Not sure if it's the time difference, or the fact that I had a list of "to do" things for today that kept running through my mind in that same pesky way a bag of marbles, dropped on the floor runs in every direction--I'm that tired...I've no idea what that sentence just said.
Basically, I fell asleep at around 3 am, and got up around 6, when my light timer was (evidently) set to go off. Either I did this to ensure I wouldn't miss my flight back in July, or, I have it all screwey since I unplugged it over the summer break. In any case, I slept another 3 hours last night.
Add that to the 3 I slept the night before, and you get 6! Almost enough for one night (sigh)
I'm off to my first class today--Pharmacology of Anesthetics. I'm nervous, anxious, and have a great need for sleep.
My best friend, Jean, is also in town and I want to see her since I didn't get to see her when I was home on break.
The good thing is that I don't have class again until Monday--but the bad thing is there are a million things to do and already tons to read and study before then.
I asked for it :)
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Done and DONE!!!!
Advanced Clinical Pharmacology Notes.
Somehow, I survived!
So it's the end of semester one.
I'm usually so amped up, and busy, that when the end comes I never know what to do with myself. So now, I've been washing the floors, doing laundry, washing the refridgerator, spring cleaning in general.
I leave for home Saturday--my driver, Jose picks me up at 6:30 am, and hopefully, there won't be a thunderstorm (though, it would be a first when I'm flying) and we won't get delayed and stuck on the tarmac for hours and hours (like last time!)
I'm so looking forward to going home and seeing my fellas :)
I've missed them so.
But I go home with a sense of relief and accomplishment; I was afraid about the chemo having ruined my chances to study, to learn to retain info, to go to school in general--I'm releived to know that I CAN do this. I can.
Not that it won't be tough, but it's not like I have mashed potatoes for brains, as I feared would happen after the chemo.
It's a balmy overcast day in New York. I don't mind it so much this time around--I guess cancer taught me to suffer through things that are temporary with a bit of patience.
Sunday morning I wake up at home, and all this will be like a dream.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Finals week
How I study for pharmacology.
Each lecture is 4 hours long, each test covers two lectures: drugs, their mechanisms of action, reactions, side effects, pharmacodynamics, pharmacokinetics, special issues, considerations, contraindications and indications...this is just the drugs, and there's also the physiological issues she'll ask us about, and drug/drug interactions and dosing and what-not...
Final is Monday--pray for me :(
PS, sorry I look awful. It's about 99% humidity, and I'm not sleeping much/well.
CLIP0024.AVI
Each lecture is 4 hours long, each test covers two lectures: drugs, their mechanisms of action, reactions, side effects, pharmacodynamics, pharmacokinetics, special issues, considerations, contraindications and indications...this is just the drugs, and there's also the physiological issues she'll ask us about, and drug/drug interactions and dosing and what-not...
Final is Monday--pray for me :(
PS, sorry I look awful. It's about 99% humidity, and I'm not sleeping much/well.
CLIP0024.AVI
Monday, July 13, 2009
Still on West Coast time
No matter what I do, I can't get to sleep at a "decent hour."
The other night, the fire alarms kept going off starting at 1:30 am and I think they might have gone off about another 20 or 30 times before morning. I went out for the first one, and the second one. We evacuate the building and stand on the wet sidewalk and watch the tall FDNY saunter into our building with gigantic axes.
Then they saunter out--they knew it was an alarm malfunction, and so did we.
The turn out for the second alarm was much smaller, and less than half an hour after coming in from the second one, the third one went off, then the fourth, fifth, etc.
By that point, I put the pillow over my head and kept sleeping.
It's amazing the things you learn to sleep through.
So, essentially, when I get back to the Bay Area, I won't have any time adjusting to do, since I wake up around 10:00 am here, and go to sleep between 1:00 and 3:00 am.
The weather's been holding out--not too unbearably hot just yet. I'm hoping it holds out for the real heat until the end of the semester, so I can miss most of it.
Anniversaries this week:
Tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of my first biopsy. I remember thinking to myself, "it's Bastille Day...nothing bad happens on Bastille Day."
Wednesday the 16th marks the one year anniversary of getting the phonecall saying the results of the biopsy was "a little bit of cancer, there." I remember thinking how this poor MD was trying to soften in, by saying it was a little bit--something we nurses are taught, clearly, is how not to do this sort of thing to patients--not to give them false hope, not to de-personalize it (it's not "the breast" it's "YOUR breast", etc) Physicians don't get this as part of their training, it seems. I don't hold it against him, I just remember the moment. Clearly.
