaesthetics has taught me to empathise with patients a lot more. Whenever doing anything surgical so far I may have had a chance to smile at the patient on the ward or have a chat weeks later in outpatients, but basically I've only had to deal with them unconcious. I've truely realised how scary people find operations and how a few kind words go a long way. The anaesthetists I'd most like to have out of the ones I've been placed with have all been the one's who've held the patient's hand whilst injecting them with proprofol if they wanted or distracted the patients with ideas for lovely dreams.

Lily xXx

Silly Socks

Socks are really hard to knit or I'm really easy to confuse.

I'm trying to knit a really simple pair of socks, they're ribbed so I don't need to put a heel in as the ribbing will make them fit the foot... however I am trying to knit them on 4 needles!!

The annoying thing is not the number of needles, but the fact that whenever I lose concentration I end up somehow just knitting on 3 and having to start again. Very frustrating, but it will feel so good once I have it done.

Less than 1 week of anaesthetics left, after today I only have 3 more cannulas to get signed off before I've hit my target of 10 successful cannulas. Or is it cannulae?

Somehow I seem to be exhausted already after only 1 day of this week... I think it's going to be a long one.

Lily xXx

Traumatic Tuesday

Ok... I realise it's Wednesday, but last night I was having a mini nervous break down so didn't feel like posting.

For some reason, probably girly hormones and exhaustion, I was really down. I was upset that the boyf wasn't around, feeling disenchanted with medicine and hating having to get up early. In fact by about 6pm I had decided I was quitting and becoming a wedding planner. I am very organised after all.

Anyway the day started early. I woke up at 5am. That is after being kept awake until after 2 by my neighbors. Great. Clearly a bad start to anyone's day.

I had a morning in theatre with the anaesthetist. My first patient had dementia, the anaesthetist decided he was very lucid and let me cannulate him. I introduced myself, chatted for a couple of minutes and then tried to put in the cannula. I warned him about a scratch and just as I got the tip in he screamed and hit me. Fabulous. I realise it wasn't his fault and when you're not entirely sure what's happening around you things can be very scary, but I would have rather he hit the anaesthetist.

After that the morning was okay, but pretty dull. The anaesthetist didn't really want to teach me anything, so it made it all pretty boring. I then had an afternoon of lectures and trotted off home.

When I got home I talked to the boyf on the phone and just having a conversation with someone I love so much without being able to have a hug made me pretty blue, so I spent the rest of the night filled with self pity.

Today I've woken up much more cheerful. It's amazing what a good night's sleep can do. I also saw Gok Wan today... in a queue for coffee!

It's back to placement tomorrow, with a morning in theatre and an afternoon clinic. Suffering my usual fear that the anaesthetist will be mean and horrible, but fingers crossed it will all be good!

Lily xXx

Needles and Tubes

It's only week 2 and already I'm dreaming about cannulas and various forms of airway maintenance.

In a couple of hours in theatre I managed to steam on with my checklist of stuff to do. I need 10 cannulas and 10 LMAs, I've done 3 successful cannulas (unfortunated my success rate is down to 75% now), and 5 successful LMAs. I'll be breathing a big sigh of relief once I've got enough to get signed off. It's only week 2 and I'm already stressing about sign-ups. I'm such a worry-wart.

I'm in a bit of a funny mood this week. Mainly due to huge arguement between the boy and I. It was very much both our faults.... his for being grumpy and short tempered and mine for being steaming drunk and therefore horrible. Anyway before the arguement we've had some tears over the fact he hates commuting from my crappy flat, in a crap part of London, where I get mugged on the way home (too regularly) and we wake up to blood and faeces in the stairwell. The 24hr loud music from downstairs doesn't help either. So the arguement was a big vent of frustrations, but we've decided it'll be best if he stays at his Nan's near work during the week and then back at the flat on weekends. We'll be able to save more for a deposit on a nicer house (he'll have a lot less petrol to pay) and we won't both be grumpy and tired in the evenings.

Even though I'm happy with this new set up because it means less arguements as the flat is so small we spend all our time walking on each others toes, I can't help feeling a bit abandonned. I know if I'm upset or have a bad day he'll do the hour's drive to come and keep me company but otherwise it's just the ferrets and I... and all the scary people shouting outside. It wouldn't be so bad if I lived in a nice area, but since the "bad people" have moved in downstairs it's really horrid here.

Lily xXx

The First Week

My first week of 4th year is over. It's been busier and more tiring than I could have imagined and loads of it was just induction!

On Thursday we ended up with an impromptu early start to our practical anaesthetics exposure as a day of lectures was cancelled. Each of us was put with a different anaesthetist in a different theatre, scary stuff considering we usually go in pairs.

Over the next 2 weeks of anaesthetics we're all expected to do 10 cannulas and 10 laryngeal mask airways. Pretty daunting since we do very little invasive things in 3rd year.

I managed to impress myself by keeping my 100% cannulation success rate (it doesn't sound as impressive when I then tell people that I've only done 2 in my life). I also managed to put in an LMA right first time which was surprisingly simple and really satisfying. Spending time with the anaesthetists I realised that it's definitely a career I'd consider for the future.

On Thursday I even got free lunch and a pen with the grand round. It wasn't soggy hospital sandwiches either, it was lovely warm lasagne with lots of veg too. Num num num.

Lily xXx

Induction Day

I made it into uni on time! Hurrah... always a good start when it's an induction.

Started the day off with free tea, coffee and pastries. Num num num. They spent a surprisingly short amount of time boring us all with boring stuff we've heard before and got straight into the interesting stuff. Timetables. Timetables fascinate me. I'm obsessed by knowing where I'll be at any particular time in the next few months. In fact as soon as I get a timetable I breathe a sigh of relief. These timetables are so complicated they have loads of colours though, which is a bit intimidating, but I think I've got to grips with the 3 different timetables I've been given!

I start of with 3 week of anaesthetics. In this I'm going to get lots of chances to cannulate and stuff like that, which will no doubt be really useful although I must admit I get so nervous doing practical skills at first. The hospital I'm placed with manages to give us 1 on 1 experience in theatre with anaethetists which means even more time to practice skills.

After that I have 3 weeks of A&E and then 6 weeks of rheumatology and orthopaedics. Although I have these timetables I'm guessing I'll know a lot more what to expect when I get to talk to those who are doing it before me.

Madsadgirl asked how my ferrets are. Great but naughty is the answer. Hugo the little one is getting really big now, but also really mischevious. It was his 2 month birthday yesterday. He's in the nippy stage but is really cute. Luckily him and Archie get on really well... Hugo's favourite treat is nibbling on his earwax. Yummy! On Saturday I'm hoping to take them to a ferret show but I need an extra pair of hands.

