Happy Medical Monday!

   Hello everyone! Happy Medical Monday! Head on over to Your Doctor's Wife for the blog hop. 

 Hope everyone is doing well.  I'm still waiting for interviews for residency programs... *sigh* Not much else new going on with me. 

Anyway, the other day I realized that I won't be scrubbing in to the OR until March, and I won't be touching any patients until next month (I'm on Radiology now), sooooo naturally I took this chance to get my nails done!  

   

Dear Right Side of Brain, Please Wake Up

   One of the unfortunate consequences of going into a super left-sided-brain profession, is that if you don't make an effort to nurture the right side of your brain, it atrophies*.  I can make a ton of excuses about lack of time, lack of energy, blah blah blah.  But the truth of the matter is that I have done a piss-poor job of paying attention to my right brain.

   I wasn't always this asymmetric.  Back in high school I was extremely creative and working on projects ALL THE TIME.  I used to sew, paint, collage, draw, dance, you-name-it!  College rolled around, and I sorta lost my creative juices in the midst of studying and doin' what college kids do.  Flash forward to med school where I briefly went through a photography phase, taking a ton of pictures of everything and everyone.  But once I started studying for boards, I turned off the right side of my brain in order to buckle down, and I recently realized that I may have forgotten to turn it back on...

   There have been times in med school when that poor half-a-brain tries to take a breath of air to come back to life. For example:

• my various attempts at pretty nails
• our genital bake-off
• when I tried to pretend I was an interior designer
• when I made these cute uteri magnets

   I have no excuses to continue neglecting my creative side now, and anyway, my head feels lop-sided.  So I am gonna turn on my creative juice faucet, just let it go and see what happens.  First on the agenda: I really wanna start journaling again.  I've done this from time to time in the past, and I'll keep up with it for months, but then I'll just get bored of it.  Also, I love blogging and all, but there are a lot of things that I don't feel comfortable writing on here for anyone in the public to see.  I like to use my blog more as a memoir of this crazy journey called med school - something that people can read, and either learn from or something they can relate to.  My goal is not to air all my dirty laundry.  

   Another reason I'd like to make artsy projects is because it really makes me happy.  I'm feeling so tired and burned out, and I just wanna feel like a fun, happy-go-lucky person again.  The happier you are, the more confident you are.  Besides, I could really use a confidence boost before I try to sell myself to residency programs during interviews.  

 *This is most likely not true; I'm just exaggerating. Though if anyone knows of any studies exploring this topic, I'd love to hear about it...        Oh great, now I'm using the left side of my brain AGAIN

Lost My 'Girly-girlness' For a Second - But I Found It!

   Ever since the Great Sephora Splurge of 2011*, I banned myself from stepping foot into a Sephora, because I am incapable of handling myself in that store.  I had been really good about it for about a year, and then I got a Sephora giftcard for my birthday...  So yesterday, I took BF with me to Sephora, and I immediately remembered why I placed a ban on myself in the first place.  That store is so overwhelming, in a good way.  I just walk in, and there are so many pretty things to look at! And SO SHINEY!  I just want everything there!!!  BF thought it was entertaining.  

  So, I love having my nails painted, but one of the things that drives me crazy is how fast they chip.  A solution to this problem is getting a gel manicure, where the polish lasts at least 2 weeks, however, you used to have to get these in the salon, and I refuse to pay $20-30 to get my nails done.  A while ago, I looked into the little UV lights that set the gel polish to see if I could maybe do my own gel manicures at home, but even with my aunt's beautician license, they were still $200-$300, so that was a no-go.  BUT Sephora just came out with a new line of do-it-at-home gel nail polishes with a UV light kit, all for $160!  I HAD TO HAVE IT... 

   So far, I just started out with the nude shade since I'll still be scrubbing in on gynecology surgeries in the next few weeks, but I already love it!  

   Also, I've been wanting to get my hair cut for a long time now, but I've just been dragging my feet because it takes so long to grow out.  But finally, this weekend, I just said, "Ah, WTF... I'll just go for it!"  So here it is... And I love it!  Hopefully it isn't too much work in the mornings...

* Great Sephora Splurge of 2011 - Last year in the fall, after bombing a quiz, Mama J and I went to Sephora for a little retail therapy.  $250 later (more then I'm usually comfortable spending in one sitting), and I decided to ban myself from the store until further notice and mandated myself to actually use all the products I bought on a daily basis to make it worth it.  

Getting All My "Girly-girl" Urges Out Before Surgery

   Just finished my shelf exam for the psych rotation.  The good news: I'm all done (pretty sure I passed).  The bad news: I felt a lot of the questions were way out of left field, so I don't think I have any chance of honoring.  Oh well, at least I got good evaluations!  Psych was fun, and I learned a LOT about people, but I'm excited to have a break from crazy people.  

