Earlier today, I couldn’t wait to get on a computer (before promptly racing back outside…wishful thinking) just so I could share/brag about what a gorgeous day it was in Philly. Riding my bike to grounds never felt so good…that’s right: riding my bike!!! Don’t tell my physical therapist, but I hopped back on Caro on Sunday night for the first time since that January incident. I’m definitely a more tentative rider so far…but, considering how I got into this mess, that might be a good thing.
Unfortunately, my mood is somewhat less upbeat at present. In preparation for the neuropathology component of Friday’s exam, I’ve been reviewing the 62 gruesome images from our head and spinal trauma lecture. I think I did an okay job holding it together, but the last ten slides on victims of shaken/battered baby syndrome did me in. In my brief time in med school, I’ve sawed through a cadaver’s jaw, hacked through a vertebral column, and pinched off the grey matter of a brain…and I have never had such a visceral reaction to the material. I think I need to meditate, after I get the image of a recently autopsied infant out of my head.
anna in med school 
I would be concerned if you didn’t have such a reaction. I cannot imagine anything more disgusting. Hang in there.
Love
Dad
thanks, dad. i just talked to john about the kids he’s seen come into the ed
love you!
Hey, be glad you react! I’d be a lot more concerned if you did not react. For far too long, that’s the way folks dealt with terrible stuff, and MDs have a much poorer reputation in general because of it.
Over the years, I’ve run into the discovery that many patients made the decision to sue or not to sue, based not so much on wrong-doing, but on whether the physician seemed to care. I think that was in JAMA a few years ago.