Ego

It’s a good thing I have a healthy ego.

Some of you might think it’s a bit *too* healthy, but I like to think it’s just right. What brings this up is a second-year med student doing a nursing attachment on the ward. I was sitting at the nurses station under the guise of looking up lab results on the computer (which really means I had a nice cup of tea and there were cookies around) when she mentioned how much I knew, and how she hoped to be as good as me in a few years.

I looked around to see who she was talking to.

I had been left on the ward to keep track of things while all the doctors were off doing clinics and running errands; of course, they had left 20 minutes ago saying they’d be back in 5. This is nothing new for me; they did it last year when I (theoretically) knew less. Anyway, the med student said they must have a lot of confidence in me, leaving a lowly 4th-year student to keep track of the goings-on of 16 patients. I decided I better bring this poor, misguided girl back to reality and get an outside opinion. I turned to the physical therapist who looks after some of my patients and asked if she was comfortable with the thought of me being a doctor in 8 months.

Sarah just looked at me and laughed.

She was joined very quickly by the nurses and most of the people in the nursing station. It spread throughout the ward…

But it reminded me of a story that happened a few weeks ago during my anesthetics term. It was just myself and the senior doctor; no junior docs around. We get set up, go through the routine, and then knock the patient out for surgery – him supervising me doing all the work. Things are going well, the surgery is underway. He looks at his watch, notes that it is time for morning tea, and says, ‘If you need me, I’ll be in the office’ and walks out of the operating theatre.

Leaving me alone with the patient, running the anesthetics side of things.

At about the same time, the surgeon looks up from his hip surgery, and asks what dropped. I told him I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. Looking puzzled, he said he thought he heard something heavy fall about the time the anesthetist walked out (leaving me alone with a very unconscious patient, I might add). Then I realized what he, along with everyone else in a 50-foot radius heard:

That was my sphincter slamming shut.

And with that, it’s the weekend. With more friends leaving, I have a bunch of dinners and going-away parties to attend to, plus a few academic activities (which really just means looking at my textbooks). Not to mention building up my ego…

As always, Love to All and keep working on your 101 list!
Bryan