Done and Dusted

It's time to crack the champagne, as my 'esteemed colleagues' and I have finally made it through our first semester. Whether or not we passed our exam (although I'm quietly confident my friends and I all passed), we can at least rest assured knowing that over the last few months we've figured out how to be med students - although figuring out how to be doctors (what we're all really here for) will probably take a while yet!

The exam itself was not too difficult for the main part, but there were particular sections that were just awful. The main frustration is the huge amount of information that is not tested. I spent oodles of time memorising various drugs, such as antibiotics and diuretics, anti-arrhythmics and oral hypoglycaemics, and many, many more. Pharmacology is certainly not my strong point. Much to my dismay, in the entire exam, there was only a single question on pharmacology, and I didn't know the answer! Thankfully, I can console myself with the fact that it seems no one else knew the answer either, and that the knowledge of drugs that I've crammed into my brain over the last few weeks - assuming it stays in there! - could certainly never be considered useless.

So now we have three blissful weeks without classes before it's back to the daily grind. Of course, there's an assignment to be done in that time - can't go giving med students actual holidays, what would people think? - but I'm choosing to not think about it, at least until tomorrow.

MBF and I are tripping off to Melbourne next weekend, so I will get to have a small adventure over the break. Poor MBF has to slave over essays this week, and I'm caught in the odd quagmire of luxuriating in my newfound free time while feeling dreadfully guilty that he has to work so hard at the moment and can see me doing nothing. I am trying to help as much as I can, proofreading things for him and discussing his essay topics, but I'm not confident I'm actually much help at all. He's always a tremendous help to me, simply by showing an interest in the case of the week, and asking me to explain things to him, that I truly hope I can repay him somewhat by helping him. Regardless of his stress levels this week, though, we'll both be free next weekend, and neither of us can wait!