Lily xXx

First Day of Year 4

I survived the first day! ...Just

It always frustrates me that I have to get up early for the first day of anything only to have my time wasted with the same talks on plagerism/exams/general conduct. Thankfully that's done for now, although I do have an induction at my placement tomorrow which should be just as thrilling.

The more interesting part of the day was my first lecture/seminar. This was about advanced trauma life support. Interesting stuff. I'm really glad they took the chance to go over this all the first day... would have looked pretty stupid starting an emergency medicine placement and not knowing any of it.

Tomorrow I have to get a bus through loads of roadworks and I'm really worried that no matter how early I leave I'll be late. This stressing out isn't helped by the fact the boyf is staying at his mum's tonight and maybe all week, so I have noone to talk sense into me.

Lily xXx

T - 7 days...

I think that's what I'd say if I was a spy or secret agent counting down until next morning. Although, not being a huge fan of James Bond, I may have got that totally wrong. Bascially 7 days until term starts.

My 5th year at uni and my 4th year of medical school. The last 4 years have gone so quickly that it's a little scary that I only have 2 years left. In a weird way although the time has gone quickly the start of med school seems more like 10 years ago in my mind, and my intercalated BSc just seems like a distant nightmare.

Even though my summer holiday hasn't been as long as it would usually be, I'm suffering the boredom that long holidays bring. At least in previous years I had loads of friends who were on uni holidays, now it's only the medicine lot who have the whole summer and everyone scatters all over the world as soon as the holidays start.

I've got nothing I aimed to do this summer done. I haven't even got to the bottom of the wash basket. On the plus side I feel nice and refreshed which is the main thing.

I'm going to use this week to sort myself out for uni. I've already bought a few bits and bobs. An academic diary. A few new cardis, a pair of trousers (which I need to take up), and some cute pixie boots which will probably be too uncomfortable to wear to uni more than once, but at least on that day my feet will look nice.

I'm thinking of getting a hair cut this week. My hair is pretty unruley so I always get worried about haircuts. If they cut it too short it just goes crazy, and I really struggle to maintain any style, hence the keeping it long and boho. Unfortunately on placement I can't just wear my hair down all the time, so I need to get something done so I can wear it up. At the moment it's so thick and heavy that it hurts to have it up in a bun. Fingers crossed the hairdressers won't do anything too awful with it!

Lily xXx

London Tourist

Although I've lived in London on and off for a large part of my life, having this staycation has allowed me to see it as a tourist for once. Admittedly apart from eating out I've been pretty lax about doing touristy things but I've really enjoyed myself.

On Monday the boyf and I went to the Tate Modern and spent our evening eating a meze at the Real Greek. Tuesday we took the car out and discovered Tunbridge Wells. Wednesday we had an amazing day at Leeds Castle which is confusingly in Kent. It's beautiful with loads of gorgeous gardens. It's just a shame the weather wasn't better for a picnic. There is also a really confusing maze there that we tackled. They also do Segway tours of the place, which is a must for next time. Thursday we did a London Duck Tour. You go in a WWII car/boat on both the land and water!!! Afterwards I ate my bodyweight in dim sum. Yum yum yum. Yesterday we took it easy and decided to take the two ferrets for a walk in the countryside. For a change I got lots of smiles more than weird looks and noone asked me what kind of dog/money/rat/hamster they were!

Today I'm off for lunch at The Narrow, which is one of the Gordon Ramsay pubs. The nicest thing about it is that it's set right on the river, so on a nice day the view is pretty good. The food isn't bad either!

I'm already getting excited about starting term again in a week. We're starting to get lots of emails telling us bits and bobs that are planned for the near future from uni. Unfortunately no hint at a timetable yet so I have no idea how demanding or not this rotation is going to be.

Lily xXx

Staycation

So, as my birthday present the boyf offered to take me away for a long weekend somewhere towards the end of my holidays.

Because of the new additions to the family (...so I got ANOTHER ferret... more about that later) and the fact the idea of struggling our way through a busy airport over the bank holiday seemed like torture, we decided on a staycation instead of a vacation.

So for the next week we're going to fill our time with lots of lovely touristy things we can do from home, and nice meals out. If we get a sunny day Leeds Castle in Kent is pretty high on my list of things I want to do, and the boyf fancies the London Eye one evening and maybe a little river cruise. We were also thinking of perhaps driving out to the countryside, finding a nice hotel and having a quiet night away where someone else cooks breakfast for us in the morning.

So... more about ferret #2. He's called Hugo. He's teeny tiny weeny at only 6 weeks old (although he's a big boy for that age). He's prone to temper tantrums and is currently in his cage screaming at the top of his voice because I won't let him out. I think Archie is slightly bemused and slightly pissed off. To be fair I'd be pissed off if I had to share a room with something so little but so loud.

I've had to put them in separate cages as Archie is about 4x bigger than him and plays a little rough, although it can't be bothering Hugo too much as he keeps going back for more.

Just over 2 weeks until uni starts again and I'm really excited. I need to go smart clothes shopping as I ended up throwing out most of last years clinic clothes which had completely worn out. I've already got a new academic diary. It's nice and shiney and new! I love new diaries!

Lily xXx

Transport Worries

With roadworks etc it'll take me almost 2 horus to get to my next hospital placement in the morning. It's a half hour bike ride according to TFL.

So off I went to get a folding bike. It's red and shiney. I've kind of forgotten hwo to cycle, but I had a practice the other day and apart from being wobbly I was OK-ish. There are a few problems I came across.

1. Cycling is hard work... I forgot my inhaler. Had an asthma attack. Not clever.

2. I kept slipping off the front of my saddle. Why? Any tips on how to stop that would be appriciated.

3. Gears... wtf?! I have no idea what to do with those.

Any cycling in London tips would be muchly appriciated.

Lily xXx

Ferret Fury

My ferret is now a master escapist. I thought I finally had his cage escape proofing perfect. I thought wrong.

Popped out for a couple of hours today. Came home to find he had got onto a ledge which is impossibly high and knocked over a huge pot of paint that I didn't even realise was up there... He then walked little painty paw prints all over the room. The only good thing is that he hasn't managed to walk any of it over the sofa.

Me thinks I'm going to have to invest in a better ferret proof cage and spend ALL afternoon cleaning paint off the floor with white spirit.

On the plus side at least the ferret is ok.

Bummer.

Lily xXx

The Results Are In...

... and I passed!

Woo!!

I don't know my marks yet as they won't be given for a few weeks yet, but the resit lists are out and if you're not on them then it's safe to say that you've passed and you're on your way to being a 4th year medic.

I'm treating myself with a couple of textbooks (gosh I know how to celebrate). I'm going to spend the rest of the day just chilling out and enjoying the idea of being one step closer to being a doctor. Hurrah!