I had all my hair.
I was in a tee shirt and underpants because the phone woke me--I was sleeping days and working nights. I was kneeling in the doorway to the kitchen, because I had called George on my cell phone to "be with me" while I got the results. He overheard everything.
That day was only just a year ago, yet it seems frozen in time...so long ago, yet only just yesterday. If I had known then just how hard the year ahead was going to be, I don't know if I'd have had the courage to go through with it.
Fortunately, we never have to do more than just one thing at a time, be present in more than just this one moment before us, so it was possible--however, looking back at the whole...makes me want to not look back, much.
I have classes until 8 pm toinght.
I did really badly on my first pharmacology test (got the lowest score in the class) because I didn't know we were having a test--the professors, who pride themselves on sneakiness buried the syllabus with the test dates in a folder called "class files" online, and so I didn't see it (I was looking under "Syllabus" Silly me.
I did significantly better on the midterm, studied my butt off, and now there's only the final to worry about.
Other classes to worry about now are Medical Genetics, in which I have to write a term paper on my pedigree (the tree you draw out from yourself to your great grandparents indicating life-span, illnesses, and death.) Obviously, I have been working with a geneticist at UCSF, and have the information at hand, but the actual writing of the paper is proving to be difficult. I really dislike writing, lately. Maybe it's the subject (cancer in my family genetics) or maybe it's just the APA style formatting that's killing me. I'm not sure.
In any case, I'm counting the days until I can go home!
(Nineteen!)
The other night, the fire alarms kept going off starting at 1:30 am and I think they might have gone off about another 20 or 30 times before morning. I went out for the first one, and the second one. We evacuate the building and stand on the wet sidewalk and watch the tall FDNY saunter into our building with gigantic axes.
Then they saunter out--they knew it was an alarm malfunction, and so did we.
The turn out for the second alarm was much smaller, and less than half an hour after coming in from the second one, the third one went off, then the fourth, fifth, etc.
By that point, I put the pillow over my head and kept sleeping.
It's amazing the things you learn to sleep through.
So, essentially, when I get back to the Bay Area, I won't have any time adjusting to do, since I wake up around 10:00 am here, and go to sleep between 1:00 and 3:00 am.
The weather's been holding out--not too unbearably hot just yet. I'm hoping it holds out for the real heat until the end of the semester, so I can miss most of it.
Anniversaries this week:
Tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of my first biopsy. I remember thinking to myself, "it's Bastille Day...nothing bad happens on Bastille Day."
Wednesday the 16th marks the one year anniversary of getting the phonecall saying the results of the biopsy was "a little bit of cancer, there." I remember thinking how this poor MD was trying to soften in, by saying it was a little bit--something we nurses are taught, clearly, is how not to do this sort of thing to patients--not to give them false hope, not to de-personalize it (it's not "the breast" it's "YOUR breast", etc) Physicians don't get this as part of their training, it seems. I don't hold it against him, I just remember the moment. Clearly.
I had all my hair.
I was in a tee shirt and underpants because the phone woke me--I was sleeping days and working nights. I was kneeling in the doorway to the kitchen, because I had called George on my cell phone to "be with me" while I got the results. He overheard everything.
That day was only just a year ago, yet it seems frozen in time...so long ago, yet only just yesterday. If I had known then just how hard the year ahead was going to be, I don't know if I'd have had the courage to go through with it.
Fortunately, we never have to do more than just one thing at a time, be present in more than just this one moment before us, so it was possible--however, looking back at the whole...makes me want to not look back, much.
I have classes until 8 pm toinght.
I did really badly on my first pharmacology test (got the lowest score in the class) because I didn't know we were having a test--the professors, who pride themselves on sneakiness buried the syllabus with the test dates in a folder called "class files" online, and so I didn't see it (I was looking under "Syllabus" Silly me.
I did significantly better on the midterm, studied my butt off, and now there's only the final to worry about.
Other classes to worry about now are Medical Genetics, in which I have to write a term paper on my pedigree (the tree you draw out from yourself to your great grandparents indicating life-span, illnesses, and death.) Obviously, I have been working with a geneticist at UCSF, and have the information at hand, but the actual writing of the paper is proving to be difficult. I really dislike writing, lately. Maybe it's the subject (cancer in my family genetics) or maybe it's just the APA style formatting that's killing me. I'm not sure.
In any case, I'm counting the days until I can go home!
(Nineteen!)
Thursday, June 25, 2009
So this is Grad school...
Well, so far it's been an interesting ride.
