THE COOL NEVER DIES!

Today I took a history from a seemingly innocuous sort of person, they had come in for pain related to a chronic condition that they were able to describe a little too well. They told me they were on no medication, but on further pushing from our tutor, revealed she had been on high doses of opioids for years. They were suitably vague on other things, and had quite a lot of non-specific pain on examination, that was in the opposite region to the pain they’d described on admission.

I am going soft. A year ago, straight out of a job in medical reception I suspected everyone of drug seeking behaviour! Now I am beginning to take everything at face value like a true science student. And it’s hard not to, because such a huge component of this course is just learning without question. You have to do it, you have to not ask why when faced with physiology because there is no why, it just does. But with patients, the need for critical analysis still remains and I’m losing mine. I’m considering finding a part time medical reception job over the holidays, just to get my suspicion and questioning mind back up I harbour no ill will towards that patient - drug addicts do believe their own stories, and you can’t take being lied to personally in this gig because it never is. It’s all about them - although it is a little frustrating because frankly I could care less if people painted themselves in purple stripes at this stage, I’m not going to judge, there’s nothing I can do for them as a student, I just want the full picture so I can learn! That being said, part of learning is not being handed everything on a plate, so in itself, it was a valuable lesson to learn.

The older I get, the greater the disparity I notice in the way I write, and the way I speak.  serp says it’s just because I get overexcited and nervous, but frankly, I sound like a bimbo.  This became apparent last year when my PPD interview said he really enjoyed the imagery in my assignment and I said something like “I know!! Like totally!!!!” then wanted to slap myself.  Repeatedly.  And today taking a history and reporting it back again, I speak all dumb like :P   Also I go blank.  My ‘instant’ recall is about ten minutes.  Yet if I’m relaxed (i.e. not overexcited) it’s all fine, I speak like a normal person.  Talk about brain-mouth interference.  I have a vague memory of a guy dumping me when I was 16 because I sounded like an idiot when I spoke.  I’m not afraid of talking, even public speaking doesn’t bother me that much.  It’s just that when required, I forget all but the most basic of language.   I am just not an articulate person when I speak and really, have absolutely no idea how to become one.

We’ve seen “d’you know what I mean”, “to be honest”, random capitalisation, text speak, and ‘no offence but’…but what am I expected to make of an entire, capitalised paragraph?! Taken from a forum I read:

I Think That It Is Easy To Look At Todays Society And Think Waiting Until Your Older Is Ideal But The Down Side Is Fertility Decreases Every Year And The Chances Of Problems In Older Women Is Very High.

I Think It Really Depends On Your Circumstances But Having Babies In Your Later 30’s And Onwards Comes With Higher Risks

My head is spinning. What universe did this person come from? I’m not the hugest grammar snob, I don’t mind spelling errors (unless they’re ridiculous) because everyone makes typos even when they know how to spell, and I struggle with apostrophes, but come on! That’s just insane!

So I was allocated into stream 1.

I’m not entirely happy with it, although at least I’ll have done a med term before the barrier (assuming they don’t bring it forward).  But argh, surgery right before pre-internship?  At least by then my anatomy should be ok

Still, these will be nice problems to have anyway…must pass barrier first.