Lily xXx

Results Tomorrow

Tomorrow midday is apparently when we'll be told whether or not we need to resit any exams. I say apparently as my medical school is renowned for it's poor organization. Fingers crossed it will be on time for once as the first resit is at the end of this week.

As true evidence to what a geek I am, I keep having nightmares about having failed the written exams. The horrible thing is that if the written exams are failed, you then have to sit the huge OSCE that passing the practical exams exempts you from as well as resitting the written papers.

I was planning to do something to distract myself but I'm feeling awful today. It's probably just tiredness as I had such a busy weekend. On Friday I took the ferret for his injection. Over the weekend everyone fell in love with him as he was being exceptionally sweet. All cuddles and napping on my knee and no nipping at all. Now he's at home he's back to being super hyperactive and nibbling my toes at every opportunity.

Friday night I went and had a huge curry with my Dad and his girlf. This fuelled me up for Saturday. In the day I manned (or womanned to be exact) the bbq at the boyf's niece's 1st birthday party. Whoever said bbqing was a man's job hasn't met me. Queen of bbqs. After that was a friend's birthday party which ended up in a nights clubbing. I ended up sleeping in until midday and then suffering an awful hangover. I only get hangovers when drinking the cheap alcopops they sell at this club. I think I'll make a point of not doing it again any time soon.

Today I'm hoping to tidy up a bit and otherwise just chill out. Make the most of what may be the last day of my summer holidays if I have to resit.

Lily xXx

Summer Hols At Last!

So, yet again I've left it ages before posting, but the last week has been pretty manic. I spent the weekend before exams babysitting the boyf's niece. She was amazingly well behaved for a year old toddler. We put her in bed before 8pm and she wasn't up again until after 7am, and even then she just wanted a bottle.

The most major thing that's happened has been my exams. Clearly. Thankfully they're over. Or at least they're over for now. Results come out on the 11th of this month and if I've failed I'll have to take them all again and do a huge OSCE. Pressure.

The exams were quite strange. Multiple guess as always. The first one was fairly hard but not impossible, the second one was just microbiology which was unfortunate as we were all under the impression that we were studying medicine. We'd also all been told not to learn all the intricacies of bacteria names and precisely what they all do. They lied. The whole exam was that. One student who was resitting the year was stunned because it was so random compared to the year before. Thankfully the final exam was pretty reasonable. Now I just have to wait until Tuesday to find out. I only have to get an average of 50% over all 3 exams so I'm trying not to worry about it.

Since then I've been chilling out a bit. Tomorrow the ferret is getting his injection and then Saturday I have the boyf's niece's 1st birthday party to enjoy and in the evening one of my best friend's birthdays. Yay!

Lily xXx

Panic Over

I passed all the practical stations. I passed them pretty well as well. I got 75% on the one I thought I'd failed, so I can't have done that badly at all. Really relieved.

The results came out a whole day late because of the universities incompetance (for some reason I always want to write incontinence). Needless to say I've been in a state since. Last night I managed to get myself really worked up and burst into tears. I was so convinced I'd failed and waiting another day was just too much for me.

The boyf was supposed to be going out with his cousins for a few drinks and lied to me telling me it was cancelled so he could sit in and mope with me. He knew I wouldn't let him cancel on them, but he also knew how much it would mean to have someone sitting next to me, eating curry and moping. I need to think of a way to make it up to him.

Now I just have to work hard over the weekend and get through the written exams.

Lily xXx

Meh

I haven't blogged for a couple of days because I really don't have all that much to say. I'm still in inner turmoil over the fact I really think I buggered up that practical station. Should get the results by 5pm tomorrow but really don't want to know.

Otherwise it's been revision, revision, revision. Nothing much is going in. Fingers crossed the fact it's multiple choice will trigger some answers in my mind.

On a nicer note I did go out for a lovely dinner this weekend and I had champagne. It was mine and the boyfs first anniversary. In some ways it doesn't seem like we've been dating for a whole year, but in other ways it seems like more. If you'd have asked me this time last year if we'd be living together I'd definitely have just laughed and said no, but it's been really great on the whole.

Lily xXx

Idiot

I had my exam on Wednesday. I've since been wallowing in a pit of self pity because I am such an idiot.

I had 4 practical stations. 3 of the stations were okay I think. 2 history stations which I'm normally good at but at the time never know if I've done well or badly and a peripheral vascular exam which the examiner naughtily told me I'd passed.

The first station I had I completely buggered up. To make it worse the second I left the station I realised what I'd done wrong. Even more annoyingly it was one of the easiest stations. Lower limb motor examination. I was thrown off at the beginning because I wanted to check the patient's gait and I was told to move on...

I started ok after that. Checked tone. Looked for clonus. Moved onto power. Graded the power. Did reflexes. Was sure there was an ankle reflex but was told that there wasn't. Did it again and couldn't find it. Started worrying I was going mad. Got all flustered. Totally forgot to check for extensor plantar response. Got asked if it was upper or lower motor neurone as the station finished. Was in such a tizz that I can't even remember what I said.

We get the results next week, but I'm not expecting to pass this station. That annoyingly means resitting the station after written exams which is technically the start of the summer hols. Meh.

On the plus side at least I didn't let buggering up the first station put me off for the other three. I'm really really annoyed with myself though. Grrrr.

Lily xXx

Exams Are Coming Closer...

My practical exam is on Wednesday. Argh. I'm just hoping I get "easy" stations as I have so far because the idea of resitting it is a little depressing. Unfortunately around half of the people each time fail at least 1 of the stations so I can't rule it out completely.

I find it hard to "revise" for practical exams, so that only serves to make me more nervous.

In other news... I survived the colonoscopy. It was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. The worst bit were the laxatives beforehand. I think I've now developed a phobia of pooing. They found lots and lots of polyps in my sigmoid colon, which most probably are just benign hyperplastic polyps, which is interesting to know. Only I would manage to have the bowel of a 60 year old at 22 years old.

I'm off to revise now and eat my breakfast. It's taken me about 20 mins to write this as the ferret keeps jumping into my bowl of cereal. Little bugger!!!

Lily xXx

Colonoscopy Dread

Tomorrow I am having a colonoscopy. I am dreading it. I've also started worrying that it may actually show something is wrong. This could be the madness from my hunger as I haven't eaten yet today! Meh.

Just to overshare I am also suffering some pretty gross steatorrhoea. For all you non medics, thats what happens when you can't absorb fats, your poo goes pale, floaty and incredibly stinky. Its reminded me why I avoid fatty foods like cheese. I just can't digest them. Yuk yuk yuk. I'm feeling pretty sorry for myself.

