Welcome to My Parlour...

Squee!!!

2007-07-20T06:33:43Z

I've had a pretty mediocre week. I spent the first half of it it getting over my nasty cold. My parents, who seem to be alternating between being madly happy and trying to kill each other, have spent the week trying to kill each other. The nasty tax department took more money than I think is fair, so our tax return was tiny. Which will make things hard while we try to buy all the things we need for Squishy. And I've been trying to work out when the best time for Mr Scruffy to move away will be.

But this afternoon, everything changed...

I got a package in the mail! I *love* getting packages, And this was a particularly wonderful package. It came from the_kaytinator as part of her "package a week" campaign. First, a fluffy lavender scarf. This is a surprisingly insightful gift, because BrisVegas is currently in the grip of it's coldest weather ever, and I don't actually own a scarf. Huzzah! It is soft, fluffy and extraordinarily scarf-like! Deeper inspection of the package revealed something even more wonderful... A soft, cuddly pink pig for Squishy! At this point, I suspect that Pumpkin Cat thought I had lost my mind, because I began to squee uncontrollably trying to dance with him. This is actually the first toy anybody has bought Squishy, and I think it's wonderful!

And, this is the beginning of a wonderful weekend HarryPotter-a-thoning. I'm seeing the moofie tonight, and I'm getting my book (and cool Hedwig toy) tomorrow morning.

So, suddenly I feel on top of the world! I have a wonderful new scarf, and an adorable toy to bring Squishy home to! So, without even knowing it, you've managed to turn everything around for me Kayt. Thank you!

:):):)

Things that are good and things that are bad.

2007-07-13T01:35:30Z

I got my exam results yesterday.

I passed! Yay! I actually did really well in some sections, which made me quite happy. I did not so well in other sections, but over all I passed. :) They threw us some curve balls in the exam, and whilst I didn't handle them all, I did much better than I thought... And better than most people, apparently!

*happy dance*

On the other hand, I have a cold. It's not pretty. Sniffles, coughs and stuffed-upedness, and I can't take anything for it, except lots of lemon and honey and bed rest.

*boo*

On the third hand, we went to a baby expo on the weekend. I've never seen so many babies and children and pregnant women in one place before. We bought a pram, which is very exciting - it's very sexy and stylish. What's more, it was super cheap! Huzzah for saving $200!!! Did you know that the top of the range pram costs $1650? That's not a typo. It's over One And A Half Thousand Dollars. Apparently it's what all the Hollywood Mums are using. Well, that's nice, but it's not what the Scruffy's are using. We opted for a $600 pram reduced to $400. Even so, I would never have thought that a pram would be so expensive. In fact, everything for babies is expensive! We also bought a few other bits and pieces, so our nursery has gone from being an empty room a few months ago, to a clutter "storage" room now... There really is a lot still to do!

*excited*

On the forth hand, Mr Scruffy came home from work last night with some possibly bad news, or possibly good news. His boss has asked him to go to Canada to work with a lab over there (Mr Scruffy works in Prostate Cancer research). This is awesome for him, and will be a fantastic boost to his career. However, his boss wants him to go next year, for FOUR MONTHS! FOUR MONTHS!!! Leaving me here, on my own with a new born Squishy for four month. FOUR MONTHS!!! Continuing to study med with a new born was always going to be a real challenge, but doing it on my own for four month seems like someone asking me to climb Mount Everest with one hand tied behind my back. I'm lucky that Mum is nearby, and Little Mother Meg is just around the corner to help out... But... How on Earth am I going to cope?

Next year, we start our rotations - 5 eight-week blocks, with a week off in between each. I have arranged with the Med School to start with my GP rotation, because it's the most flexible with the least amount of contact time - perfect for me and ~8 week old Squishy, and then gradually increasing my work load throughout the year until I finish on my Rural rotation, where I will be in the country for 8 weeks. That will be in November, when Squishy is about a year old. So, now, on top of this, we need to sort out when Mr Scruffy will be heading away - at the beginning of the year, when I will have more time off uni, but Squishy will be so small, or later in the year when Squishy is a bit older, but I have less time off uni...

*agghhh*

So. Life is like a little roller coaster. Can I get off this ride yet?

Oh Woe Is Me?

2007-07-05T10:48:02Z

So, it turns out that the class average for our exam is a fail... Which means means more than half of us failed.

I don't know what my grade is yet - the Med School is still trying to sort out what they are going to do.

Hmmm....

Picspam

2007-06-26T00:47:53Z

I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to get these up - Mr Scruffy fixed the scanner on Friday night, but then commandeered the computer for the whole weekend...

