My Weekend Off

I know you’re all wondering what it is med students do on their free weekends, which I had this past weekend. So, here it is!

1. Sleep. A lot. Naps and probably 10 hours of sleep per night. Yes, naps was plural.

2. See friends. Especially non-med school friends who you may inadvertently ignore during a
tough rotation. It doesn’t matter what you do – you could go to dinner, go to a movie, go ice skating, or go see a bunch of girls you’ve known since grade school and just hang out. Whatever you do is bound to be fun, because it’s social and it’s out of the hospital!

Back to RJJ Toledo!!!!

3. Work out. Which in my case meant I got to return to RJJ Toledo!! It was so great to be back training with my team. Saturdays are the toughest day at our academy, and it was full of high level guys pushing each other. I wish you could all experience how much fun it is to have a great training session with a BJJ family! Everyone’s training for the tournament this Saturday (which, sadly I can’t make it to because I’m working).

4. Shop. For new clothes (though nowadays this means less casual clothes and more work-appropriate clothes), winter boots, a winter coat, and heck we can throw a new purse into the bunch! I’m a binge shopper which means I *may* or may not have spent a LOT of money this weekend. Oops.

5. Stock up on your favorite caffeine source. For me, that’s currently Diet Coke. Meijer had aphenomenal sale where I got 36 bottles for $12. I think I’m stocked for a little while….

So that’s how I spent my free weekend. And today I started my OB/Gyn rotation! We had an orientation. I officially start on the labor&delivery floor on Thursday morning. I have 5 shifts in a row, two day shifts and three night shifts. We have to see at least 2 deliveries (and participate in one) and two c-sections in those 5 fourteen hour shifts. So that should be…interesting!

How’s everyone else spend free weekends? I like to think probably quite similarly.

(And for fun, this is apparently what ice-leaves look like when leaves freeze to your car).

Life In Akron

I’ve been in Akron now for 2 weeks, and I’ve gotta say, it’s definitely growing on me. Before I left my parents and brothers thought I was crazy for choosing Akron over other options such as Columbus or Ann Arbor. I think it’s definitely been a good fit for me, in terms of life in the city. Unfortunately, the general surgery has been oddly slow (I’ve only seen 3 surgeries in 2 weeks) but I’ve still learned a lot! AND I even got to sneak in a morning clinic in ORTHO! Which was really fun, especially after a full day of hernias and hemorrhoids.  Finished the surgery oral exam, the OSCE, all that’s left is the shelf exam this coming Friday.

So, here’s life in Akron: (plus I got to visit my brother at JCU!)

The first impression of the house they put med students in in Akron. It’s bad, I know. But don’t let it fool you.

A view of my window from the outside.

While I was here in Akron, I was lucky enough to get to train once at Top Level Martial Arts (http://www.toplevelmartialarts.com/) with Bill Jones. The class was really great – we worked omoplata from closed guard and variations of omoplata plus he tweaked my bread cutter choke a bit!

Head instructor and owner of Top Level Martial Arts, Bill Jones. It was great to meet him and train with his guys. It’s really cool that no matter where you go, there will always be a BJJ family to take the edge off after a long day at the hospital.
If you’re ever in Akron, definitely check out his academy!

Akron General is a really nice hospital! View on a beautiful fall day

When I was on call at Akron, they gave me two pagers – one is a trauma pager. It was a lot like being an intern when they would both go off at once.

A patient of mine in clinic told me about Ninni’s – an authentic Italian bakery where everything is made fresh every morning! So of course my housemate and I made a trip out there. It’s absolutely phenomenal.

But I’ve got to say – the best part about coming to Akron was getting to catch up with my best college friends again who I hadn’t seen in over two years!!! 🙂

More of my favorite Carroll friends! Both bio majors only, but I won’t hold that against them.

I will see you all back in Toledo this weekend! And then starts… OB/GYN!

Changed blog address and platform!

Hey everyone!

Just a quick FYI that I finally made the switch from Blogger to WordPress. Which means that my blog address changed! I’m excited for all of the new options and will be playing around with wordpress for a while before I get everything figured out. Hopefully this brings a better blog 🙂

 

Still in Akron on general surgery through next week. Between surgeries, clinic, studying hard, seeing lots of friends here in Cleveland, and learning to cook for the first time in my life, so I’m keeping fairly busy. 

 

And, one of my favorite Grey’s Anatomy quotes to start this new blog:

Life is not a spectator sport. Win, lose, or draw, the game is on. So go ahead … argue with the ref, change the rules, cheat a little, take a break and tend to your wounds. But play. Play. Play hard, play fast … play loose and free. Play as if there’s no tomorrow.

–MEREDITH GREY