You've got a friend in me

Life is full of surprises. Sometimes bad, but sometimes amazingly wonderful. Like free cup of coffee day wonderful. Or birthday party wonderful.

Friends will surprise you. Sometimes in great ways, sometimes in not-so-great ways. They'll surprise you by how one friend can hold onto something so seemingly petty, while another is willing to overlook giant flaws and mistakes with a smile. I think that's probably why I have such trouble opening up to people. Because only those close to you can hurt you. Only those whom you counted as your closest friends can betray your darkest secret aspirations. It hurts when they laugh at you, but it's heartbreaking when they laugh about you.

I've been slammed more than once on this whole friendship thing. In high school, my best friend of seven years started dating my boyfriend less than a week after we broke up. I was stood up at my seventh grade Sadie Hawkins' because one of my so-called friends told my date that, no - I wouldn't mind going stag, and yes - of course I would understand the draw of going with a much older and wiser eighth-grader, and yes - she'd definitely let me know about it. She didn't tell me, and she was wrong about how I'd feel, of course. Middle school is awkward enough without having to deal with that kind of school-wide humiliation. And I could have killed my mother (and my orthodontist) for giving me headgear just one week later.

But forget my pity party; that's not the point of this post. The point is, every now and then, friends will surprise you and make you realize that opening up to someone is not a bad thing. Their friendships are worth all the betrayals and slam books and gossip that might be said about you. Because you can point to someone who you know will bail you out of jail if need be. True, they might not let you forget it 'til the end of time, but they're there. Whether it's with chicken soup when you're sick, or a sympathetic ear to listen to your relationship problems, they're there. And while it might not make sense at the time, looking back I've realized that it's all worth it. Because one true friend is infinitely better than five fake ones. The way I see it, at least with the betrayals, I can tell who is truly worth my time.

Perhaps one of the best things is when you finally realize that you've had one of these true friends all along, and just never fully appreciated them.

I've known a girl whom I'm always called a friend. The thing is, while we may have talked about celebrity blogs and reality TV, the truth is, I never knew how much I could open up to her. We were always nice to each other, studied together every now and then, but I never really talked about things with her. I was an island, plain and simple.

I realize that being an island is not something to be proud of. Everyone needs someone to confide in. I mean, look at Tom Hanks* in Cast Away. Everyone needs a friend, even if it is an inanimate object.

This week, I realized that it is okay to open up. No pretenses. No lies. Just pure, unadulterated - though sometimes messy - honesty. And I can't even tell you how validated I felt to be accepted as is. Flaws and all. It was wonderful, not to be shut out. Rejected. Instead, you built me up, made me reevaluate things.

We might have only had the foundation of acquaintances or mere study buddies at coffeehouses, but you said things I would only expect from someone I've known and confided in my whole life.

Thanks for understanding. Thanks for knowing, somehow, that I needed you when I did. For inviting me out to lunch. You've kept me sane while I've had to deal with all of the recent events, all the sudden coming-of-age realizations. Thanks for asking all the right questions, and for reassuring me about other big question marks in my life. I've been far more vulnerable with you than I might even have been with my own sisters because it felt safe. Comfortable.

This past week may not have changed where I fall on your friend ladder, but this week I realized that I'm merely glad to fall somewhere amongst the rungs, because you - you are one heck of a good friend.



*I don't know why I keep referring to Tom Hanks movies in my posts. I swear I'm not obsessed. Really. I blame TBS and their week-long Tom Hanks marathon.

Fly me to the moon

After seemingly endless days of studying, we all need to go out there and do something crazy every once in a while. Some people plan personal day trips to Indiana (hi Mike!), others go to Toronto for the weekend (hi Jefferson!), and some people just take a day off to shop on Michigan Avenue (hi Amy!).

Me? Well, let's just remember that I am a nerd through and through.

I went to go see the lunar eclipse last month. When I found out that the Adler Planetarium was planning a huge extravaganza for the event, complete with FREE TELESCOPE VIEWING, I needed no coaxing. I was so there.

And so, there I was, even in that freezing, below-zero weather.

It was pretty cool. As weird as it might sound, standing there on the brink of Lake Michigan, in weather so terrible and so cold that any exposed skin felt like it was being freezer-burned off your face, it was still pretty cool. (And no, I'm not just talking about the temperature.)

