Yo estoy cansada.

I went to Ixtlan this past weekend and invited a friend, Veronica, to join me. I always am excited to be able to share this most special part of my life with those here in GDL with me in a way that's more than a mere Bible study. The prospect of playing volleyball and Dutch Blitz is a positive attractant for them to come also ;)

Upon getting back to GDL yesterday I had my work cut out for me and was weary from the start at what I knew was to be another all-nighter. I first had to meet with a group as today we were to present a clinical case that all weekend via email we had gone back and forth over prospective differentials without being able to nail down a definitive diagnosis. With out a doubt our most difficult case yet. Presenting it today has not been easy at all, after 2 hours we've only just started in on our labratorios y gabinete (I don't know how that translates). My group is pretty amazing though. We must admit it's scary going into something you know you're going to get ripped apart on, but in the end everyone's still able to smile and say "oh well, we're learning". ok, ok, ok, so there might be a few things mumbled under the breath. Anyways, after the group meeting I still had two projects needing done. To my amazement, two friends volunteered to help me complete them. It was small what they were able to do, but because of their selflessness I was able to finish both with time to spare. a.k.a. there was time left over to sleep :)

This is what I'm discovering about my commute to the hospital. If I leave on time traffic is slower as everyone knows that they have time. As I'm not a fan of slower traffic say I leave a minute or two earlier, there's much less traffic and the commute actually takes almost a whole 5 minutes less. But then if I leave within 5 minutes late there's much more traffic, but now it's quick as if everyone's left 5 minutes late and knows they've got to hurry and the commute is quicker once again. This morning I experienced the 5 minutes late scenerio. It's still night out, and everything is silent. It starts out with just me going down the street, after a few turns and a glorieta I'm on a four lane road and then there's a handful of cars zooming down aquaducto (which is one of my favorite roads in GDL as there's portions like a rollar coaster). Then another glorieta and aquaducto merges with another road it's 6 lanes wide, then 8 lanes wide. The whole time the handful continues to grow till it feels like I'm part of a pack, and a pack because it's not like we're racing each other but rather as if we're all running together to get to our destination. As we change roads again and get closer to the hospital our pack continues to grow, but this doesn't slow us down as we all share a common origin...we left 5 minutes late.

I was sent a survery via email to gather some feedback on how I felt UAG prepared me for the step. I was filling it out trying to make productive answers, till I got to question #9. "How do you feel about failing the USMLE step 1?" I just about choked and had to read it again. Then immediately went to the ecfmg website and rechecked my official notice to reassure myself I had indeed passed. I have to say it was with a little bit of a harrumph! that I put "I didn't fail." as my answer to that question. Leave it to UAG to get the survey wrong. oh brother!

The correct answers for Friday's exam were posted today. After realizing that I got the first 5 questions wrong I lost the nerve to continue checking, so I don't know exactly how bad I did. We were all required to attend a session where the questions were all gone over with us, and what I realized then was that I got a lot wrong because I gave up on the question. Instead of allowing myself time to think the case through I went the easy way out blaming the fact that there was a word or two that I didn't understand, and therefore had tricked myself into believing that I probably couldn't get it due to not understanding the few words.

Hasta!