I was having a problem with my upstairs neighbor/wrestler/pro-bowler who was running around, crashing into things and so forth bdtween midnight and 6 am. The other night, I didn't get to sleep til 5:30 am, having to call the campus security people twice. I wrote an email to the campus housing coordinator and got a reply back that they wanted to talk to me, so I went in (rather than edit my paper, due that morning) and met with the director of student housing and the coordinator.
They were very sympathetic and nice, and the director said at the end "I'm going to personally go over there and have a talk with them" and they also posted, slid under the door, and mailed notices warning them that they were in violation of the housing contract, etc. Well, whatever she said, it worked. I slept like a baby that night and last night. Though I can still hear someone walking around, it's normal, not loud crashes and bangs and running around like an imbecile at 4:30 am.
Needless to say, my grades have suffered.
I did pretty badly on a test, though, it was mostly because it snuck up on me and I didn't know about it. Though I had been studying, there was not the level of pre-test study that would have normally gone on, so I did very badly.
Another problem I'm having is that I don't know how to write a scholarly paper.
I've received back an assignment and basically they minced it all up...as if I had been a 5 year old and tried to write something.
Partly, this was my fault for trusting the professor when she said it was just an opinion paper about an article we read. So, I found a news article regarding San Francisco's "Healthy SF" initiative, and how Kaiser hospital has just joined, and how great this is.
I got back something that basically said my paper had nothing to do with the article I ahd included. What the...
So, I have to step it up several notches. Lisa doesn't know the meaning of quit.
I'm off today to spend the day at a study cubicle of the library in preparation for my next Advanced Pharmacology exam, and to read about a thousand pages of journal articles that were assigned reading for Genetics and Health and Social Policy classes.
Outside, it's muggy. Overcast and hot--it will likely rain again today.
Only a few weeks now 'til I'm done and can go home!
I was having a problem with my upstairs neighbor/wrestler/pro-bowler who was running around, crashing into things and so forth bdtween midnight and 6 am. The other night, I didn't get to sleep til 5:30 am, having to call the campus security people twice. I wrote an email to the campus housing coordinator and got a reply back that they wanted to talk to me, so I went in (rather than edit my paper, due that morning) and met with the director of student housing and the coordinator.
They were very sympathetic and nice, and the director said at the end "I'm going to personally go over there and have a talk with them" and they also posted, slid under the door, and mailed notices warning them that they were in violation of the housing contract, etc. Well, whatever she said, it worked. I slept like a baby that night and last night. Though I can still hear someone walking around, it's normal, not loud crashes and bangs and running around like an imbecile at 4:30 am.
Needless to say, my grades have suffered.
I did pretty badly on a test, though, it was mostly because it snuck up on me and I didn't know about it. Though I had been studying, there was not the level of pre-test study that would have normally gone on, so I did very badly.
Another problem I'm having is that I don't know how to write a scholarly paper.
I've received back an assignment and basically they minced it all up...as if I had been a 5 year old and tried to write something.
Partly, this was my fault for trusting the professor when she said it was just an opinion paper about an article we read. So, I found a news article regarding San Francisco's "Healthy SF" initiative, and how Kaiser hospital has just joined, and how great this is.
I got back something that basically said my paper had nothing to do with the article I ahd included. What the...
So, I have to step it up several notches. Lisa doesn't know the meaning of quit.
I'm off today to spend the day at a study cubicle of the library in preparation for my next Advanced Pharmacology exam, and to read about a thousand pages of journal articles that were assigned reading for Genetics and Health and Social Policy classes.
Outside, it's muggy. Overcast and hot--it will likely rain again today.
Only a few weeks now 'til I'm done and can go home!
Sunday, June 14, 2009
was it a dream?
Here I am, back in New York. A terrible flight home (more than 3 hours delayed) and an ok flight back, though both were middle seats and I hate those. I guess it's better than the window, though.
I've only been back about half an hour and already I miss George and Rutger so much I want to cry. It didn't seem this bad the first time I came (two weeks ago) but now, maybe because the novelty's worn off, I really just want to be done with this semester and go home for a long while.
My driver, Jose, asked me for advice regarding a friend who had had brain surgery and 4 or 5 days post op had a stroke...what can you say to that? I think people latch on to the fact that you're in health care and just have questions, you know.
I did lots of reading both at home and on the plane, but I bet it wasn't enough. I still don't feel buried but I guess that will come soon enough...tomorrow I have my 8 hour day and then tuesday is my friday. Then I'll hit the bricks running and knock out a few more assignments and so forth.
