Travel and Torment

So about that road trip…I decided to go to Oxford by rail instead! Only this has caused its fair share of problems – firstly I went to the station and they told me that there were no trains running south of Birmingham. So after some huffing, I went home. And sat on the doorstep for 40 mins because I’d left my keys at home so my mum could drive my car while I was away (but heaven help her if she scratches it!!).

Then I phoned my friend in Oxford (his name is Aaron) and asked him what he thought I should do, and he phoned a lot of people, and eventually I went back to the station and got on a train which was going all the way to Oxford. All good.

Until we got to York and they announced that the train would be terminating at BIRMINGHAM. Grrrrrrrrr at Virgin!

So I had to call my long-suffering friend who very kindly agreed to drive up to Brum and pick me up. What a star.

When we got to Brum, I asked a guy at the information desk where cars could pull up as I was trying to get to Oxford, and he said, ‘oh, this bloke here’s going to Oxford too’, so I was introduced to a lovely young guy who assured me he wasn’t a serial killer rapist or anything and turned out to be a History student at Leicester on his way back from a TA training weekend in Aberdeen. Anyway, he provided amusement and conversation until Aaron arrived and drove us both back to Oxford. So you see it worked out ok in the end.

And now, it’s Monday – yesterday, I went with Aaron round the colleges, sneakily avoiding all the tourists by waving Aaron’s student card at the many security people, and wow, were they amazing! I felt kind of stupid wandering about in all the academic glory of these gorgeous old buildings, and kept having to tell myself ‘you’re a doctor, you are not stupid’ – the Oxford mantra, I think!

Anyway we had a nice day wandering about, it didn’t really rain and there were lots of tourists to avoid and awesome buildings to see.

And today, the Thames and the Ouze are both flooding and I may well get stuck here! The trains from Oxford to Birmingham all go through Banbury, which is totally under water, and there are no replacement buses, so it looks like the only chance to get back is to get a lift to Brum again and go from there. Aaron’s working at the moment (he’s a med student, grad fast track so back early!) so I might have to think again.

In other news, my rota is apparently FINALLY winging its way to me through cyberspace and should be in my inbox in half an hour or so when the lady I called about it finished whatever she was doing. More on that after I’ve scrutinised it…

Vehicular bliss!

Aaaah, I am in love with my new car! It’s soooooo nice, it is smooth and handles beautifully and it’s so pretty, I am a happy girl!

Now, for those of you who are very observant, you may notice that this post has changed since you read it before…

Basically I was planning a big road trip down to Oxford to see a friend, then to Birmingham to see another friend and go to a funeral, but I’m having doubts…

I blame my mother really! She suggested that it might not be the wisest idea to drive for several hundred miles alone in a new car when the (quite considerable I’ve worked out) petrol money will be coming out of my overdraft. So I’ve thought about it and maybe she’s right – I’ve never driven this far (I’ve only had my license 6 months after all) and perhaps it would be better to do it with someone else for the first time rather than on my own.

Anyway I haven’t decided for definite yet, promise I will commit my indecisive self to something soon!

Vehicular nightmares

Man, having a car is a stressful business. We phoned and confirmed the car this morning which is awesome, and we have to go do the paperwork tomorrow and can pick it up on tuesday which is great.

Unfortunately now I have to enter the tedious world of insurance! I got a quote from a leading four-sided company which was much better than the other ones – bearing in mind this is my first car, I have had my license for 6 months and I’ve been on my parents’ policy so don’t have a no-claims bonus yet. So I went onto the website having got a quote from a baffle-free-we-get-all-the-quotes-for-you site, and lo and behold, it wouldn’t take my password, so I had to call them up. When I get through, I am told that the quote I have been given is only valid if I pay IN ONE GO, as if I have £712.98 lying around! Was very cross, the price if I pay monthly is £170 more than this but I don’t have that kind of money.

Grrrrrrrrr. Back to the electronic drawing board I think.

The other thing about this car is, it’s pristine. I’m used to driving a slightly battered Nissan Almera which has rusty bits and scratched bits and a dent where my brother backed it into a lamppost after going to see a particularly exciting Pirates of the Carribean showing. So if I scratch yon Nissan, tis not a big deal. Or at least it is easily hidden. Or blamed upon somebody else. But if I scratch the new shiny car which is mine and mine alone, I have nobody to blame but myself! Also I have never driven a Ford, what if the clutch is weird and I drive it into a wall the first time I try to get it out of the shop?! Can I just get it home and then just leave it in the driveway and not drive it and polish it lots?!?!?

