So I had all these "stay balanced" things planned into my study schedule. Gym time, free time in the evenings, all that wonderful stuff. Unfortunately, I think my schedule was a bit too ambitious and as a result those days I was supposed to be done at 6pm are more like 10pm and gym time has been forsaken to make up on lost sleep. But what other choice do I have, really? If I don't get through the material now, I won't ever... and the thought of going into the test having NOT finished a subject scares the crap out of me.
So much for balance.
I was ambitious, I mean, masochistic enough to believe I could get through all of neuro today. I did it... but it took me 10 hours. On a Friday night.
Questions continue to oscillate up and down for me. I'll do a pretty good number on a subject and think I have it hammered down then drop 15% in the same subject a day later. But the fluctuations are getting less dramatic and my scores are slowly trending up, even if it doesn't feel like it. I created an excel spreadsheet with a graph and trendline to prove it to myself. Yes, its gotten to that point. Today was a down day for questions. That coupled with the sadistic enterprise that was neuro and the fact that its Friday but I hardly noticed since it was just like any other day made for a pretty down day for me. I have heard of medical students being reduced to tears during board studying. If I was one of those more sensitive types, today probably would have been one of those days. Instead, I did what any testosterone-fueled male would do... and raged. I have developed a habit of verbally abusing my QBank when reviewing questions. OH! ALL I NEEDED TO KNOW IS THAT tRNA HAS 94 NUCLEOTIDES AND ENDS IN CCAGGG ON THE 3' END! THANKS USMLEWORLD! YOU'RE A GREAT HELP! I've also developed a habit of talking to myself when studying now. That's a new symptom.
14 more days...
The Step 1 gods show no mercy or remorse. This is the forecast for the next week:
This was apparently a holiday weekend. The people I saw out walking and enjoying this wonderful weather sure seemed like they were having a lot of fun. Me, I had fun grinding my ischial tuberosities into my chair slogging through my first couple full days.
I tried to come up with some witty or insightful analogy for what studying for Step 1 is like. But all I could come up with is what everyone will tell you:
It sucks.
Now, this is the type of studying I could really enjoy if I was, say, reclining on a beach with a mojito with a 3 month deadline. It is after all a sort of review, and it's somewhat satisfying when you have those "oh! I remember that!" moments. But the short deadline and the long days add enough displeasure and stress to more than amply offset any enjoyment I may derive out of this process.
Questions are trending up for me. My goal is to get through all the organ systems this week then spend the next two weeks on a meticulous review of each subject/system. Renal and GI are up tomorrow. We'll see how my next NBME looks this coming weekend.
So today I started my Step 1 prep. I purposely scheduled myself a "light" day to ease into things, and even that was pretty exhausting. This is going to be a lot of fun!!!! < /sarcasm >
Anyways, here's my next 3 Weeks of Death™:
Well, to survive the first two years, all you need to do is memorize this information in 74 weeks:
5 wood and manatee for comparison. Manatee may or may not be to scale. Tape measure reads just over 4 feet tall (1.21 meters) tall.
Done with second year. Wooo.
So I have my final exam of second year on Thursday. While there is a certain degree of surreality to typing that (part of my brain still feels like its 2008... or 2007 for that matter), I am definitely looking forward to leaving the brain-desiccating monotony of the pre-clinical years behind. If finally hit me as I was sitting down to study today after lecture how close I am to being done with second year. And my brain thought: cool.
A couple posts ago, I talked about my plans for studying for Step 1 up until the end of class and my intensive 3 week period (namely: not studying, but simply "pre"-studying). Well, that was going well, until chatter around the lecture hall started slowly switching to boards, then becoming predominantly about boards, eventually becoming the all encompassing obsessive fixation of the class. The lecture hall soon became riddled with micro note cards, flow charts of the nephron, acid-base tables, and clotting cascades. And frankly, I am not a strong man. I hate feeling like I'm not doing something I should be (one of the many reasons I do not study in the school library). So I've acquiesced and started doing more QBank questions to at least give myself the illusion that I am trying harder. The results have looked something like this:
... I think if you ran a linear regression on that it'd have a negative slope. But the main thing that is so maddening is the up-and-down nature of it all. One night I'm feeling like the work is starting to pay off. The next... certain doom. I took a second NBME and I'm up 15 points from my previous score. Yeah! Still 40 points from my goal. Crap. It's finally starting to sink in what a bear of an exam Step 1 is going to be. Sure, everyone "knows" that but there's a difference between watching Twister on your DVD player and standing in the middle of a field as a F5 tornado descends on you.
So that's is where I am at. Less than 48 hours away from having to regurgitate my last syllabus. Either destined to pass or fail Step 1. Can MedZag make the final push and make up those 40 points to preserve his future career? Or is he just a cocky jackass for thinking he could accomplish so much in such little time, destined to practice primary care in Disappointment, KY? Stay tuned.
Back when I was younger, I used to hold a certain level of disdain for people who owned Apple electronics. Too trendy for me. Not enough functionality for the price.
Fast forward 5 years. I'm in a Starbucks, doing QBank questions on my MacBook Pro, listening to Explosions In The Sky on my iPod, my gym equipment with my iPod Nano in my car. I get a text message and respond... on my iPhone.
My how the mighty have fallen.
A couple years ago, when I was recovering from a shoulder surgery, I watched every single episode of Scrubs in chronological order. Yes, I'm that big of a Scrubs geek.
So it was sad to see the show end last night after 8 seasons on the air. I always insisted it was the most accurate medical show on TV, and people often stared at me with crazy eyes for suggesting a slapstick comedy show could do such a thing. But I still feel like no other show really got at the deeper drama and emotional aspect of a hospital than Scrubs did. And its medical terminology was always spot on.
So farewell, Scrubs. And thanks-for-everything-five.
And yes, I can finally tell after all these years that the xray is backwards. Either that or the joke is on us and we're looking at a perfect example of situs inversus.
