Fast forward update

Okay, here we go with another manic post:

I am dating someone. She is awesome. She runs. She is sassy. She is hot. She is also very smart. She enjoys sushi. She likes me, thank god. She is also friends with my roommate's GF, which is also a plus. Down side? She lives in Chicago currently, and I don't. That can change very quickly. Well, within a year.

I am on Pediatric Neurosurgery currently. I enjoy it. The cases are wicked complicated and cool. Cranial reconstruction on a 2 month old is awesome however you look at it. This rotation has swayed me somewhat to consider Peds Ortho more seriously. My outpatient Peds experience kind of left me with a bad taste for peds.

I am trying to decide where the hell to spend the next 5 to 7 years of my life. I'm looking at pretty much every Orthopaedics program in the midwest and beyond. It is so damn hard to sift through the bullshit and get to what the program has to really offer. I also want to be close to Chicago, for reasons that are stupid and selfish, but I really like this girl. I know that I shouldn't let my feelings dictate where I spend 5 to 7 years, but it's hard when you're a sucker for a beautiful woman who rocks.

You know when you see someone who you know, but you are not sure how? Well I had that experience the other day at work. Some nurse came up to me and started talking to me like we were long lost friends. I don't know how I know her face, but I do. I don't think it was from college, but it could have been... Damn it. That is so frustrating.

Okay, off to bed. The hours on Peds Neurosurg are good, but not that good. It is still a surgical service.

Rage -OUT

My decision not to go into Psychiatry

I come into work, knowing it is my last day of Psych, and I'm happy. Well, I have a shit-eating smirk on my face. My disdain has started to permeate my relationship with my patients. Somehow, I end up with the assholes on the service. All of them have Borderline Personality Disorder and are just plain angry. Well, all except for my sweet old man with Major Depressive Disorder with mood congruent psychosis. He is a nice guy that we are giving ECT. If you don't know what ECT is, I'm not going to tell you, because I don't want to get into a debate with someone who has no idea what they are talking about. ECT is the gold standard for treating sweet old men with depression who are so depressed they don't eat. Let's leave it at that.

So... I'm sitting in the conference room with the other students and the residents and we are just bullshitting our usual stuff in the morning. One of the residents brought in a cake for one of the students. (Hmm... now, do I decide to tell you what the cake was for? Why did it have the words "ninety-two" in icing on it?) The cake was for guessing the closest IQ for one of our patients. (It's a long story for another post. Yes, it is cynical and slightly mean, so it fits me.) I digress. All of a sudden we hear a lot of yelling in the hallway. It is the voice of one of my patients, and he is yelling about getting out of the hospital (it's a locked ward, so the patients can't get out). Apparently there is a warrant for his arrest and the police are coming to get him. Long story short, he becomes more physically confronting towards the nursing staff and the VA police are called. Now, a police matter is one thing. Usually it is town, county, or heaven forbid, state. In this case, they are federal cops, and hence underpaid, overworked, and mean. My patient then tries to barricade himself in his room, which isn't smart. He then actively resists arrest from the VA police and is dragged out in handcuffs. Now, most of this we are hearing through the wall and door of our conference room, because there is no way in hell that we are leaving that room. Also, the patient's room was 6 feet away. So, we got an ear-full.

It was not at that moment that I decided not to do Psych. It was much earlier than that. So, that is a glimpse into the psychiatric patients that are being cared for by the US government since they are "service affiliated." Peachy.

My decision not to go into Pediatrics

So there I was in the office of my preceptor with a 15 month old girl screaming in my face as if I had just stolen one of her stuffed animals. I had just walked into the room and had a subsequent epiphany: I don't want to do Pediatrics. Not that I ever did, but that was one of the things that solidified it for me. Another was when I had a 4 month old pee all over my hands. I wasn't even the one to take off the diaper. I don't like poop, so I'm not going to be a general surgeon. I don't like pee, so I'm not going to be a urologist. I don't like the two of them mixed together, so I'm not going to be a pediatrician.

I was mildly intrigued when I spent a month in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Wishard. (for those of you that don't know, Wishard is a county hospital, hence a different population than a University hospital) I dealt with kids that were sick, but not so sick that they went to the children's hospital, which was next door. My kiddos (as they are referred to in Peds) averaged from 23 weeks to 33 weeks, but all had some serious problems. Well, problems in addition to having shitty mothers. Mothers that continued to smoke crack while pregnant. Mothers that didn't want to claim their children. Mothers that drank while they were pregnant. Mothers that did heroin while pregnant. All in all... real winners. I liked the kids though. The hours were good, and you do a lot of procedures for neos. But it was not meant to be. It was not surgical. It was not for me.

Fast forward a month from my NICU month. I'm on outpatient peds in the office of a guy who is preaching to me about Jesus and God's love while in the room of a 15 year old kid. It was at that moment that I heard something I never thought I would hear at work. "Do you want to change your life? Then read the Bible every night." I think the sound my jaw made when it hit the floor kinda sounded like someone dropping 40 pounds of shock and disbelief on the floor. For a moment I thought I was in Iraq during the invasion and by god, I was "Shocked and Awed."

So anyhoo, needless to say, I am not a Bible beater, nor am I going into Peds. I am however, considering Pediatric Orthopaedics, among others. I also like Ortho Onc and Hand. Yes, I'm set on Orthopaedics. I don't care what the hours are. I like it. When you go to work and finish a shift still feeling intrigued, you have found what you should do with your life. Passionate. Dedicated to learning, delving, discovering what is out there. What more? What else? That is how you should approach your job and your work. Well, as long as you don't work in a cube...

Sorry guys, that is just not for me. Also, I think I have a bit of a complex. I know what it is. It's prevalence in the population is the highest for all the personality disorders. I have a healthy dose of narcissism, and I'm not really ashamed to say it. I guess technically that means I don't have the personality disorder, but maybe I'm just insightful... Or am I just stating the obvious? Irrelevant and Erroneous on both accounts!