Residency: The Excitement

While the title of this post was meant to evoke the adrenaline-pumping thrill of a summer blockbuster, I have to admit that the thrills of residency have been of a much more...erm...humbling and exhausting variety. Nonetheless, there have been highlights:

-learning that very little in medical school prepared me to make diagnoses on slides.
-despite the above, getting more cases right than wrong...for the most part

-discovering that even though you're not in a clinical specialty for residency, that you can still hit 75 hours on surg path
-...but your clinical colleagues will still express shock and surprise at seeing you in the hospital at either 7AM or 7PM
-...even though you're pretty much there at those times every day

-having one of "my" thoracic cases on the national news
-...and, prompted by the above case, hearing a story from your attending about the time he had to scope a resident to remove a chunk of Dorito lodged in her bronchus
-...not eating a dorito since

-finding out that we have $7 to spend at the cafeteria for dinner on call. the downside to this is that...A) your dinner is from the hospital caf B) you're staying late enough that you need to eat dinner at the hospital

-husband finding a stray kitten on his jobsite, making our household one where cats outnumber people, and that much closer to crazy-cat-people-dom.

-seeing my platelets through an electron microscope (as a control)--just today, actually!

I'm not sure what my point is...maybe that, despite the often-long hours and sense that the pile of information I need to know is unconquerably enormous, that it's somehow still wonderful...to be doing, finally, and enjoying, the work of my chosen career--rather than playing at different roles as a student, wondering if they'll fit, as I have all my life.

Actually getting paid something for my slave labor is nice too.