I think having nothing to do is playing havoc with my rational thinking faculties – I keep playing over and over all the terrible things which could happen to this pretty car in my hands and wondering if it’s a bit too much responsibility and perhaps I should just leave it in the drive!

My word, if I can’t handle having a car, how on earth am I going to cope with being a doctor and having to make decisions about people?! Or owning a house? Or (heaven forfend for the next 10 years or at least until I’m a registrar) having a baby?!?!

Oh what a disaster I am, I think I’ll go and play the piano to calm down a bit!

Sorry for the slightly hysterical rant, will be calmer next time I promise!

PS Thanks for the comments people, it’s great to know that people actually read this sometimes!

Graduation day!

Yesterday was graduation day at my uni, and a good day was had by all. The weather was good, the gowns were appropriately Harry Potter-like, the ceremony was mercifully shorter than last time I graduated, and we didn’t have to sing in Latin again which was a bonus! The garden party was champagne-filled, and in the evening I went out for dinner with my family and my friend Elaine, her parents, and her flatmate Anna.

Now I’m back home, and today was very exciting for several reasons:

Firstly, I went to look at a car with my dad, and I think we are gonna buy it which is awesome! I am very happy, it’s a great car, and it’s pretty which is good, and the reverse is in the right place (down right, opposite 5th, not push-down-and-in-first-ish) which is brilliant.

Secondly, I went to a financial advisor and learned all about ISAs, which was really interesting – I am loving the finances.

Thirdly, while I was out doing the above, my mum had a go at my pigsty room that I’ve been struggling with for weeks and made it beautiful in like 2 hours! It must be a mum thing.

So anyway it’s been a good day.

Now I am watching Election, I’d forgotten how funny it is! More another time.

Alcohol, my permanent accessory

Alcohol, a party-time necessity,
Alcohol, alternative to feeling like yourself –
Oh alcohol, I still drink to your health…

…oh, hello, didn’t see you there. Bonus points for guessing the song and the artist!

It’s been a crazy week. I’ve been following the FY1s who are on the ward I’m going to start on, trying to learn the ropes and how things work. I’ve met lots of nice people (I had heard that BCI was not the friendliest of places but everyone’s been lovely so far, including all the consultants), everyone’s really friendly and the two girls I’m working with are really cool, I think we’ll get on well. There are some oddities about how things work in this hospital compared with University Hospital, but I think that would happen anyhere. And yes, I have got lost a lot!

Parking at BCI is extortionately expensive and there aren’t really any alternatives to park – there’s a housing estate close by in which you might get a space if you’re lucky, but otherwise it’s a bit of a nightmare. Thankfully I only live 2 miles away, so I’ve been walking there and back this week. I’ve actually really enjoyed it, I like the fresh air, the exercise, the fact that there are lots of trees on the roads I walk along, and the fact that I can have some free thinking time before the day starts. I’m planning to walk to work in August when we start as long as it’s still light, except perhaps on late days. Or when it’s chucking it down.

My ward is GI, which I was expecting, but what I wasn’t expecting was it being only upper GI, and the fact that the vast majority of my patients are alcohol enthusiasts and look like a cross between Tweedle Dum/Dee and Homer Simpson! Alcoholic hepatitis is the order of the day for most of them, with a few scary alcohol-associated things which give me The Fear and involve a lot of management about which I know nothing. Oh, and just in case life gets boring, half of them have varices and like to puke their circulating blood volume all over the place. This has happened a couple of times this week, with one fatality and a couple of ITU transfers. I am pretty scared of this too. The only non-alcoholics have oesophageal cancer, which is not particularly cheerful either. Good grief, this was not quite what I had in mind. Must read some books before I start and the fate of these people rests considerably on my decisions!

Anyway, I’m still missing my social life but I’ve been really knackered this week and I still have a lot of stuff to sort out at home – still unpacking, oh the misery – and I’m trying to be realistic about it. I can’t expect to make friends as good as my friends from uni in a week, but I’ve met some nice people and I’ve managed to get in touch with a few people at the church I mentioned before who are going to introduce me to some more people. All good. I am Joey, Networker Extraordinaire.

Right now, I’m going to try and do something about the dreaded unpacking so that I can actually see enough of my bedroom floor to hoover it!