On a different note, my ferret has started writing a blog archietheferret.blogspot.com . I think you'll find he's a good little blogger and mentions his bowels less than I do (so far... although ferrets are 10% love and 90% poop).

Lily xXx

Panic Setting In

Now revision panic is really setting in. I have my mini-OSCE next week!! What's off putting is that although it's only 4 stations, it's sudden death, unlike the big OSCEs where you can still pass overall if you fail a couple of stations.

These mini-OSCEs are a lot about luck as well as actual clinical skill. If you get a couple of easy stations you're laughing, but if you get tough ones then you'll probably fail even though you'd have passed with someone else's stations. I've been lucky so far and I've had easy stations. Basic life support, examining a neck, explaining cardiovascular risk factors and then some simple history stations.

Most of the histories we do come from the pastest book. For the last 2 exams I've refused to look. I want to know how to take a history, not remember a list of questions from pastest. I've done pretty well so far. I'm getting more and more worried that I'm going to suffer for this though. What if I'd got the taking a uraemia history from a patients wife? I'd have never asked for hiccups because I hadn't read it in pastest.

On a lighter note the ferret is so fun! At the moment he's running around the living room with the brush from my dustpan and brush set in it's mouth. I wonder if I can teach him to sweep up properly. He's already shown such a little personality. He's generally playful, but gentle although he has an awful temper. He's only bitten me once and the boyf once, never hard enough to break the skin, but when he does he gets told no, tapped on the nose and put in his cage. This is when his temper starts. He'll throw his litter around and jump up and down trying to get us to let him out of the cage. He'll then sulk when it's opened later and refuse to come out for half an hour or so before he'll come over to wherever we are for a snuggle to say sorry.

Lily xXx

Welcome To The Family

There's a new edition to my household... My little 10 week old ferret called Archie.

He's coloured like a polecat and he is lovely. He was friendly straight from the word go and the second I put a litter tray in the corner he chose to poo in, he started using it. Clever little ferret. Excitingly he can even play with a ball, which is great fun to watch. Either that or I'm really easily amused.

As soon as the boyf lets me upload a photo instead of revising (which he is shouting at me to do now!) I'll put a photo of Archie up for everyone to see.

Lily xXx

Reality Strikes

Finally, probably a couple of weeks later than I would have liked, the reality of what I have to learn for my exams has hit me.

Yesterday I managed a couple of hours of reading through case studies in a book written by one of the people who writes our exam papers. By this time next week I hope to have written a couple of pages of notes to remind myself of the various drug treatments for things. Then after that, if I keep reading notes and revision-style books I think I might be okay.

Apparently only 1 person failed the written exams last year, I really don't want to be that one. It would be shocking to go down from the top quartile to the only person failing. Sense tells me that because I bothered to turn up to things this year, that even without revision I should probably scrape a pass. It would be nice to do well though. It would also be nice to feel like I'd done enough work so they night before I'm not freaking out.

On Thursday I'm going to BodyWorlds. Sooooo excited. I saw the first one in London when I was at school. I'm treating it as kind of revision. I can use it to remind myself of anatomy. Who am I kidding? It's just going to be a nice day out. Unfortunately beforehand I have to queue at the council offices to get another parking permit as they run out on Monday. I have a feeling that it could be a long and tedious morning.

Lily xXx

The Other Side

I want to be a doctor... not a patient. In fact I don't really like doctors or hospitals from a patients perspective. Maybe the subconscious reason that I'm studying medicine is "If you can't beat them... join them."

Anyway, to the point. I have a hospital appointment next week for a colonoscopy. A word that fills me with dread. To cut a long story short I've always had what I was told was irritable bowel syndrome but have never had any tests done, and earlier this year I had a couple of prolonged episodes of bloody diarrhoea... gross and slightly worrying.

So off to the gastro doctor I went after much bullying from my friends, hoping I'd be told to stop making such a fuss and to bugger off. However the doctor thinks it's best to investigate (and she's probably right), so I'm stuck having a colonoscopy in a fortnight.

As if having a camera shoved up my bottom wasn't horrific enough there is "bowel preperation" involved. I always presumed that was a couple of senna tablets. Oh no. It's a week long thing.

It starts with 3 days of being able to eat practically nothing interesting. White pasta with no sauce, white bread, white rice, white fish, steamed chicken, butter, cheese, egg, and no fruit or veg except banana. Then as if that isn't bad enough I then have to have a day of nothing except clear fluids. NOTHING. I live for food. I get so grumpy when I can't have food. I haven't eaten in 3 hours today and I'm already hungry and grumpy. Then on the day of the test I still get no food and have to wait until the afternoon to be colonoscopied.

As well as the not eating I have to take these super strong laxatives which recommend I stay near a toilet, from the night before. Fun fun fun.

A large part of me feels I'd rather bleed to death out of my bottom. My rational side says that this is a 5 day diet plan which will help me shed some tummy and will hopefully lead to a solution to all my tummy cramps, diarrhoea and bottom bleeding.

Apologies for any overshare

Lily xXx

Sun Safety

As I do at least once I year, I learn the benefits of sun safety the hard way.

I got sunburnt.

I've spent the last 2 days by the seaside as I've had no uni, and even though I put on suntan lotion, I didn't put it on often enough and I didn't cover up. The results is a sunburnt back and a very sore and sunburnt leg. Sensibly I'm staying indoors this morning, but this afternoon I want to go to the beach.

I read the last of the Twilight books yesterday, and ended up doing no work what so ever which was less than ideal. I really can't seem to knuckle down and start revising.

On a complete tangent... Why does asparagus make your wee smell funny?

Lily xXx

Beautiful Wedding

All my finger crossing worked, as this weekend the weather was perfect for the wedding I went to. Not only was the weather gorgeous, but the wedding itself was the nicest I've ever been to. It was held at a beautiful country house, with lovely gardens and a big marquee.

The tables were all named after a different type of sweet, with little jars of those sweets for everyone there. The meal was also amazing, it was a selection of bbq meats, lovely salads and bbq veg, realy nice for a hot summers day.

The boyf looked gorgeous in his smart usher's suit, and even though for a lot of the wedding he was running around doing things, everyone else there was so friendly it was no problem at all to mill about chatting to other people.

I completely fell in love with the part of Surrey the wedding was held in. So much so that going back to London last night was actually really upsetting. It was all small beautiful villages and winding country lanes. Perfect. I really felt as if all my problems were just lifted off my shoulders for the weekend.

Now I'm back it's time to finish my bursary form, tidy the flat and do some work. A big crash back down to reality.

Lily xXx

Exciting Weekend Plans

For once I have something really exciting planned for the weekend...

A wedding!

... not mine. Obviously! It's the boyf's cousin's wedding. Scarily, he's a year younger than the boyf which makes him only 2 years older than I am.