It was amazing watching the moon turn bright orange. Even playing in the museum exhibits that ended up not being free and consequently getting kicked back out into the cold. I mean, call me a nerd, but I'm also a cheap nerd who can't afford such luxuries as $13 museum exhibit tickets.

And yes, I made sure to look through each and every telescope the museum had set up specifically for the public. Looked through and saw the huge craters on the moon and the now-famous-thanks-to-Apollo13 Mount Marilyn, and in that moment, realized just why Tom Hanks is so obsessed with space that he is determined to make HBO miniseries and movies ad nauseum on the subject. Because the moon? It is more than just a big ball of cheese in the night sky. It's more than just something a little girl nonsensically asks her father to drive towards and catch for her. It is awe-inspiring and amazing and infinitely cool.

And I looked through another telescope and saw the outline of Saturn's rings and refused to believe that it was real. Swearing to anyone who could hear me, I was convinced that the Adler astrologists had merely stuck a Saturn-shaped sticker on my viewfinder.

But the best thing of the night? That night marked the very first time I actually wished on a shooting star. Oh, there were plenty of satellites around, but that night, I saw my very first shooting star, and so, I wished. I wished hard.

There are a million things I could wish for. Better grades. More love. Less war. More sushi dates. A pink pony. Friendships to last a lifetime. Never-ending hugs. A puppy.

But instead, I wished for time. More time with friends. More time with family. More time with the ones I love. More time dreaming. More time playing. More time, period.

I'm sorry for spending time - precious time - fighting. Worrying. Being envious and insecure.

Because time well spent is time spent lovingly. Smiling. Happily. Confidently. And in really fabulous company.

Because, in the end, when you look back on things, you don't think of the arguments and the petty fights. Life is made up of little moments - yes, I just referenced a Brad Paisley song. Surprise! I listened to quite a bit of country back in my undergrad years. But I digress. The point is this. I don't want to look back on med school and think of studying. And worrying. And despairing over things that can't be changed. I want to look back and think of Chinatown dim sum runs, birthday surprises and scrapbooks, play dates with childhood friends at Millenium Park, impromptu trips to musicals, and s'mores at Cosi.

Sorry for the mini-rant/massive digression. I just want to state for the record that I am infinitely grateful for the people who care about me. Thank you for giving me something to remember about med school other than the three walls of my designated cubicle in the East Reading Room of the library.

Anyways, back to the point of this blog. I saw the lunar eclipse last month. And I wished on a shooting star. It was pretty cool.

Irreplaceable

Two Fridays ago, I woke up late. I laid in bed and debated about getting up. It was the last week of the unit, but I didn't want to go to school.

You're going to have to go over the lecture at some point today anyhow. Start your day right and go to school! said the angel on my right shoulder.

But you know the lecturers are terrible...and you can get all the information just by reading the syllabus, said the devil on my left.

Back and forth it went until I realized it was 7:40AM and I jumped out of bed, rushed to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, ran a comb through my hair, and was on my way to school by 7:45.

I walked pretty quickly, running across crowded intersections and red lights.

I got to school on time. Early in fact.

So early, I debated going to Starbucks for a morning coffee. I did, afterall, put my wallet in my bag today. But in the end, I couldn't justify spending five dollars on just a drink, so I stayed in my seat and waited.

The professor came late. Thirty minutes late. But the lecture was decent, so I was glad I had gotten up that morning.

The second lecturer was a mess. All over the place, with nothing to say. And so, frustrated with the education I was getting in class, I headed to the library at 10 to read up on the information on my own.

At 10:37am, I got an email from my bank.

There has been some irregular activity on your bank card. Please sign in to review this activity, and give us a call immediately at 1-877-OMG-WHAT.

So I signed in to my bank account, and apparently I had ordered some food from McDonalds and got the coffee I was craving from Starbucks at 10:16AM and 10:22AM respectively.

Except, my butt was firmly glued to the cubicle chair that entire time.

I must have left my check card at the grocery store by accident. And someone must have found it today and started having a field day. Frantically, I grabbed my backpack and started looking for my wallet that I knew I had put in my bag earlier that morning. Unsurprisingly, it wasn't there.

I started calling friends (who were still in class), texting them to ask if my wallet had fallen out during class, or if they remembered if I had left my wallet at their apartment after our study party the other night - even though I knew the answer was no. Because I distinctively remembered putting my wallet in my bag that morning. I had thrown my folders and computer into my bag, then in went the wallet (along with dreams of Chipotle for lunch), with my computer battery on top of it, along with my scarf and mittens.

