how to look after your fellow med students.

Med school can be really tough sometimes, and it’s easy to feel completely alone. And often, we know when our colleagues are having a bad day, and perhaps we’re not comfortable asking them if they’re okay or if they want to talk. 

But it’s really important to create a sense of community in med school. No one quite knows the struggle of anatomy and placement and patients as well as we do. 

These are the little things colleagues have done for me when I’ve been down. These are the things I remember and honestly, these are the reasons I haven’t quit med school. Small actions make all the difference. 

1. Shout your friend coffee. Nothing says ‘I’m here for you’ quite like a cup of caffeine. And, of course, it gives you an excuse to chat and be there for a struggling colleague. 
2. Bad jokes. And I mean really, really bad jokes. Example: Have you heard about the movie Intussusception? It’s about a bowel within a bowel within a bowel. 
3. Text messages and instant messaging. They don’t have to be deep and meaningful. I spent half an hour arguing with a colleague this evening. The topic? What will happen if I’m a student and he’s my intern. (Apparently, I’m working every day and I only get ten minutes for lunch. This is how we show affection.)
4. Respect. If you’re assigned to present a topic in a tute, actually do the work. There’s nothing more insulting than creating good notes for your colleagues, while they have no intention of reciprocating. 
5. Birthday cake. They don’t take long to make (you can use the baking time as study time!), and a round of ‘happy birthday’ can brighten anyone’s day. And there’s sugar involved. 
6. Acknowledge their existence. We can’t know everyone in med school really well. But if you recognise them, say hi. Ask them how they are and how they’re finding the course. A quick discussion might brighten their day. 
7. Share resources. After you graduate, no one will care what marks you got or if you were valedictorian (except maybe your grandkids). So, if you stumble across a great website or textbook, let your colleagues know. 
8. Smile. Smiles are universal, and contagious. Hospitals can be sad places, so cheer is always welcome. And it makes you seem friendly and approachable, and interpersonal skills are what will make you a good doctor. Not your ability to name the branches of the brachial plexus. 

Your challenge: do one nice thing for a colleague tomorrow. Even if it’s just waving at the in the corridor. 

Let’s change the culture of medicine. Let’s start a revolution and foster a sense of community. 

why i’ll keep studying medicine.

I want to write and read and stare out windows and document the world around me. 

I want to run away to book towns and hear the world speak and infuse ideas and inspiration into my soul. 

I want to do a million things that won’t make me a better doctor, but will make me a better person. 

I can write essays. I can write patient notes and ring pathology and talk to doctors. 

But the best thing about paediatrics? Blowing bubbles at little kids. Talking to parents and distracting them from their seizing child and the uncertainty. Watching parents cry as their child takes their first breath, watching a baby open it’s eyes for the first time. Cuddles with a struggling infant as the smile and giggle in their sleep. Teasing the doctors and sharing tales of life outside medicine, of movies watched and books read. 

That is why I don’t run away and give this all up. 

The second in a two part series entitled why they never should have let me pass pre-clinical years. This is also why I’m a medical student and not an artist.

Occasionally, my mind can’t take being serious and writing copious amounts of text, so instead I leave you with the first in a two part series of why they should never have let me pass pre-clinical years.

(Yes, this is what I tried to pass off as studying. Yes, I did almost fail that exam.)

an open letter to med school.

Dear med school, 

There are a lot of things I’ve sacrificed for you. I’ve given up sleep in favour of seven-thirty ward rounds and the excitement of having fifteen doctors ignore me every morning. I’ve said goodbye to normal relationships, finally acknowledging that not only do these need time, but most intelligent people recoil at tales of surgery gone wrong and how you scored your first PR exam. I’ve learnt to eat irregularly and infrequently, scheduling surgary snacks between studies and surgeons. I’ve discovered that caffeine is a food group and that one can survive for days on nothing but black coffee.

But I’ve also watched myself and my colleagues fall into your trap and be consumed by you. Sucked into your vortex so strongly that help seeking becomes an impossibility. Found my reason to wake up and take notes on ward rounds slipping from me, a descent matched only by my grades. I’ve been alone at night, numb and exhausted. Meetings with the faculty in failed attempts to make everything okay.

Dear med school, remember this: I will not give up. I will become a doctor, and I will become a good doctor. I will change this world, despite the obstacles you challenge me with. I will grow up and grow strong and dedicate my life to make sure that no one has to feel this low.

Once upon a time, med school was thought to sort the weak from the strong—I don’t believe this for a minute. Med school isn’t designed to set us up for failure, and nor should it. Call me naive for thinking I can change the system, but I will never stop believing.

Love, me.

(Source: bbeautifuloccupation)

my journey.

I recently became involved in a young people and technology research project, and we had a workshop where one of the tasks was to reflect upon how and why we became involved with the organisation.

So, this is my journey.

It’s hard to pick a point where my story really begins. The defined point would be the first time I cut, but I know that wasn’t the first time. It was the insomnia in prep, the diet plans in year three, the breakdowns in year five. The need to be everything. The need to be perfect. Skipped meals because I was in control and bingeing because I wasn’t. The feeling of not being sick because I never tried to take my own life, I just wanted to.

I was in therapy for the first time seven years ago. One-third of my twenty-one years. Seven years of remitting and relapsing, seven years of making myself okay for someone else. Replacing blades with scratching and calorie control because it wasn’t self-harm if it didn’t bleed. Seven years of being afraid to ask for help because I knew they’d think I was making it up, because they’d know how weak I was. Seven years of convincing professionals I was safe and doubting I’d make it through the day. Seven years before someone realised that it wasn’t just anxiety, it wasn’t just stress, and that maybe I needed more than just help.