I don't really know the cousin or his fiance very well, but I'm still really excited. The boyf is an usher and looks very very handsome in his lovely suit. I have a nice dress which is black, covered with white flowers and I'm going to wear it with a white bow on a headband in my hair and a lovely little purple cardie to brighten the whole thing up.

Hopefully it'll be a really lovely day. I've only been to 3 weddings in my whole life, the last of which was when I was 15 or 16, so I'm really looking forward to it.

Fingers crossed it doesn't rain in Surrey!

Lily xXx

P.S. Does the Micheal Jackson dying news strike anyone as the root of a new conspiracy theory? I think he's alive and living with Elvis.

Yuk

New people moved in downstairs in my block of flats just over a month ago. Since then there's been nothing but trouble.

I live in a part council, part ex-council block of flats in a pretty rough area of London, but although it has looked pretty tired and tatty since I moved in, the block was always otherwise OK. Until now.

Now the people downstairs play stupidly loud music most of the day and night. To top it off since they moved in the public areas have been getting worse and worse. Before the rubbish in the hallway would be the occasional crisp packet or sweetie wrapper left by one of the kids. 2 weekends ago the hallway was covered in blood and even poo in one corner. Not nice. Although the floor has been cleaned since there is still blood smeared all over the walls. Last night coming home on the stairwell was a burst plastic bag of bits of rotting fish which has been dragged down 3 flights of stairs... from just outside their flat to the bottom of the stairs. Thanks to the local council it still hasn't been cleaned and its gross.

It's really been getting me down living here over the past month, and the boyf hates it too. Unfortunately the people at the council don't really seem to care.

Lily xXx

Jinxed

I haven't blogged for almost a week for a good reason. Not only did my own laptop break weeks ago, but last week I turned on the boyfriend's computer then it crackled, went bang and started smoking. Not good! Thankfully he wasn't upset with me because it wasn't really my fault that it blew up when I turned it on, but I'm starting to think that I'm jinxed.

I'm starting to really wonder about revision. I've decided the best way forward is to go to the wedding this weekend and then as of next Monday really knuckle down which gives me over a month until written exams.

Although I have enjoyed this year loads, I can't wait for it to be over. It's so very long. Next year has lots of interesting things to look forward to, especially the elective. I really want to go to a place in the South Pacific, but have emailed the people lots of times and still not heard anything.

Lily xXx

Full Day

For the first time in quite a while I have a full day at uni today.

Surprisingly I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be nice to go into uni and do a full days work as opposed to coming in for an hour or two and feeling like I'm wasting the rest of the day.

I'm going to continue my productivity later at home by filling in the hardest form known to man. The NHS bursary form. It makes what should be simple questions rather difficult. It also asks for loads of random paperwork that I'm not sure I'll be able to find. Needless to say I'll be pleased if I get it done today because that will mean that it's all out of the way.

I'm having revision dilemmas, like the rest of the year it seems. When do we start? What do we cover? How much do we do? Is it worth revising at all when multiple choice can be so random?

I'm also worrying about my mini OSCE already. Unlike a lot of people I haven't failed any of them so far, but it would be just my luck to fail the last ones and have to resit right at the end of the year when I should be soaking up the sun/redecorating my hallway.

On the home front... my shower still isn't working. I haven't managed to get through to the right person at the council to agree to turn off the water to the whole building while I have a new stopcock fitted. Nightmare. Anyway I'm off to uni now.

Lily xXx

Summer Holidays

I'd quite like to be on summer holidays now. The weather last summer was rubbish and this summer so far it seems pretty good. Unfortunately I have weeks and weeks more uni and then exams. I shouldn't moan because if I pass things first time I get just over a month off which is great, but it's frustrating seeing everyone on their holidays now.

Lily xXx

Broken Shower!!

The only cure for my bad back has broken :(

My shower is officially dead. It's been dying for a couple of weeks now, in fact last Friday it game me an electric shock. Although we have a nice shiny set of mixer taps and shower to go on the bath, the stopcock to the bathroom has been broken by the lady who lived here before me so we have to wait for the weekend for the boyfs Dad to do something plumbery to stop the water in the bathroom.

I really don't like baths that much. They're okay for chilling out but not for washing. For a start they get cold too quick, then there's the fact I have really thick hair so it's impossible to wash in a bath. It also uses so much more water than a shower.

On the plus side my Dad is bringing me some anchovy stuffed olives from France. The boyf hates olives and isn't too hot on anchovies so I have the whole lot to myself. Nummy!

Lily xXx

Old Before My Time

My nickname around uni has become "Granny Lily". Originally this was just because of my penchant for knitting, ballroom dancing and cookery shows. Some see it as my quarter life crisis, I just see it as a nice calm way to have fun.

More recently it's been applied to my health too. I seem to be falling apart. This week I seem to have pulled my back out. Not only is it excruciatingly painful, it also sends pain all down my left arm and makes the side of my hand twitch (more exactly it makes my abductor digiti minimi fasiculate for all you anatomy buffs).

So, cures for a sore back please people.

Paracetamol doesn't even touch the pain, co-codamol helps a bit but taken too much gives constipation which I'd like to avoid. I'm allergic to NSAIDs so ibprofen, diclofenac etc are a no-no. Hot showers help, but as much as I'd like to staying in the shower all day it is not an option.

Any other tips?! Any ways to help it get better more quickly?!

Lily xXx

Sims 3 and Other Procrastination Techniques

I have had a rather unexpected weekend.

It turns out the boyf wasn't not texting me back because of his textual issues, but because he was in the car on the way home. He had family issues which meant that he had to rush home to his Mum's house on the Saturday morning of the Stag do, and then after that he just felt like coming home for a cuddle, not a weekend of carnage. I feel awful that he missed out on the whole thing and paintballing because he was really looking forward to it. Fingers crossed he'll have the opportunity to do something with the boys again sometime soon.

Because of this my weekend was pretty much turned upside down. Just as the boyf arrived home, one of my best friends was popping over to say hi and have a gossip as I was supposedly on my own. Instead he got to know the boyf a little better which was good. We pretty much just sat in and snuggled Saturday evening which was lovely. Unfortunately there was a huge thunder storm in the night which not only half woke me up, but I think it led to one of my horrible nightmares, so Sunday morning the boyf and I were both a bit groggy after he was woken in the early hours with me irrationally sobbing.

We weren't sure what to do on Sunday so I started with a little revision, which lasted about half an hour. After that I sewed an arm for my sock monkey (thats the body, tail and an arm that I have done now!) and then didn't really know what else to do with my time.