Alarmed, I called my bank back and told them to cancel my account. And then I called all my other credit card companies and told them to do the same. (P.S. Nordstrom Bank has the nicest customer service of them all, by far.)

Then, on a friend's tip, I headed to the university police station to file a police report. And that's when I realized that I had stupidly put my social security card in my wallet. Right underneath my ID card*, right there with all of my identifying information. My birth date. My address. My weight and height.

Because really, if it were just my ID card, the cash, and the credit cards, it's not that big of a deal. Those things can be replaced. But my social security number can't.

I'm positive that my wallet probably fell out during my morning commute. There was a lot of running around and jostling. Never mind that my scarf and mittens and computer battery were in the exact places I had left them.

I don't know why I was in so much disbelief that someone would just find a wallet and proceed to use it, instead of turning it in. Because, in my head, in my perfect, idealistic world, turning it in would be the right thing to do. And weren't we all taught to do the right thing? To be a good person? To listen to our individual Jiminy Crickets?

Please don't use my social security number. Please please please please. I have too many loans to deal with a bad credit number.



* Yes, I meant ID card, not driver's license. Because, fun fact! I have never driven a car in my life. I never even got the permit. Mass transit all the way, baby. That and really nice friends with cars.

Tonight I wanna cry*

My life sucks right now. So much so that just the other day, I said to a friend, "I'm not depressed or anything, but I kinda just wish I didn't have to exist for a little bit. Just a little bit." And he totally agreed. It would be nice to just escape for a day, or even a couple of hours, just not have to deal with med school. And life in general. How great would it be to just get out and play?

And ironies of ironies, my wallet was stolen today. Along with all my hard-earned government-loaned cash, credit cards, and ID cards.

And if you could see all the charges on my credit cards- if I had actually made all of those purchases - dude, today would have totally been Michelle's Day Off. Bueller's got nothing on me and my cigars, pizzas, perfumes, and spa treatments.

I hope those hoodlums enjoyed themselves while they could.

*Sometimes listening to Keith Urban on repeat is not good for my optimism.

Tubthumping

I have a theory that you can tell what specialty a med student wants to go into by the way they play Jenga.

Yes, Jenga.

Jenga - as in that game you used to play as a kid. You know, the one where you remove a block and put it on top, and hope that the beads of sweat dripping off of your brow don't hit the brick tower in the wrong place and cause it to make like London Bridge and all fall down.

Now mind you, this is a completely untested theory. I have absolutely no data to back it up; I only have my observations of my friends playing.*** Most of the time inebriated. Which of course makes the study absolutely valid. But it is what it is, and if this turns out to be true, I just want the NIH to know that I was the first person to write a case study. FIRST PERSON. Please give me grant money to help me pay off my sky-rocketing debt, and I promise I will test my hypotheses in a beautiful double-blind and placebo-controlled case study.

So, onto the predictions:

Internal Medicine - This person tests almost every single block to see which one is the loosest and will therefore be the best block to remove. However, even after finding such a block, this person will continue to tap on neighboring blocks, because he is thorough and doesn't want to miss anything. On opponents' turns, they will play nice and let them know which blocks they thought were loose at the time. Jenga is a team sport, people. Let's all use our knowledge to build the largest tower we can. Only together can we be successful. Best thing is, when they finally choose which brick to remove, they're often right, and it slides out like butter. And they are meticulous when placing the brick on top, knowing that that brick can play a big role in 3-4 more turns.

Psychiatry - This person spends a lot of time looking at the tower. They don't touch anything, they don't move. They just sit there and observe. Then after what seems like a million years to the surgically-inclined Jenga player (see below), they figure out where the tower's center of mass is, what they believe is the best course of action, and then - and only then - pick a brick and start to move it. Of course, if they feel as though the block doesn't want to move, they will try nudging it a little, but if they still meet resistance, they will patiently move the block back in place and try a different approach.

Pediatrics - This person doesn't really understand the game and just wants to watch the tower fall over and make great big "BOOM BOOM BOOM" sounds.