   Next up for me is surgery, which I'm excited for.  We get a week-long "summer break" before we start, so I am going camping on the beach in Oregon again (look out for a post on that later).  I am really excited because we had such a great time last year, and it will be a really nice mini-vacation.  Then, later next week BF's mom is in town from the East Coast, so I'm excited to meet her!  I wish we got a week off between all the rotations *sigh*.

   Anyway, I am interested to see what surgery is gonna be like.  I really have no idea what to expect, so I'm going in with an open mind.  Since scrubbing in will require short, un-polished nails, I took the psych rotation as my last chance to have girly nails.  And naturally, I had to take pics.  

12 Days To Go

   Not a whole lot has changed since the last time I posted.  Today is day 23 of my study hibernation.  It's weird because I feel anxious that I am running out of time to study, but I'm also exhausted and just want to get the next 12 days overwith, all at the same time!  I've been relatively calm for the most part, which is good - I've only started to feel anxious in the last couple of days (when I realized how many questions I still have to do in my Qbank), and no "freak outs", thank goodness.  I think one of the key things that's been keeping me going is studying with other people, mainly BF.  BF and I have been playing this cute game.  Whenever we study at a coffee shop, every time one of us goes to the bathroom, the other one will leave a cute post-it hidden in the other's study materials.  Then we'll find it a few minutes later and giggle about it.  It's pretty fun :)

Found this under my FIRST AID book

   I don't like to study in the same place for too long, because I start to get restless and can't focus.  So I split my days in half, and rotate around between school, the library and several coffee shops around town.  I've been photo-documenting my study adventures for the future, so I can look back and think, "Man, what was studying all day every day for Step 1 like?"  Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of any of the numerous sleeves I have ruined with highlighters, being the hot mess I have been. (Warning: these are boring pictures of studying...)

Coffee Shop with sister

Home with Baby Z

Library (gunner habitat)

Secret patio at school

School (hey look, it's BFs hand lol)

*$

Coffee shop that reeks of bacon

We made an "IUD of trust" with our laptops (yep,  I'm going crazy)

People being social while I'm having a one-on-one time with WORLD

Raining outside

Saturday - wishing I was out there

*$

Me creeping on BF

Studying at BFs (yeah, I'm getting fat. The stress eating has come out full-force)

I insisted we take this picture lol

One day we decided to wear red lipstick just for the hell of it

   I haven't been doing my nail therapy as often as I anticipated, mainly because I have been studying at coffee shops a lot, and it would be rude to smell up the place.  But here are some of my nail salon adventures:

Oh yeah, and Mama J took this super creepy picture of me from across the coffee shop, then proceeded to edit it to be even creepier

Two Months To Go!

   It's officially February, which means I have two months until I take boards.  So far, my studying is going a lot slower than I planned for, BUT I seem to be retaining some things, so I'm okay with it.  I have started out by concentrating on my weakest areas.  Went through biochem, and am currently going through microbiology (barf), and next will be immunology.  Before I even started boards studying, we took a practice exam at school, and I was pretty satisfied with the results (considering it was before studying anything).  So, there is a lot of work to do, but I am feeling ready!

    One of my friends said something about how she is feeling about boards that I think a lot of people in our situation can relate: "I have a couple of internal shells. The most inner core is huddled and crying, the layer outside is freaking out, and the layer outside of that doesn't want to do shit, and then there's what I portray....the look of a zombie"

    After my test, I am going to Peru with one of the Gamma Phi's from UCLA, which will be amazing, I'm sure.  I've decided that I am going to try not to use retail therapy too much during this stressful time so that I don't go broke.  So if I behave, then I am going to buy the ice-cream-making attachment for my mixer after boards.  

My friend, the ultimate creeper, taking pictures of me painting my nails while studying...

Man, my nails are going to look great for the next two months :P

My New Favorite Distraction

   A few months ago, I realized that once I start working in the hospital, I'm probably not going to be allowed to wear nail polish anymore.  And then I thought, "Wow! I might not be able to wear nail polish for the rest of my life depending on what specialty I go into!"  (Yes, these are the things I think about).  So... ever since then, I have been going WILD on my nails!  I've even mastered the technique of painting my nails while studying, because let's face it - who has time to sit around and let their nails dry?! I sure as hell don't.  

   Painting nails has also been a great excuse to get together and have girl talk with some of my friends.  We like to call it "nail salon".  Every time one of us has a bad day, we text the other, "nail salon?" and talk it out over some nail decorating.  It's quite therapeutic!

   I even made an entire album on my iPhone of my nails... yeah, don't comment on that.  Here are some of my creations: