USMLE Step 1

It sure has been a busy few months. Second-year finals ended in late February, which meant it was time to start studying for boards. The medical licensing exam has three parts: one you take at the end of second year, one you take in fourth year, and one you take during intern year. Step 1 is really important because you can't move on to third year and residency programs really look at the score to determine your competitiveness.

I decided the best thing for me would be to study at home. I didn't want to have any responsibilities besides studying. Plus, it would be nice to be treated like a princess for 2 months!

Words of encouragement around campus.

Studying wasn't actually too bad. I had made a schedule which broke down my days into 8am-6pm on weekdays and 8am-2pm on Saturdays, with Sundays off. I usually ended up taking the entire day on Saturday to finish up questions and whatnot, but for the most part my schedule worked and kept me in check. I had gone through all of First Aid throughout the year so that my study period could be focused on review and question banks.

The holy grail.

I also decided it would be a great time to pick up a new series to read! I read the Abhorsen books throughout my study period and I fell in love with them. It's got a perfect balance of modern-day and fantasy weaved in to what are essentially coming-of-age stories. Garth Nix is my new favorite author. (I eventually read Shade's Children as well. That wasn't my favorite, mostly because it was more science-fiction than fantasy. If you enjoy dystopian futures, then it's worth a read.)

Study break: hike

Study break: restaurant

I felt pretty good during my study period. I was doing well on questions and felt I had a good grasp on the material. I did fairly well on my practice tests. They were still a little below my ideal goal, but I figured I hadn't reached my peak yet and all would be swell come exam day. However, the test was absolutely brutal. It didn't help that I slept a grand total of 2 hours the night before. I didn't think I would be nervous but I lay wide-awake, tossing and turning. By some miracle, I had enough adrenaline pumping through me to make it through the entire 8 hours without feeling sleepy, but I did not feel I did my best. It was going to be a hard three weeks until the scores were released.

By that time, we had already had orientation and I had started my surgery rotation. The gossip is that you get paged the morning your scores are released if you failed. Of course I got paged and my heart just sank. Of course the page had nothing to do with me. I was still feeling shaky at the end of the day when I got home to check (I didn't have the guts to check while I was at the hospital). And I couldn't believe it: not only had I passed, I had scored above my goal! Such a relief.

HOORAY!

On to MS2

Today is the first day of summer - the season, I mean. It's also the penultimate day of our "summer" break. These last six weeks have just flown by. I guess that was partly my fault since I split up my break. I did a two week "mini" psych clerkship where I followed around psychiatrists on the consult service in the mornings and outpatient clinics in the afternoons. Since I was going to be around, I figured I might as well be at clinic as much as I could as well. This meant the timing of things would be a little tricky. I ended up going home for 2 weeks after finals, then coming back up for a couple of weeks, and going home again for another 2 weeks.

I did learn a lot doing the summer program, though. My attending wanted to make me feel like I was part of the team so she had me do an oral presentation on the neurocircuitry of OCD and also present a paper for journal club. It was pretty cool being challenged at the level of an MS3. It makes me less nervous about the transition to third year. Anyway, psychiatry is definitely a tough field to go into. It's not necessarily physically demanding, but very much so mentally and emotionally. I really really liked being on the consult service though. It's a nice mix of medicine and psychiatry since these patients are usually brought in for a medical condition and need to be evaluated for an underlying psych issue or develop something throughout the course of their inpatient stay.

The rest of break was a mix of being sick right after finals, hanging out with friends, and eating a lot as usual.

Life lesson learned: I like inpatient much much more than outpatient - at least for psych.
Movies seen: 3 (X-Men, The Fault in Our Stars, 22 Jump Street)
Books read: 6
Binge-watched: alllllll of Sherlock and Game of Thrones season 4

The Fault in Our Stars was amazing. Amazing. Amazing. It's such a charming story and I bawled all throughout the book and movie. I'm a sap for YA lit. I tore through the Maze Runner series during the break. The movie comes out in September. Cannot wait. In the meantime, it's 12 weeks of Brain and Behavior and as many World Cup matches we can watch on the huge screens in our lecture halls.

Wet burrito at CaCao.

Traditional post-finals Porto's outing  with med school friend A. So happy!

Mmmmm cappuccino mousse.

Baked my brother brownies and a cake made with turmeric as soon as I got home. What a spoiled brat.

My brother's all-time favorite food. My grandmother made this for him even though it's blazing hot. It's yogurt-mint stew with meat/wheat balls and chicken.

Move night with high school friends. Those on the left are roasted strawberry-balsamic reduction-greek yogurt popsicles. The ones on the left are margarita mix-greek yogurt popsicles. 

I decided to chop off my hair for new beginnings. Wish me luck with Year 2!

I'll have to think of a better title later

Wow, sometimes I have to remind myself that I have a blog. When I started this, I had the goal of posting at least on a weekly basis. That has since dwindled down to monthly, yikes! New goal: biweekly? Baby steps.

Studying Microbio with my favorite mug by my side.

Yours truly made hummus from scratch.

HuGE Valentine's Week at school. Aka the best college to be part of :) LOVE these chocolate roses.

This week, I got to see college friend S who is in med school on the East Coast. It was so great catching up and seeing her. I think I hadn't seen her in person for at least 1.5 years. :) And I also learned you can tie individual challah rolls with a surgical knot (ha!). See below for beautiful result...not that I can take the credit, though.

Homemade brownies and challah bread. Thanks for such a great night!

Block 2 has actually been a little more stressful than I anticipated, especially with the added clinic responsibility. I really love some of the classes, but others have been a little more challenging and I've had to devote more time to study those and adjust my way of thinking. But I think I'm getting better and the material is much more clinically relevant so I actually feel like I am in med school and can go through cases. However, to combat that stress, I brought back some books (YA fiction, of course!) from home when I went for the long weekend and am trying to read at least a chapter every couple of days or so. 

I like YA fiction and I cannot lie

Every year I look back and list the books I've read throughout the months. I usually average 23 books per year, but of course this year it's going to be half that number. I did not read a single book between mid-July and mid-December, sigh. Here are some thoughts:

1-4) The Caster Chronicles by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

I read these because I was intrigued by the trailer for Beautiful Creatures and like to read books before I see the story on the big screen. The story is much more rich and you are the one creating the imagery in your mind. The movie was okay. Not too bad, but I think it didn't do too well so I don't expect the other books to be made into films. I really really enjoyed reading this series. It had a nice blend of fantasy, romance, and mystery. I initially thought the beautiful creatures are the witches, or "casters," but it actually refers to humans. (BTW, that wasn't a spoiler, don't worry.) Pretty easy and fast read and you get hooked.

5) A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin

I admit, I put off reading this one because I am stubborn and was waiting for the paperback to come out so that my entire set would look the same (I have paperbacks of the first four books). But the publishing date kept getting pushed back...and back...and back. So I caved. I'm sure I actually would have held on to my resolve and waited for the paperback had I not been starting med school in a few months. Since these books are usually 1000+ pages, it's a huge commitment, and I really did want to finish (whatever's been published of) this series ASAP. It was one of my least favorites of the five, but perhaps I'm biased because the book is Dany-heavy and she is one of my least favorite characters. Sorry Khaleesi fans. (Side note: I know the show refers to her as Khaleesi a lot, too much for my taste in fact, but really that's a title, not her name. She is Dany. Please.)

Tell me this asymmetry does not give you heart palpitations.

6) The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

What a charming book. Don't expect a happy ending since the central premise revolves around two teenage cancer patients, but it's really sweet. Can't wait to see the movie!

7) Stiff by Mary Roach

A book about what happens to bodies after people donate them. Each chapter is dedicated to a different thing - anatomy lab, crash testing, forensic testing, etc. Not that morbid, believe me. And eyeopening.

8) This Won't Hurt a Bit (and Other White Lies They Tell You) by Michelle Au

Ha! Dr. Au has her own blog (the underwear drawer) and is the brilliance behind the scutmonkey comics. This is sort of an autobiography and I just love her tone and honest musings about third year, internship, residency, and how to balance work life with family life. She explicitly states things you know we are all thinking so it's very validating.

9-10) The City of Ember/The People of Sparks by Jeanne Du Prau

The first book in this series was gifted to me by one of my undergrads that I supervised at my old lab (cue the aww!). She apparently asked an employee at Barnes and Noble about something that would be appropriate for a Harry Potter fan (she knows me too well :) and this is what was recommended. I really liked it! It has the post-apocolyptic/dystopian future vibe that is so prevalent in lit these days, but the main characters are 11 or 12 years old so things are told from a more innocent/less jaded perspective which is refreshing and interesting when you realize what they are referring to through their descriptions. I didn't like the second book as much. It felt less character-driven and more plot-driven, but I still read through it. I started the third book as well, but I'm not sure if the same characters are going to show up since most of the storylines were tied up during the second book and the setting suddenly changed in the third. I stopped after the first chapter to switch over to Divergent (see: below), and now it's the end of break so I probably won't get to this for a while.

11-13) The Divergent Trilogy by Veronica Roth

I admit I wasn't too intrigued when I first heard about this series. I think I saw it on a BuzzFeed post or something and thought it looked mildly interesting so I wiki-ed it and didn't think I wanted to read it. Saw the trailer last month and thought, hmm, it does look good. And then one of my friends read the entire series in the middle of finals week because it was just that good. So of course I had to read it. I did spend the bulk of my reading time on this series and didn't get to read as many other books as I thought (I had 8 set aside, and got through 4 which is better than nothing!), but I don't care! It was so so good. I know a lot of people are disappointed with the way things ended, and I can definitely see why. There are a bunch of questions that are still open or the answer wasn't satisfying/didn't fit, but I'm not regretting reading it. I definitely cannot sit down and write a short story let alone a trilogy so you have to give credit where it's due. The books are definitely page-turners and they're easy. I don't think it's fair to compare to Harry Potter or The Hunger Games. They are all different. And at this point in my life, I'm reading more for entertainment than analysis (see: # of YA lit on this post) so I'm happy! Guess I will be seeing plenty of Shailene Woodley next (yikes!) this year at the movies.

Things I did over Winter break

Movies seen: 4
Books read: 4
Number of times went out with friends: too many to count

What a relaxing, glorious 16 days this has been. This was the first break that was truly a vacation - nothing to study, no presentations coming up, no clinic since I went back home for two weeks, no waking up with alarms. I cannot believe I go back tomorrow. I wish I had a timeturner. It's going to be back to the grind starting Monday, with more difficult classes (I presume), more responsibilities at clinic, and who knows what else.

Movies seen:
Catching Fire (again!), Frozen, The Desolation of Smaug, and 12 Years a Slave

Other fun stuff:

Annual Cooking Baking Pahtay. This was from last year because we ate all the cookies this year before I remembered to take a picture, ha!

Traditional BJs date with college friend R who is also in med school. Yeah, we go for the pizookies. :)

Three future docs