Surgery - This person knows exactly which block they want. And they go after it. Even if it doesn't seem like the best block to remove, they are determined to force it out. All that matters is the end result. Also, once the block is removed, they toss it on top carelessly - like a tumor into the metal bin. It is of no importance anymore to them. Side note: Those interested in neurosurgery seem to go after the most difficult block to move - typically at the bottom (see above picture). They also don't move around the table to find an easier position to remove the block from. I mean, come on - if they're gonna perform brain surgery in the future, removing tumors from seemingly impossible brain cavities, they need to know how to remove a simple Jenga block with their left hand bent 180 degrees backwards.

Radiology - Are you serious? This person doesn't ever leave their computer, much less the four walls of their room, and you honestly think they would come out into the light of day to play a trivial board game? Come on!


***Hi friends who put up with me and let me play board games with them, even though I'm totally the one who always makes the Jenga tower fall over, because hello - future pediatrician here. This post is totally facetious and trivial, so please don't get all weirded out the next time we play Jenga. I swear I'm not judging.

Total eclipse of the heart

It's kinda freaky how the moment you think you have something, you start developing all the symptoms. I mean think about it. If you think you're sick, what's the first thing you do? You place your hand on your forehead, and swear to anyone within earshot that it's 10 degrees warmer than it normally is.

I think there's a CNN story from a couple of years back where a woman was convinced that she had conceived immaculately. Her tummy started expanding, she had the glowing skin, the morning nausea, her belly button went from an innie to an outie, ate anchovies with pickles, and all that other great pregnancy stuff. The thing is, she wasn't really pregnant; she just convinced her brain that she was, so she was going through all the same hormonal changes - baby bump of fat and all.

So that's what happened to me. No, not the fake pregnancy thing. The whole generating symptoms thing.

The moment I found out that I might have mitral valve prolapse, I started freaking out. And then I was convinced that I could physically feel my blood leaking backward from my left ventricle to my left atrium, which, though possible, is impossible to feel. I started checking my pulse every five minutes, convinced that it was sky-high and irregular. I started feeling faint randomly throughout the day, and when I went to the gym and couldn't run more than a mile, I was positive that my shortness of breath was due to my heart problem.

And whenever I had my stethoscope on me, I would listen to my heart, positive that my mitral valve leaflet was thickening by the second, making my murmur get progressively louder. The thing is, word got around, and more and more people approached me with stethoscopes, eager to hear my murmur. The best part was during our Physical Examination Skills class, two of my classmates grabbed a teaching stethoscope - it has the same diaphragm, but two people can listen at the same time.

"Oh man!!! Did you hear that CLICK?!!"
"Holy crap...Michelle - don't die please."

Those are words everyone wants to hear: "Don't die please."

So the thing is, I didn't make the call last week. I didn't call and blackmail the doctor into giving me an echocardiogram. Instead, I just emailed her, along with about five different people - the cardiology fellowship director, my PBL preceptor, my college mentor, and a random cardiology lecturer that we had in class on Friday. My emails to all of them were along the same lines. Omg, I'm dying. Do you know anyone or any studies that would able to assess my heart condition via an echocardiogram? Omg, did I mention that I'm dying? Sudden cardiac death is a complication! Please respond!

My emails were like Dawson's Creek scripts. Full of big words that I can't really define, and a lot of whining, pleading, and angst. Lots of angst.

A couple of days went by and I heard nothing from anyone. I was just about ready to take out a second mortgage on my parents' house to pay for it, because after all - what do you have if you don't have your health, right? - when I got an email from someone I hadn't even contacted in the first place.

"Hello. Please meet me at the hospital at 11:30AM in Room 220. This is regarding your echo needs."

Talk about cryptic. But I'm not one to look a gift horse in its mouth, so I picked up my schoolbag and went to the designated spot at 11:30AM. Put on the gown I was given. And I got my echocardiogram, courtesy of my fabulous professors who somehow found a glitch in The System so that I could get a free exam.

Good news. There's absolutely nothing wrong with my heart.

Three failed relationships later, it turns out that my heart isn't broken. In fact, it's perfectly healthy. The cardiologist, who ended up explaining the findings to me, couldn't find a single thing wrong with my heart. Not a single thing. There wasn't even evidence of a little something wrong.

"Looks like you've got a good heart. Literally."
"Well, I like to think that I'm a good-hearted person."

I could have sat there and exchanged heart puns all day, but she had actual patients to attend to, and I couldn't stop squeeing with excitement over my completely normal, unfascinating heart.

Now I just wonder what my classmates and I were listening to these past two weeks. Did we all just make up the huge whooshing sound? The click? The irregular heart beat? It's a conundrum, all right.