Nerves and missing uni

Back in the rainy UK now, after a very scary flight! Seriously, the most turbulence I have ever experienced, actually thought we were coming down a few times, people were screaming and everything. Not so nice. Consequently I got no sleep at all, though I went to bed for a few hours in the afternoon after I got back. Feeling back to normal today after a nice rest.

This morning I went to church. Not an unusual thing for a Sunday morning, but this week was the first week I have been to church in this city since moving here. I have provisionally decided to go to a large, pretty lively church which is connected to the one I grew up in (same denomination and many decades ago they were the same church before it got too big and split into two, one suburban and one in the city), but at the moment they are doing up their building bigtime so are moving about locations in the city. It’s usually in the university halls, there’s a big room there, but this week it met in the city centre.

It’s a great church, it’s really lively and there are lots of people about my age and lots of families and stuff, but it also has the usual problems of a massive church – how to break in! It’s so big that you don’t often meet the same people twice, and today I didn’t know anybody, I sat on my own and nobody talked to me which was a bit crap, though what with the new location and stuff it must be hard to tell who’s new, but it sucks to go to church alone and leave alone without having talked to anybody. I’m gonna go again tonight, so hopefully I’ll have more luck then! I think the way to do it is to join a homegroup – I guess the nice thing about moving is that I no longer have any evening commitments so I’m free to arrange things. I know one guy who runs a homegroup (didn’t see him this morning but I know he works funny shifts) so perhaps I’ll try to go to that.

Missed my old church at uni quite a lot, and it’s just starting to strike me that I’m actually completely sans social life at the moment since I don’t know anybody here! Will have to put on my Sociable Hat and go to lots of things where I don’t know anybody and try to make some friends without feeling like a total pratt!

Tomorrow I’m shadowing at Big City Infirmary – I’m pretty nervous to be honest, but also a little excited, it will be great to see the place I’m going to be working and to ask all the silly questions I need to ask and to meet the people I’m going to be working with (another sociable opportunity!). It feels like everything I do and everything I go to in the next few weeks is going to feel like being the new kid at school – the majority of people who are shadowing at BCI trained here so will probably know each other, but hopefully I’ll meet some people and we’ll get on well.

Sorry to air all my insecurities here, and sorry nothing that interesting is happening, I’m just trying to settle in and build a life I guess! Will post about shadowing if it provides something blog-worthy!

In dispraise of cockroaches

Hey ho people, I know there are a few out there – and I have cancelled my sitemeter thing because after my previous rant I got several comments and still it registered no visits, so I ditched the useless piece of junk, it wasn’t helping my ego!

Anyway, here I sit in my parents’ living room under the sweet, sweet air-con after everyone else has gone to bed, swatting away the very persistent mosquito which seems intent on getting a piece of me and feeling pretty pleased with myself for managing to swim around in a pool all day and not get burnt! Lovely to see the parents, even if they still do my head in the way that only parents can, and lovely to get out of the rain!

We’ve been battling the monsters here though – Catherine my travelling buddy and I had a fight with a massive cockroach last night after it had the audacity to sit on her Marie-Claire magazine and wink at her as she tried to go to bed! We have a can of magic bug spray which kills them dead but I think it’s a bit like mustard gas for them, they go a bit mental before they die and scrabble around on their backs (always their backs, why?!) while we stand there and watch, feeling ashamed and villainous. I’d be a crap Buddhist. Anyway, the magazine just happened to be next to Catherine’s toothbrush which was a bit of an issue – this bug spray does not smell good so I doubt it would taste good either – but after some obligatory squeaking we sprayed it lots and sure enough, the scrabbling began. Catherine pipes up in a wee plaintive voice, ‘can we put it outside? I don’t really want it dying in my room!’ so we hatch a plan to scoop it out of the window. This plan fails when we can’t find a dustpan – we have a long handled broom and neither of us is willing to get closer than the length of this broom, so in the end Catherine sweeps it down the stairs! She was sweeping one stair at a time, but since the floors are patterned marble and it was dark it was kind of hard to see this here roach, so eventually we swept it down about seven at once and out the front door. Drama over! Amazingly, we didn’t wake the parents, despite all the squeaking. It was a BIG roach. It was. I’m not just being a wimp. Really.

