Placement 2

The past week and a half have been quite the experience. I flew back from Asia and felt ill. Initially I thought it was just from the lack of sleep so thank goodness my research tutorial group did not have class that morning because there was no way I could've sat through it. I decided to immediately get some sleep and it just got worse from there. Just two hours from having to leave for my first day at a new placement, I somehow developed a high fever and was vomiting after trying to get some food in my stomach. Just sitting up was making me nauseous. All I could think about was how bad this was going to look, missing the first day of a new placement.

Well I ended up calling in sick and other than being thrown in the deep end the next day, without a life jacket, the placement has been good so far. After a full week of consuming only soup, my stomach has settled down but there are still some really bad moments.

Placement has been challenging thus far. I feel as though I know enough to make myself sound confident and effectiv but not enough to be fully comfortable. The details of everything we learnt is slowly coming back. We have these tutorials every morning and every morning you realize how wrong you were prior to that tutorial. It almost feels as though this placement needs to be additional four weeks before I feel confident with my abilities.

I love getting new patients because it is my sole responsibility to ask the right questions and solve the mystery. It's like an episode of CSI, where I have to first find all the clues and put the puzzle back together, except with a time limit. Sometimes I get leaded down a dead end and have to turn around. Other times it seems like I just stubble my way through to the answers. Hopefully the road is becoming smoother. I'm not really sure yet. I have to wait and turn the corner before I can see the road clearly.