We have a great big group project/presentation and we chose emergency contraception as a topic...I hate group projects, I hope these guys are good at writing papers because I feel like my skills have waned considerably.
Ah well. Tomorrow is Monday.
It's hot and muggy in New York, but that's a given.
I miss home, too.
But, that's a given, too.
I've only been back about half an hour and already I miss George and Rutger so much I want to cry. It didn't seem this bad the first time I came (two weeks ago) but now, maybe because the novelty's worn off, I really just want to be done with this semester and go home for a long while.
My driver, Jose, asked me for advice regarding a friend who had had brain surgery and 4 or 5 days post op had a stroke...what can you say to that? I think people latch on to the fact that you're in health care and just have questions, you know.
I did lots of reading both at home and on the plane, but I bet it wasn't enough. I still don't feel buried but I guess that will come soon enough...tomorrow I have my 8 hour day and then tuesday is my friday. Then I'll hit the bricks running and knock out a few more assignments and so forth.
We have a great big group project/presentation and we chose emergency contraception as a topic...I hate group projects, I hope these guys are good at writing papers because I feel like my skills have waned considerably.
Ah well. Tomorrow is Monday.
It's hot and muggy in New York, but that's a given.
I miss home, too.
But, that's a given, too.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Uh oh
So, I flew home yesterday.
I spent $700 on one of the last few seats left on a flight direct from JFK to SFO. I called my driver, Jose, and he said it was no problem to pick me up at 6 am, in front of my dorm.
The night before, I was in class. Mondays, my day is 8 solid hours of sitting in lecture, staring at powerpoint slides, as Pink Floyd said "ticking away the moments that make up the dull day..."
I went home, made flashcards of my pharmacology lecture, and had a little dinner. I took breaks to pack my bags (not much packing, really...just text books, and flash cards, and my laptop)
When 3 am rolled around, I knew I had to get some rest, but I was so worried that I would oversleep and miss Jose and my flight. I realized that though I had been there nearly 2 weeks, I had not yet used my alarm clock, a mild-mannered, weak little "tweet-tweet" sort of alarm. I set my phone alarms (all 5 or 6 of them) to buzz and ring as loud as I could make them, and I set the phone under my pillow. I drank a liter of water, ensuring I'd wake up at least a couple times,a nd I slept with the window shade all the way up--hoping light might wake me.
Between the ambulances baking up and the sirens, the thunderstorm that rolled through (WTF?) and my worry, I didn't get more than 20 minutes sleep.
Jose was on time, there was no traffic, and I was waiting at my gate with an hour to spare, relaxedly sipping coffee and having a blueberry scone (all bad carbs)
As soon as we get seated on the plane, the pilot's voice tells us there's a storm ahead of us, and all flights in New York have been grounded. Over the next 3 hours, they came over the intercom to tell us that flight had resumed, only to tell us they had re-halted take offs.
Finally, in the air, with a 6 hour flight in front of me, and a middle row seat, I made the most of it--I read my homework until my eyes gave out, then I napped for 15 minutes, then I started over.
I did all my genetics reading on that 9 hour flight.
I went to the bathroom, however, and discovered I had gotten what looked like my period. GREAT. I haven't had one since December of last year...and NOW??? I have to get one NOW???
So, I started to worry that the tamoxifen I have been taking every other day to start out with did some ovary stimulating (as 10 mg/day seem to do according to my drug book) and when I got home I took another 20 mg pill, though I had taken one the day before. So, now I'm taking it daily as they had intended, and I hope it won't make me sick. I only took it every other day for a little over a week, as my oncologist had recommended starting it.
So, with the delay, I was certain I would miss my dentist's appointment. When we got our first notice of delay, I called the office and let them know I was grounded, and they managed to switch my appointment with someone at 4. At the airport, George met me with my premedication (Amoxicillin mega dose for my Ventricular Septal Defect--to prevent endocarditis from having dental work done...my life sucks)
My dentist takes a look at it and agrees he's glad I came home to have him do the tooth, because now he knows what's under the filling. He said he thought I'd eventually need a crown in a year or so, but that he'd try to do a filling. I love this guy...I'm still walking around with a filling from when I was 16 yeras old, and my old dentist said I needed a root canal, but said, let's try this first, and put something into my tooth to numb it, put a temp filling in and let me walk around with it for a while, then filled it.
I ended up having that filling replaced (it was amalgam) and this dentist (who bought out the practice of my old dentist) said it was barely any tooth...all filling, and that he thought it was amazing it didn't end up needing a root canal. So, that filling has been with me (in two different forms) for 34 years already. I told him I bet the filling he did yesterday would last longer than he thinks it will.