Anyway, I’ve just finished reading a great Ben Elton book called ‘The First Casualty’, I recommend it highly – I started it on saturday and finished it today, but I read another book in the middle about a guy who died for like 9 minutes and had a bit of an Ebenezer Scrooge experience, it was interesting but very far out. Now I’m gonna get back to the Jodi Picoult I was in the middle of before finishing Ben Elton became a priority so I could leave it for my mum!

Sorry for the boring post, I’m using safari on a mac and it doesn’t allow html so I can’t do anything exciting. Well, that’s one reason – the other is I’m on holiday and it’s bedtime and I like bedtime!

Back to the UK on friday night, get in at some ungodly hour (yes, 5:30am straight off a plane onto a bus then a train then another bus, grooo) on saturday morning and have to hoof it back from Even Bigger City to Big City and try to unpack some of the seven thousand boxes that still remain before shadowing on monday! More then, sure I will have some adventures getting lost in Big City Infirmary!

Many, many things

Wow, it’s been a crazy few days. I went to the grad ball extravaganza which was awesome but knackering, then the day after I got back I packed up my [mountains of!] stuff and moved house, which was not in the least bit fun and very knackering, and now I am surrounded by boxes and bags and stuff and I have to pack up and go again tomorrow!

For tomorrow, ladies and gents, I am going to the sun to see the lovely people again! I am really looking forward to seeing them, though I am not really looking forward to being sweaty all the time (it’s very warm there) and I’m not particularly looking forward to the 5-and-a-half hour flight – I get bored! But when I get there, I will have a week of parent time and I can’t wait.

I’m sad though, as well, because my friend was meant to be coming with me and due to (CRAPPY) circumstances (and medical school IDIOCY) beyond her control, she can’t come. I amd GUTTED about this, as is she. Another friend was able to step in and buy the ticket which means nobody lost any money, so it worked out alright, but I feel so bad for my friend.

But I’m trying not to dwell on the guttedness, and I don’t want the friend who is coming instead to feel bad about taking the ticket, so I will mention it no more. I hope this doesn’t offend anyone.

For now, I found this silly quiz thing on this blog and thought I’d do it, just because I feel like it!

Two names you go by: Joey, Dr Joey

Two things you are wearing right now: Brown linen trousers, med school class of 2007 hoodie

Two things you would want (or have) in a relationship: Trust and patience

Two of your favourite things to do: Walk barefoot in grass, take long showers

Two things you want very badly at the moment: my first paycheck, my stuff to be magically unpacked and all the crap that I don’t need chucked out or given away!

Two pets you have had: several guinea pigs, a rabbit

Two people I would like to do this: I don’t really mind, and if my sitemeter is anything to go by then nobody actually reads this thing so I can say ANYTHING I WANT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Two things you did last night: unpacked some boxes, cooked dinner for my roomies

Two things you ate today: chicken and mint imperials (not together)

Two people you last talked to: parentals and Matt The Roomie

Two things you are doing tomorrow: Going to a big post office to get a passport application form for my dad who is running out of pages in his despite it not expiring for another 5 years, and flying out to the sun

Two longest car rides: from Uni Town to Big City, then tomorrow from Big City to Even Bigger City to catch the plane

Two favourite holidays: Last summer’s elective was pretty darned awesome. And I love Cairo too.

Two favourite beverages: Diet Coke and OJ with bits in!

So there you go people, I did this without being tagged too, but that’s because I am a rebel. And I’m defying my sitemeter!

Anyhoo, I might post while in Sunland, otherwise see you in a week!

Finito!

Today I finished medical school! This morning was the last of the preparatory foundation lectures, and, after a lunch provided by the dean (with proper food and cakes and everything) I cleaned out my locker (read: stuffed my not-been-worn-for-at-least-3-years white coats into my rucksack and chucked out several ancient editions of the Times) and got back my £5 deposit, and bid farewell to the hospital which has been my home for the past nearly six years. It was a strange moment, all things considered. I’m really happy to finally be finished, but I’m a little sad to be leaving behind all things familiar. And the best doctors’ mess in the country, so I’m told!!

Still can’t really believe I’m leaving so soon…I’m moving to a city that I know like the back of my hand and yet I don’t know anybody. I really hope the reputation that the medical students in Big City Infirmary have as being stuck up is not true! I know two guys who study there and neither of them are stuck up so maybe that bodes well!

I haven’t heard ANYTHING from the good people at BCI, not a peep. No contract, no rota (though I wasn’t expecting that quite yet), no confirmation letter, nothing about the shadowing week coming up. I’m going away on friday for a week in the sun and shadowing is supposed to start the day after I come back, so hopefully something will come before I leave or I’ll have to get on the phone!