That’s the hardest part. Coming to terms with the fact that I may have this for the rest of my life. Admitting that there’s no recovery, just recovering, and wondering if I have the strength to do it. The self-defeating attitude: you can’t see my scars, so my problem was never serious. I only had thoughts, never the attempts. Disordered eating but never the eating disorder—there was nothing wrong with me, there were no mental health issues, no depression, no anxiety, nothing.

I hope this is where the research comes in. A way of saying that this isn’t okay, this isn’t pathetic, you’re not making it up, you can deal with this, and you don’t have to do it alone. That you don’t need to be on the cusp of collapse to deserve help. That there are avenues for young people to seek help without the fear of being branded crazy.

Seven years on, I may still be in limbo and maybe I’m not yet okay, but maybe when eight years rolls around, I’ll be a little closer to alright.

That’s my story. That’s why I care about young people and mental health. That’s why I’m doing medicine.

doubts and med school.

I’m still having those doubts, though. I can’t get rid of the thought that I can do something else, something that I’m sure I’ll enjoy. How can one come into terms with these doubts? And furthermore, what inspires you? :D

I wanted to turn this question into a post, just because I think it’s a really important question—I hope you don’t mind!

When I started my clinical placement, I was suddenly surrounded by all these doctors that knew everything and seemed to do so effortlessly. The consultants knew every intricacy of the human body, both with regards to and outside of their specialty. The surgeons could multi-task: cut, stitch, teach and be friendly all at once. The interns could make time for needy, insecure med students like myself, have time to compose case presentations, sustain their own mental health and their relationships, and win the respect of the registrars.

I couldn’t see myself ever being a doctor, and I think that’s what creates the most amount of doubt for med students.

I can’t see myself prescribing medications and doing admissions for new patients after I graduate (which, admittedly, is coming closer and closer every day). I can’t see myself being able to skillfully detect heart murmurs and remembering every systems review there ever was. And of course, this self-doubt is compounded by the fact that every single med student around us apparently knows everything. They somehow fit in time to study, socialise, eat, and they keep their lives under control while we convince ourselves that we’re the only ones struggling and the only ones who consider giving up.

Here’s the secret: all pre-med students, all med students, and I’d go so far as to say most junior doctors feel this way. Very few people can see themselves as a doctor, but most can see themselves doing anything else—at the end of the day, it comes down to what you want to do. No, I can’t see myself as a doctor or as a surgeon, but I know this is what I want. The human body fascinates me. Patient interactions, though sometimes tricky, have been some of the most rewarding conversations that I will ever have. I’ve been lucky enough in my journeys in hospital to meet the most inspirational doctors and nurses and seen traits that I hope to some day emulate.

So, in summary, there are two ways to come to terms with your doubts: don’t expect to transform into a doctor straightaway, because it’s okay to feel doubtful and unsure, and don’t let medicine be your everything—if there’s something else in life you enjoy doing, never give that up. I love writing and the arts, and I make sure to find some time during the week to dedicate to that. Honestly, a break from medicine occasionally makes medicine more enjoyable.

As for inspiration, books, museums, people and music. I could spend days lost in museums. Or on Broadway. If anyone is willing to fly me to New York, I’d really appreciate it. (:

reasons why my little sister is awesome.

help-seeking and med school.

Okay, storytime. When I was fourteen, my best friend tried to kill herself.

I was the one that she called right before she did it. I didn’t do anything. I sat and waited and hoped for the best, but I didn’t do anything. I didn’t know what to do.

It’s easy to say that I was only fourteen and that maybe I can be forgiven. But I regret it almost every day. (For the record, she’s okay now. We don’t really keep in touch, but I know she’s alive.)

In med school, we’re taught to help others. To sit down with our patients and discuss their psychosocial concerns because studies have proved that a good home environment and a stable mental state improve health outcomes. I’m not here to debate that.

But for some reason, in med school, it becomes very easy to ignore our colleagues when they start to fall apart. Perhaps it’s the culture ingrained into our medical school system. On my first day of clinical placements, my cohort was told we don’t want your mental illness here. Yes, it is proven that depressed doctors make more mistakes than their non-depressed counterparts.

But as a student with social-anxiety-generalised-anxiety-disorder-depressive-symptoms-and-disordered-eating in the process of trying to get help, it was a massive deterrant. Suddenly I felt as if I wasn’t supposed to belong. As if I should be able to overcome my “crazy” and that I wasn’t a med student if I had these issues. I see it in hospitals all the time. Doctors are supposed to be invincible, and the long hours everyone from students to surgeons have to work, and the stresses we’re under, are all part of the hardening-up system. Survive this, they say, and you can survive anything.

And so we don’t get help, not for ourselves and not for others.

You know what? Let’s change that. If we can’t see that we need help, perhaps we can recognise that sometimes, our colleagues need it. Yes, it’s easy to say that we don’t have time and it’s not our place and someone else will deal with it and maybe we’re seeing things.

Let’s be honest. If you’re a med student, you probably know the criteria for most mental illnesses. You can probably guess if someone’s struggling. Talk to them. Talk to a tutor or a supervisor or someone you trust.

We can get rid of this “physician, heal thyself” philosophy and encourage help-seeking. Med school isn’t going to get easier, but maybe together, we can make it bearable.