I have to go back today and have another filling put in on the other side (I don't want to take a chance and break another tooth!)
These stupid cavities, I get because I go a long while between flossing--when iwas in ETP, I think I might have flossed 4 times. I get a small cavity between teeth and it goes unnoticed until I'm eating popcorn. I knew about these two, and was going to have them filled a month ago but then Rutger had his seizure and I had to cancel my appointment. I never got it rescheduled so I was planning on coming back in August to do it...little did I know I'd break a tooth and find myself back here emergency-style.
I spent $700 on one of the last few seats left on a flight direct from JFK to SFO. I called my driver, Jose, and he said it was no problem to pick me up at 6 am, in front of my dorm.
The night before, I was in class. Mondays, my day is 8 solid hours of sitting in lecture, staring at powerpoint slides, as Pink Floyd said "ticking away the moments that make up the dull day..."
I went home, made flashcards of my pharmacology lecture, and had a little dinner. I took breaks to pack my bags (not much packing, really...just text books, and flash cards, and my laptop)
When 3 am rolled around, I knew I had to get some rest, but I was so worried that I would oversleep and miss Jose and my flight. I realized that though I had been there nearly 2 weeks, I had not yet used my alarm clock, a mild-mannered, weak little "tweet-tweet" sort of alarm. I set my phone alarms (all 5 or 6 of them) to buzz and ring as loud as I could make them, and I set the phone under my pillow. I drank a liter of water, ensuring I'd wake up at least a couple times,a nd I slept with the window shade all the way up--hoping light might wake me.
Between the ambulances baking up and the sirens, the thunderstorm that rolled through (WTF?) and my worry, I didn't get more than 20 minutes sleep.
Jose was on time, there was no traffic, and I was waiting at my gate with an hour to spare, relaxedly sipping coffee and having a blueberry scone (all bad carbs)
As soon as we get seated on the plane, the pilot's voice tells us there's a storm ahead of us, and all flights in New York have been grounded. Over the next 3 hours, they came over the intercom to tell us that flight had resumed, only to tell us they had re-halted take offs.
Finally, in the air, with a 6 hour flight in front of me, and a middle row seat, I made the most of it--I read my homework until my eyes gave out, then I napped for 15 minutes, then I started over.
I did all my genetics reading on that 9 hour flight.
I went to the bathroom, however, and discovered I had gotten what looked like my period. GREAT. I haven't had one since December of last year...and NOW??? I have to get one NOW???
So, I started to worry that the tamoxifen I have been taking every other day to start out with did some ovary stimulating (as 10 mg/day seem to do according to my drug book) and when I got home I took another 20 mg pill, though I had taken one the day before. So, now I'm taking it daily as they had intended, and I hope it won't make me sick. I only took it every other day for a little over a week, as my oncologist had recommended starting it.
So, with the delay, I was certain I would miss my dentist's appointment. When we got our first notice of delay, I called the office and let them know I was grounded, and they managed to switch my appointment with someone at 4. At the airport, George met me with my premedication (Amoxicillin mega dose for my Ventricular Septal Defect--to prevent endocarditis from having dental work done...my life sucks)
My dentist takes a look at it and agrees he's glad I came home to have him do the tooth, because now he knows what's under the filling. He said he thought I'd eventually need a crown in a year or so, but that he'd try to do a filling. I love this guy...I'm still walking around with a filling from when I was 16 yeras old, and my old dentist said I needed a root canal, but said, let's try this first, and put something into my tooth to numb it, put a temp filling in and let me walk around with it for a while, then filled it.
I ended up having that filling replaced (it was amalgam) and this dentist (who bought out the practice of my old dentist) said it was barely any tooth...all filling, and that he thought it was amazing it didn't end up needing a root canal. So, that filling has been with me (in two different forms) for 34 years already. I told him I bet the filling he did yesterday would last longer than he thinks it will.
I have to go back today and have another filling put in on the other side (I don't want to take a chance and break another tooth!)
These stupid cavities, I get because I go a long while between flossing--when iwas in ETP, I think I might have flossed 4 times. I get a small cavity between teeth and it goes unnoticed until I'm eating popcorn. I knew about these two, and was going to have them filled a month ago but then Rutger had his seizure and I had to cancel my appointment. I never got it rescheduled so I was planning on coming back in August to do it...little did I know I'd break a tooth and find myself back here emergency-style.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)