We decided to buy The Sims 3. I am a self confessed Sims addict. I used to get my Dad to lock my Sims disks away in his safe over my exams at school because I find it so distracting! Sims 3 is amazing. The graphics are much better and you can get Sims looking really freakishly like people you know. It's actually scary how like me my Sim looks. You also get to give them 5 different traits from a huge list. It's great because not only is my Sim as excitable as me, it's also as clumsy! Because we're a pair of saddos the boyf and I made sims of each other, made them fall in love and get married. Possibly the geekiest Sunday ever!

Lily xXx

Lie-In Saturday

I'm such a procrastinator. Now I've finished my essay I should be starting making revision notes. Instead last night I read the whole of Eclipse, one of the follow ups to Twighlight. Then as I stayed up so late last night I needed a nice big lie-in.

Having a lie in on a Saturday wouldn't be such a big deal if I thought I'd be able to concentrate for the rest of the day, but I doubt I will. I'm a born worrier, and if I have the slightest bit of worry about anything it completely takes over.

Today I'm worrying about the boyf. He's off at a Stag Weekend. If there's one thing the boyf isn't good at is keeping in touch. I'm sure by now his phone will be dead and he won't be in the slightest bit concerned. He let me know he got there okay last night and I'm sure that's the last I'll hear of him until Sunday. Unfortunately even though I know this I can't help but worry. In my mind I'm thinking "What if something happened when they were out last night?!"... being arrested, getting lost or dying of alcohol poisioning in a ditch is not beyond any of them. Worse today they're going paintballing. It's my idea of hell. Running around while people shoot you with hard pellets of paint. No thanks! So now I'm thinking of the million and one things that could go wrong at paintballing.

I'm also a bit worried for the Stag. I've heard lots of rumours of what they're going to do to him. Thankfully they went off the idea of going to Vegas, kidnapping him and then leaving him in the desert. I'm sure they would have eventually gone back for him... when their scatterbrains meant they remembered.

Lily xXx

Woo Hoo!

I finished my essay last night... thats a full 48 hours before the deadline. Not bad if I say so myself. I could start revision today as exams are in just less than 7 weeks, but I've decided since I worked so hard I can read New Moon and finish my Sock Monkey.

So I'm doing something productive I think I am going to try and make some kind of revision timetable and perhaps, maybe, possibly spend an hour making notes today. Just enough notes to learn the nerve roots and nerves which innovate various muscles as I have a little test in neuro on Tuesday. Thats all I can think that will really come up. Maybe I could learn a bit about cranial nerves too, but thats pretty much what we cover with this one tutor. I'm hoping that if I learn it well for Tuesday, I won't need much reminding for end of year exams.

Sitting outside one of the uni building this week I've seen loads of 5th years finishing their OSCE, their last exam of medical school. How exciting. In two years that will hopefully be me!

Lily xXx

Heat Wave

I think the bout of extremely lovely weather over the past few days is starting to get to me. I've gone from trying to sit in the bright sunshine at every spare moment, to sitting in the shade sipping on water to stop turning from a grape into a raisin. Even so I'm a little upset that apparently tomorrow is the end of the beautiful warm sunshine. There's nothing that's much more pleasing than being able to have my lunch as picnic outside to break up the day.

Annoyingly the weather only started to brighten up after my birthday drinks on Wednesday. We picked a pub by the riverfront especially to be able to sit outside and enjoy the day and it was miserable. Thankfully Thursday, my actual birthday, was much nicer.

I had a couple of really good days celebrating my birthday. A nice night out with uni mates and an equally nice night out with some friends from home over the weekend. My Dad also cooked my favourite food when I came home which was much appreciated and another friend took me to Pizza Express.

Pizza Express is doing new "diet" pizzas. I quite like the theory behind it. They just cut out the middle of the pizza and put a handful of salad there instead. Instant cut in calories. Even better is the fact that I struggle to finish a whole pizza and I love salad but could never justify a whole pizza and side salad. Now I can have both. Hurrah!

Lily xXx

The Sun Has Got His Hat On

... but I didn't so now I have a sunburnt scalp. This matches nicely with my sunburnt shoulders and sunburnt chest. Thankfully being bright red just sets off my ginger hair even more. Suncream is never enough. Next time I'm covering myself in something thick and impenitrable to the sunshine... like cement perhaps?!

Essay is halfway through so I have tomorrow afternoon and wednesday afternoon to bash out 2000 words. I'm quitely confident that while in a state of panic that will be completely obtainable.

Lily xXx

All Over The Place

Bank holiday's always mess with my mind. I always end up thinking that Tuesday is actually Monday, and then when the Tuesday things happen I get all confused. My body calender has been completely fried.

To make things worse public transport was a nightmare today. The rain slowed up all the trains, and half the trains to Waterloo this morning didn't even turn up. To make things worse my waterproof Primark coat is far from waterproof so I got completely soaked.

As if an omen of rubbish things to come I also found out that a close family friend (so close my family lived with their's since I was 15) may have a serious illness. Totally and utterly unexpected. I don't really know what to think. He's got more tests to confirm it tomorrow so I don't want to be all doom and gloom until things are 100%, but it's quite hard not to be. It makes it really hard not being home at times like this.

Lily xXx

Cannibals

I've come to a slightly scary conclusion. My neighbours are cannibals.

Why do I think this?

Well... All the flats where I live are pretty small. About 15 people walk into their flat every day, but I NEVER see anyone coming out. All I can conclude is that the flat is either a tardis or they're eating all the people who go inside. Until last night I hadn't made up my mind which it was. Then I heard it.... Chanting. Okay, maybe it was just some children singing, but with my vivid imagination I've now decided. They're cannibals.

Lily xXx

Last Presentation... Done!

This morning I did the last presentation of this academic year. Woo! I got 9/10 on this one too, which has made me pretty happy. Two 9/10's in one week can't be bad. I've also finally got a little more sensible about about this essay, which is now due in 2 weeks and I'm getting on with it. I've also made the boyf promise to bully me into doing most of it this weekend just in case I try and skive.

The reason I need to get most of it done this weekend is because most of next week is going to be a write-off because of my birthday. I have plans all the way from Wednesday - Sunday. Not that all of them are birthday related, but it's lots of stuff I want to do, and lots of people I want to see. For that reason I really want the first draft done by Monday evening at the latest. It also means I'll be able to hand back the huge pile of library books taking up space on my floor.

Lily xXx

Procrastination Queen

Yet again I'm spending this evening procrastinating and not doing any work. However I feel that I have a right to tonight. I've done a fair bit of work over the last 2 days and even got 9/10 in a presentation. I've also looked up all the stuff to do around 1000 - 1500 words of my essay, which I should be able to churn out in an hour or two tomorrow. Helen is definitely right when she said I should set myself a couple of hours to do some work and I'd probably just carry on... so that is the plan tomorrow. I'm making myself do 2 hours of essay and if it carrys on then bonus, I should get loads done, and if it doesn't 2 hours is still a lot of words when I have all the research sitting there ready in front of me.