I hope these don't hurt anyone's download restrictions :)

This is our Squishy in profile. The arrow is pointing out her cute little button nose. You can see the outline of her head, her spine and her fat little tummy (to the left). In the very centre of her chest, you can see her heart beating (that's the funny dark shape that looks like a J on it's side). She has the cutest little chin and little rosebud lips... (Bonus points for anyone who can identify the dark grey line running just above her spine!). Maybe I'm just a little biased, but I think she's very cute...

This is a 3D image of our baby girl - see how she has her right hand pressed dramatically against her forehead (it must be a tough life for the little mite!) - very "Woe is me!". You can see her eyes (they are shut), her cute little nose and those gorgeous little lips. Notice how long her fingers are? Especially that thumb (that's the digit that sticking straight out across her brow)... I suspect she's going to be a thumb-sucker.

So.... there we go - that's my gorgeous little girl.

We have been thinking of names.... In my family, the first born daughter in every generation has the middle name "Ruth" in a tradition dating back over 125 years - there is a beautiful gold bracelet that goes with it. So, her middle name is Ruth. This has posed a few problems with the selection of names, because our surname starts with the letter S. We had a few really lovely names picked out - Ailsa, Alison, Ailie... and then we realised that her initials would be ARS... arse. I just can't can't do that to my little girl! We've got a list now of around half a dozen or so names - mostly traditional Irish names (my family is Irish).

And, to top off the single most exciting week of my pregnancy -- I felt her move for the first time on Sunday night!!! It is the most incredible feeling, and really hard to describe. It's a bit like little bubble popping inside my tummy, and a little like having one of those soft stress balls bouncing around inside me. It was utterly amazing, and it actually kind of tickles. This week, Squishy is busy growing the nerves in her ears that will allow her to hear things. In the beginning it will just be vibrations (like my heart beat and the rumble of my voice and snores), but soon she'll also be picking up the noises from the outside world! I think there is something really romantic about the idea that at the same time I become aware of her swimming around inside me, she's also becoming aware of me!

There are not superlatives enough...

2007-06-22T07:41:01Z

We're having a little girl!!!!!!!!

*happy dance*

We had been suspecting it was a girl, and now we know, it's very exciting.

So, we were scanned by the wonderful and amazing Dr G (who was my supervisor over summer). He looked very closely at every aspect of our baby, and found nothing wrong. She is small, but she's all in proportion, and looks to be growing normally. Except for her abdominal circumference - our little Squishy has a fat tummy (kind of like her mum, I guess)! So, all in all, Dr G says not to worry about the fact that she's small, because everything is progressing well. Her brain is a good size, her heart is functioning perfectly and she has all the right vessels in all the right places. Her kidneys and bladder are working, her feet are in the right orientation, and she has nice flow in the cord. Her eyes even have lenses!

The only thing that Dr G found was a bright spot in her heart (called an "echogenic focus"). This is a "soft marker" for chromosomal anomalies, but only when seen in conjunction with other soft markers, which basically means that on it's own, it's pretty much just a quirk (around 1:20 babies have this). In fact, it was so subtle that Dr G only found it because he was really looking for these kinds of things - he wanted to make sure he didn't miss anything. One of the reasons I wanted Dr G to do my scan was because I knew I could trust him to find anything, and and he'd tell me everything he saw. So, I came away feeling supremely happy - my little baby girl is small and perfectly healthy.

I have some pictures, but I can't seem to get the scanner to work. So, when Mr Scruffy gets home from work, I will make him fix it, so that I can bombard my flist with picspam :)

Just as I thought...

2007-06-16T00:35:01Z

My exam is over, and it was as random, odd and confusing as I expected. I am not sure how they were testing our ability to be good doctors, but there must some kind of method to their madness. The awful part was knowing that I probably could have done this exam two weeks ago and not done any worse than I did after the two weeks of study. However, I was not alone in this, which made me feel better.

The exam was at 8am, on the coldest morning this year in BrisVegas. Yay. However, the little heater I have growing in my belly actually helped to keep me quite warm, and the lovely supervisors got me a more comfortable chair when I asked for one! They also let me eat my nuts and an apple during the exam!! I was really glad about that - because there is no way I could have managed three hours without eating something.

So, I'm on holidays now, and my list of chores is so long I'll probably need 3 weeks, not one, to get them all done. Number one is to find a day car centre for Squishy for next year. We are having our morphology scan on Friday - this is the big one where we will be looking at Squishy to make sure everything is in it's rightful place. I'm really excited about it... We'll also be able to find out if Squishy is a boy or a girl, if we want too.

Actually, one thing has been worrying me, about Squishy. I'm nearly 18 weeks, and I'm not really showing. Granted, pre-pregnancy I was at the higher end of BMI scale (obese, not to put too fine a point on it)... I saw Little Mother Meg during the week, and she (who is also at the higher end of the BMI scale) commented that when she was 16 or 17 weeks pregnant, she was obviously showing. I've not put on a single kilo during my pregnancy, which I am really proud of, but it does worry me that my baby is, well, really small.