So yeah, the end of an era. The medics’ grad ball is this sunday till tuesday, which I’m sure will provide a lot of madness – I’ll share some tales when I get back, provided I’m in one piece!

ohgoodheavensidon’tknowanything

Today was a bit of a crazy day, and by the end of it I realised once more that I did not know a damned thing!

First off was a lecture about how to interpret and fix dodgy blood results (man I hate renal failure but I hate dodgy LFTs more and oh my word I’m on GI for some of my first block I am so screwed), then we had a lecture from two of the FY2s on what it’s like starting work – one of them was a graduate of my uni, one was a graduate of the place where I’m going to work. The former was fairly positive and talked a lot about careers and stuff, the latter was less positive and said when she started work she had shadowed for 5 DAYS (compared with our 2 months) and so wasn’t very organised for the first few weeks (oh hell, am I going to be expected to be really organised?!), and she basically scared the crap out of us – she apparently stayed till 10pm on every shift for a month and didn’t know how to do anything. Ooooooooh goody now I can’t wait to start!

Then came a lecture on perioperative management, which wasn’t that bad actually, but it was in the afternoon that it all got hairy!

We had a scenario exercise where we rotated round 3 stations in groups and were taught on various aspects of acute management by some anaesthetists. The first room was fine, nothing we couldn’t handle, just use of GCS and things.

The second station was to do with management of respiratory problems – basically A and B of the ABC thing. Stupidly, I volunteered for the first scenario, and MAN WAS I CRAP. I managed to get an airway and find a suitable sized Guedel, but couldn’t explain how I sized it (knew it was something to do with the jaw and the chin/teeth but couldn’t explain exactly, oh dear) and then put the patient on 100% non-rebreather (yes, he was breathing, I’m not a total dope) despite the fact that he had a past history of COPD (yes, that was correct too) but then when I auscultated I was told the patient had really crap air entry. By this time I was starting to freak a bit under the scrutiny of this here anaesthetist, and apparently my Reg was still 5 minutes away and my patient was going down the tubes, and the crash team anaesthetist was also 5 mins away so it was still down to me. I was faffing about trying to think of what to do while burbling something about getting lines in, and she was going, ‘are you happy with breathing?’ and I (having not seen the bag and mask lying on the side) was thinking, oh hell, what can I do now other than intubate which wouldn’t help because the problem wasn’t with the airway but with the lungs, but eventually found the bag and had my ‘nurse’ bag the patient. This helped a bit and got a nod from the anaesthetist so I could move onto circulation – oh dear, shocked patient, shut down, 2 large bore venflons, bloods off for FBC U&E clotting cultures and various other things, then fluids (‘what?’ – 0.9% saline, ‘how much?’ – 1 litre) then oh thank goodness my Reg arrived and I was saved and could take my seat again in shame for my poor performance!

The next station was even worse – in fairness to us, it’s really hard to run a peri-arrest with a dummy because they don’t do anything and we never know whether we are supposed to just get on and do stuff or wait for the supervisor to tell us the clinical situation. Anyhoo, we started off and I have to say we were a bit crap! Because we haven’t had any CPR training since the new guidelines came in, we are still a bit rubbish at them, so we were a bit unsure and a bit slow, and basically pretty scared!

Question time saw one of my stupidest questions to date: ‘if you charge the paddles to 360 and you don’t need the shock after all how do you get rid of the charge?’ – it turns out that you can just turn it down, but to do that you need several hands, and so I dug myself further into the hole and said, ‘can you not just discharge them?’ – OH WHAT A DUNCE apparently this is a sure-fire way to kill random people in the room! In my defence I had remembered that you could discharge the paddles at some point but couldn’t remember if it was a good thing or a bad thing to put the paddles back on the machine beforehand (good!), and although it was a stupid question we were all thinking it and it was just me (as ever) who voiced it!

Anyway the anaesthetist was really nice about it and said it was fine to ask dumb questions because when else could we ask, but I still felt like a pillock.

RIGHT I’m not even going to read this post because I have just proverbially spewed it out in a big panic, so I will just post it and stuff the poor grammar and layout!

The main message is, I am terrified again, I don’t know anything and I am going to SUCK. But I will try soooooooo hard and dammit I will get there in the end.

Repeat ad nauseum until you believe it!!