Tomorrow I also have another presentation to do, and this should really be the last one of this academic year.... thank goodness. In a couple of weeks I'll need to be concentrating on revision and not presentations and essays.

On a random unrelated note... bovril on toast = amazing. I don't have it for a couple of days and forget how good it is, but it really is amazing. In fact I'm actually quite upset that I only discovered it a couple of months ago and thus have wasted over 21 years of my life without experiencing bovril. It's so nummy.

Lily xXx

Birthdays Everywhere

The boyf's birthday dinner was a total success. I made prawn and apple cocktail, boeuf en croute and hot chocolate fondant pots. Surprisingly everything went completely to plan, the only bad thing to happen was that I smashed a glass in the kitchen. Fortunately I only got a teeny tiny piece of glass in my foot.

After dinner, where we both put on about 10kg, we had a relatively early night so we could get up and clean the flat properly for the boyf's Dad coming over. The flat was surprisingly easy to clean. I realise it's tiny, but I always overestimate tidying up time. It's so nice to be in a tidy clean flat. It was lovely seeing his Dad too. Later that afternoon we drove to the seaside to go and see his Mum and go out for drinks with his friends, so overall it was a busy, but really nice weekend.

Unfortunately it means I've done no work and I have 2 presentations this week, a load of psych stuff to type up for a psychiatrist and I want to get 1000 more words of this essay done. Fun fun fun...

First presentation is a neuro one tomorrow with no powerpoint, so that shouldn't be too major. I have a patient in mind I just need to write myself a few cues and a couple of definitions if I get asked questions about things.

I really really really cannot wait for the next few weeks to be over even though it's my birthday in less than a fortnight because I have so much work to do. Weirdly it's the boyf's sister's birthday and two of my best friend's birthdays in the next fortnight too. I'm actually spending a small fortune in birthday cards!

Lily xXx

Stupid Phone

About a month ago I got a new phone. An XDA Ignito. Either the phone is totally rubbish or I completely cannot work it. In fact this morning it very almost got thrown into the wall.

I was wondering if anyone else knew how to work this phone?! Just in case here are the things that puzzle me...

1. The alarm. How do you turn it off?! Even when I turn it off it still goes on. I have to turn the phone off and back on to get it to stop. Very frustrating at 6.30 am.

2. Locking it. Sometimes when I put it in it's case it manages to open stuff and call people. Othertimes halfway through a text when I pause to think the whole thing will lock.

It is a puzzling machine.

I'm going to have quite a busy today considering I have no uni. I'm actually going to do some more essay. On top of that I'm meeting a friend for an hour or two AND I'm cleaning the flat because the boyf's Dad is visiting on Saturday. Unfortunately the flat is always a tip which just makes things worse as it looks so rough from outside. The lack of a lift at the moment doesn't help either.

Lily xXx

Exhaustion

Have I used this as a post title before?! Probably.

Yet again I'm really exhausted. It's not that I'm not enjoying uni, or am feeling overworked by it, it's more the fact that I can't seem to get a full night's sleep.

On the plus side I got 7 sign-ups today. That's about a 1/3 of what I need to get in this rotation.

I'm also slowly improving in sqaush. I've gone from not being able to serve at all, to being able to serve quite well some of the time. I reckon in a couple more weeks my service will be pretty good most of the time and then I might have a chance of winning a game.

Those who follow this blog will probably be bemused to know that I still haven't finished writing my essay. I'm determined to knuckle down tomorrow afternoon and Thursday, when I have time off to get a big chunk of it done. Fingers crossed I'll be able to self motivate.

Lily xXx

Haircut

I have a new skill. A skill good enough to give me a back-up plan if I completely fail the rest of university.

I could be a barber.

Today I cut the boyf's hair. It actually looks pretty good. This may just be because I was so convinced I'd have his scalp off with the clippers that anything short of a hair studded blood bath is amazing, but even he thinks it looks good. Or at least he's telling me that so as not to hurt my feelings.

Lily xXx

Presentation Tomorrow

Every rotation we have to present cases to the rest of the group in a power point presentation. Every rotation I end up volunteering to do the first one out of some strange misplaced sense of guilt. I just hate it when noone volunteers for something.

Yet again I'm panicing about presenting a patient in a topic I'm nowhere near comfortable in. To make it worse my computer charger has died so I had to do the presentation against the clock after drafting it on the boyf's computer on word as he doesn't have powerpoint. A clear sign that he isn't a student.

Anyway tomorrow morning I get it out of the way and if I get a good mark it's the last powerpoint I'll have to do this academic year. If I don't get a good mark then I'm allowed another go because by doing the first one I'm putting myself at a disadvantage. Fingers crossed my firm head will think good things and up my overall mark for being a little bit keen.

Lily xXx

Toast

Whenever I am hungry in the slightest (which is most of the time), I can't seem to help my tummy making hugely loud rumbles. Toast for breakfast seems to make this worse. Why is it two slices of toast fill me up for barely 2 hours?! It's all about cereal, but unfortunately I've run out of nice cereal. A shopping trip is seriously needed.

Hampering my needs to go shopping is the fact that the car is still broken. It finally went into the garage today and may cost anything from £300 - £1000+ to fix. I'm horrified. What's even worse is that the boyf can't take any more time off work so as of tonight is staying at his Mum's so he can get to work. That makes him around 65 miles away from me. Thats much more than the 65mm distance we usually have. He's only been gone a few hours and I've already started talking to Teddy C...

Lily xXx

Last Term Lethargy

Even though this is a new rotation I am definitely experiencing last term lethargy. It seems that because of exams the only proper relaxing holiday time I have is the couple of days once my exam is over, so I'm never getting time to fully chill out and relax. I'm really looking forward to the end of this year so I can have a couple of weeks to myself. It's also exciting to think that I'll start my penultimate year in September.

Even though I'm feeling a little lazy and possibly not as motivated as I should be to start learning neuro bits and bobs I am really getting into psych. It's soooo interesting. Geekily I can find myself reading a psych book and actually getting lost in it. Maybe psychiatry will be the career for me. Who knows?!

Unfortunately I can't seem to bring myself to sign up for a night on call. A bad experience in my first term where everyone just made my clinical partner and I feel as if we were completely in the way for hours and noone would let us see anything interesting has kind of put me off. Tomorrow I'm going to have a pow-wow with my clinical partner to decide what we should do.