Mr Scruffy keeps telling me not to worry about it - I'm very short, I'm being careful about my weight and I'm eating healthy and doing lots of yoga. Little Mother Meg and is very tall, and her baby is HUGE (I mean it - she's actually off the chart for length-for-age... She's 8 weeks old and around 65cm long, 5.5kg). Mr Scruffy just hugs me and says that our baby is small, and there is nothing wrong with that. He's right of course, but my brain keeps on thinking about the things that can happen that can stop a baby growing in utero . Which is partly why I am looking forward to this scan - they are going to happily say "your baby is fine, just small, which is okay, because you are short, and your husband is hardly a giant! stop comparing yourself to all the other women and stop imagining scary things...". In the meantime though, I'm going to imagine....

Finally, a story from Scruffy-Brother. He is currently doing his surgical rotation, and was called in by the urologists to do a minor procedure. A gentleman need a foreign object removed from his bladder... A cotton bud. Apparently the patient had inserted the cotton bud entirely into his urethra, and then used a second object (unknown) to push it all the way up into the bladder... Yes, it must have hurt a lot. Scruffy-Brother's job was to removed the cotton bud the same way it went in (under anaesthetic!). When asked if there were any other foreign objects that the surgical team needed to know about, the patient responded "I'm not sure"....

The mind fairly boggles....

And on that note - I'm off for a walk around the park with Mr Scruffy!

So much to learn

2007-06-09T22:56:46Z

I've reached the point where I feel I'm learning the same stuff, over and over and over, and yet it's not really sinking in. At the same time, though, I feel like there is this whole other sphere of knowledge that I'm actually also meant to be trying to learn, and somehow... I'm just not - it's like it's so huge, it's not even on my radar.

This exam accounts for 25% of my final grade for year 2, so it's not like it's do-or-die. On the other hand, these are marks that i feel I really could use at the end of the year! I left my study group this morning with the sinking feeling that the neurons in my brain had reached the point where they were trying to synapse with my skull. And have I mentioned that hate, HATE multiple choice questions? About a fifth of our exam is multichoice, and I have never been able to get the hang of it. There is no scope to justify your answers - so, if your interpretation of the vaguely worded question isn't precisely what the examiner was thinking, you're stuffed.

If the exam was merely (and I say merely in scoffing tone of voice) going to examine us on our understanding of medicine, I think I'd be okay - I know enough to be able to be able to demonstrate that I do in fact understand things. What is disturbing is that they also expect us to memorise all the crazy lists they give us - "On the 12th slide of my third lecture, i had a list of the risk factors associated with melanoma - please recite that list". Now, I can easily tell you about these risk factors. But, I might say "fair complexion" - covering skin, eyes and hair colour. Unfortunately, the list they want us to regurgitate may have separated these things - and if I don't separate them the say way, then I won't get the marks. And THAT is what freaks me out. It's not that I don't know this stuff - it's that I don't know it the way they want me to know it....

Which means, I should be getting back to it.

You know it's time to go to bed when...

2007-06-04T11:40:55Z

... You log onto your LJ and see an ad for 'Free Grandma Quotes'

(It was actually an ad for 'Free Gardener Quotes')

There are rainbows in my kitchen

2007-06-04T05:10:50Z

A long, long time ago, Mr Scruffy and I met through a mutual friend. It was my 19th birthday, and she asked if she could bring a friend to festivities. I'm the kind of person who thinks that birthday parties are more fun when people turn up, so I agreed. When he arrived, I was struck not by the fact that he was tall, and quite possibly the handsomest man I'd ever seen, but by the fact that he had brought me a birthday gift. This struck me as a sign of a very nice person - to be dragged to a birthday party for someone he didn't know, and still bring a gift for them!

The gift was a small crystal prism - one of those dangly little pieces you can get at the markets on weekends. At the time, I remember thinking it was beautiful, and the prism hung in my bedroom window. Mr Scruffy and I drifted out of touch for a while, the sort of acquaintance you smile at in hallways or wave at in passing. Years after this birthday, we ran into each other at a very boring seminar - the first time in about a year we'd seen each other, and by some strange cosmic force, I had that small crystal prism in pocket at the time. This struck me as some kind of omen... I was right, of course :p

When we first moved in together, he unpacked the box with the prism in it, and was surprised that I still had it. We hung it in the kitchen, and it has hung in the kitchen of every home we have ever had. Just now, I walked into the kitchen to find it awash with tiny little rainbows, and every time the breeze blew, they danced. It looked so pretty :)

I really do love Mr Scruffy.

Simplicity

2007-05-31T07:45:30Z

So things have been a bit weird of late...

