As I’m sure you can tell, my posts have been a little uninspired recently. I’ve hit that point in studying where I’m a little over it, and I’m just making myself hammer through practice questions because the ticking clock of the q-bank is the only thing that keeps me moving. Now I understand why my friends told me to absolutely not spend more than six weeks studying for this exam. I mean, I could spend A YEAR studying and still not feel ready, I could drive myself crazy. So, I’ll just get it done on the 29th and move on. I hope that some of the pictures of the cute beefcake have been good enough distraction.
This is going to sound awful. Yesterday I spent a couple hours in a Starbucks waiting for the library to open, and these two girls at the table next to me were studying for the MCAT. One of them started crying out of frustration and stress. I offered a few go-get-’em words that I’m sure more annoyed than motivated them, but I left the conversation feeling a little better. (I know, I know, it’s horrible for other’s anxiety to help lessen one’s own but, still, thank God I’m not studying for the MCAT.) I keep thinking about the med students I would see when I was studying for the MCAT in 2008 (has it been five years?!), really thinking that they had made it. And then I think about how many tears I cried over that damn test. (My husband is a saint.) The boards aren’t over yet, but I don’t have the same sinking feeling of impending doom (well, John will probably remind me of when I did, in fact, burst into tears a week and a half ago…but I’m over it, really), even if I still have some practice tests where I get fewer correct than what the laws of probability would assume if I had guessed on all of them.
My studying is bookend-ed with Ari rituals, like sitting on the kitchen floor eating over-easy eggs before the sun’s come up, and watching her do crazy shit like pull herself up to standing, or wrap her arms around my legs when I come to pick her up (heart to floor). Oh, and her excited panting has been replaced by a gorilla like, deep: “Hoo! Hoo!” Must get on video.
Helping mama eat up them boards! (That’s the binding of the First Aid for the USMLE Step 1.)
anna in med school 