I made the time to play squash again today, instead of going for a run. I really really like squash, but I just can't seem to master serving. Once the ball is bouncing around I'm pretty good for a newbie, but the ability to serve just eludes me. Fingers crossed this squash and running will help me drop a few pounds. Tried on some summery 3/4 length trousers on the weekend and they were nowhere near doing up even though they fitted fine last summer. Disaster!!!

Lily xXx

Car Trouble

As per usual car's have been causing me problems. The boyf and I decided to go home for the long weekend to see our families and enjoy the fresh seaside air. Saturday morning I got up and went for a run (don't be too impressed, it was only 1km). After coming back, having a shower and getting dressed I was all excited about going home. The boyf and I ran down to the car, buckled ourselves in... and then disaster!! The clutch was broken. No warning signs, no anything, just a broken clutch.

Understandably on a bank holiday weekend it is impossible to get a new clutch. So the boyf and I were stuck. No car, no seaside, just smog.

Sometimes I can get quite down where I live. It's by far not the nicest borough of London. I haven't been raped or mugged here so it can't be the worst, but it's very tatty and oppressive sometimes. I was not happy about being stuck here all weekend.

After an hour or two of sulking and swearing about how rubbish everything was we resigned ourselves to no seaside this weekend and instead got on the bus. Now I realise it was actually a blessing in disguise that the car broke. The boyf and I have spent all weekend sitting in the sunshine in parks, walking around the pretty parts of London and enjoying glasses of wine on the riverbank. In fact I don't think we could have asked for a more perfect weekend. Rather than going home, rushing around to see our families and spending no quality time together we had the best weekend we've had in ages.

This really nice long weekend has put me in a good frame of mind for next week. I'm going to get on with that essay I keep talking about. I have another month until the deadline so rather than rushing I could actually do something really high quality. I also have a presentation about a psychiatry patient to do on Friday which will be good to get out of the way so early on in the rotation. This week I also want to master how to test all the cranial nerves. The hardest thing about neuro placements in my opinion is the fact that the overall examination is so complex.

Today I'm going to have an indoor picnic because the weather has taken a turn for the worst. Over the last fortnight I've developed an obsession with sandwiches again. I make an amazing apple and cumin chutney (oh look... I'm being modest again!), which is amazing with mature cheddar. I also have an addiction to chorizo sandwiches. Anyone have any ideas for yummy sandwich fillings I might not have tried?!

Lily xXx

Modesty... I Think Not.

Oh yeah... I forgot to mention....

I passed my exams!!!

I also did very well. I got 90% in one of the stations. 90%!!!

Modesty has never been my strong point though. Need to work on it.

Lily xXx

Eureka... it works!

I learnt something fabulous today. Taking my inhaler before exercise actually really really helps. Ever since I got asthma I cut right down on exercise and totally stopped running. Once I found out it was asthma and was given an inhaler I knew that it was supposed to help and in theory should make my running easier, but the memory of how scary and painful it is to have an asthma attack put me off trying it out.

I'm really convinced that I want to do the 2010 London marathon so I need to start running again. After Tuesdays asthmatic disaster I was a little wary today when I went to go for a short run (only 1-2kms for the first week to get me started again). I decided to give the inhaler thing a bash and took two puffs before I set off. It was amazing. Just like before I had asthma. I could actually breathe. It felt so nice to stop running once my legs were getting achy not because I suddenly felt I couldn't breathe anymore.

Even though it was only a 15 minute jog, at a fairly slow pace, it's really made me feel that perhaps I can actually do the marathon.

Lily xXx

Good First Impression

I met my neurology consultant today. He seems like a really nice guy. I've spent most of this year petrified about getting some horrible, scary neuro consultant who'll expect me to know everything from day 1, but this guy seems nice, good at teaching, approachable and reasonable.

It was nice to be home a little early today too as the first week tends to be a little less demanding than the rest of the rotation.

I've decided to apply for the 2010 marathon, so I decided to go for a run today. I learnt a valuable lesson. Don't go out without an inhaler. Apart from the odd wheeze my asthma really hasn't played up for over a year until I went running today. After about 600m I tried to take a breath and just couldn't, then I couldn't get a big breath out either. I ended up sitting on the pavement in the rain trying to calm down and not panic so I could catch my breath. Not surprisingly where I live noone decided to help me.

Once I'd recovered a bit I took a stroll about half a km back to my flat. I somehow ended up carrying my neighbours baby up loads and loads of stairs because the lift wasn't working. That was more than enough of a work out for me. Somehow I need to get the motivation to try and have a run again on Thursday. We shall see.

Lily xXx

First Day of the New Term

What a long day.

Up at 6.30am.

On the bus not long after 7am.

Back on the train home at 8pm.

Lots of stuff in between.

Today was possibly the most pointless day ever. I literally had a whole long day of various people from uni explaining admin stuff that they had already emailed us. Us medics may not be the brightest of people but we can read!

Tomorrow I have to have a whole day of neurology. I know nothing. Starting to panic now.

Lily xXx

Real Time Off

Since Wednesday, when I finished my exam, until Monday when I start my placement I have actual real holiday time off with no revision. It's been really really nice and relaxing for once although I haven't got anything I planned to do done.

I spent Friday playing squash and got home quite late, so today I was going to clean the flat, especially the kitchen which needs a really good deep clean. Anyway, it just hasn't happened so that's now going to be tomorrows job after I've done the things I have planned tomorrow.

Tomorrow is the London Marathon. Woo. Two of my friends are running in it, so the plan is to meet at a pub with a group of people and later on meet them when they've finished running.

I wish I had the determination to train for and eventally run a marathon, that takes a lot of hard work!

Lily xXx

Exam Run Down

I did my exam yesterday.

I always find exams, especially practical ones hard to interpret afterwards. For this reason I have no idea whether or not I've done well.

The stations I had were all pretty straight forward. As there is still one day of exams left I won't go into too much detail, lest I give it all away, but I can tell you some stuff without giving it away.

I had one examination station. I missed part of the examination, but it's the same part a friend missed when doing the identical station last time around and she still passed comfortably.

My other two stations were histories. One had a man who talked really slowly and at length, so it was so hard to take his history in 5 minutes. Another was really grumpy. He asked me if I thought he was going to die and if I could tell him what was wrong with him. In response to this I gave him the answer I've always been told to give in the hospital... "I'm only a medical student so I can't tell you much about what illness you may have, that's down to the doctor who is much more qualified than I am and won't accidentally mislead you." In reply to this he had a huff and said I clearly knew nothing more than the cleaner. That was a little mean.

Talking to other people after the exam really upsets me. Every time someone talks about the stations I think of all the things I've missed. To make it worse those going into the exam in the afternoon usually know what stations they will get by finding other people who had the same stations as them earlier than them last time. I'm first thing in the morning so I'll never get that luxury.

Lily xXx