Firstly, the entire world of med-bloggers had a series of small MIs regarding the "outting" of some people to their collegues, triggering a domino-effect of fear.

Then, the the deleting-of-communities-and-blogs of the past 48 hrs, triggering mass panic amongst all kinds of ordianary people, and the strange silence from LJ regarding it.

However, in the world of Scruffy, there are but two things to be interested in:

1. My exam is on the 15th of June
2. My baby has a heart beat and it beats at around 150 beats per min.

My exam requires that I understand the pathophysiology of all aspects of the following:
The skin, the immune system, the haematological system, the cardiac system, the vascular system, the respiratory system and the gastrointestinal system. So, like, most of medicine :p

But did I mention that I heard Squishy's heart beat? How cool is that?

Procrastination Reaches New Heights...

2007-05-21T22:22:35Z

... I'm knitting

This isn't actually that odd - I like to knit, and usually knit at least one project a season. However, I can usually gauge how much I'm procrastinating by how much I knit, and this weekend I actually contemplated taking my knitting with me to a study group. I think I have a problem.

Hi, I'm Scruffy, and I'm a Knitaholic.

It's for a good cause, though - I'm knitting a baby shawl for Squishy. It's very pretty - lots of lacey edges and stuff. And there is something relaxing about only having to worry about how many stitches you have and how many rows to go before you change pattern. It's certainly more relaxing than thinking about ECGs, chemotherapy drugs and the haemotological profile of various disorders...

Meme me up, Scotty...

2007-05-17T08:06:42Z

I don't normally meme... But I have an exam in 4 weeks, so today, meme's are my friend.

Milk&TwoSugars tagged me this meme, which is essentially 8 random things about me... So. Here we go...

1. Mr Scruffy and I are so incredibly slack that although we've been married for 18 months, we've never picked up our wedding album.
2. In my past, I have been a PhD student, a researcher, a sales rep, a sales consultant and a manager at a Harvey Norman store. In that order.
3. I'm eating Sour Cream & Chives flavoured rice thins, which I suspect have too much salt in them to be healthy.
4. I play the trombone.
5. I sleep on the left-hand side of the bed.
6. I sometimes think that for all the internet was supposed to bring people together, it sometimes seems like a very lonely place.
7. I broke my ankle 3 years ago going for a jog - I got to the end of our driveway and tripped over a tree root.
8. I never wanted to be a doctor, because generally, people annoy me...

And that's my meme. :)

So, this is why I pay so much in HECS...

2007-05-16T06:41:24Z

(hold yourself up - three posts in as many days... It must be coming up to exams!)

DrScruffy's pathology lecturer: Barrets oesophagus is the change in the lining of the oesphagus to a glandular epithelium. This can lead to the presence of adenocarcinoma in the oesphagus, where it would not normally be seen

DrScruffy makes the notation: barret's oesophagus --> adenocarcinoma

DrScruffy's pathology lecturer: If you find an adenocarcinoma in the oesphagus, you can diagnose Barret's oesophagus.

DrScruffy makes the notation: adenocarcinoma --> barret's oesophagus

Excellent. So I learnt that cause leads to effect and that the presence of the effect is caused by the cause.

A matter of perception

2007-05-15T07:56:24Z

Up until tonight, I had kind of thought that I was in the majority of women who have no real "risk factors" for my pregnancy. It's strange, because most medical people I know tend to be a little bit inclined to over estimate their own risks of things - I guess because they know what the consequences are.

Tonight though, I had a phone interview with the midwifes at the hospital I'm planning on delivering at (the same place I was at over summer). The lovely midwife asked me all the questions I expected her to ask, and as she did so, I began to realise I had some pretty significant risks...

Firstly, two of my aunts (one on my mother's side, and one on my father's), both under 50, have both died as a result of pulmonary embolism. This a condition where a clot forms somewhere in the body and then travels to the lungs and "gets stuck", and large enough ones can result in death. This condition which is common in pregnancy, and my family history implies I'm at a greater risk than most.

Secondly, when my Grannie was pregnant with my mum, she had was is called a "complete placental abruption" - this is where the placenta comes away from the uterus before the baby is born, and can be life threatening to both mother and baby. There are many reasons for this, some of which are inherited, and some are not. Unfortunately, Grannie was never told why this happened to her. However, when my mother was pregnant with me, she had a "partial placental abruption" - this is where the placenta only partly comes away. It would have progressed to a complete abruption, except her very astute ObGyn noticed the signs and delivered me by c-section, preventing too much damage to me! Although, according to my brother's, this is strictly a matter of opinion. In this case, it was due to a very, very short umbilical cord (only 15cm long). No one seems to know if this is an inhertied condition or not... However, two generations of placental abruption were enough to make my midwife make unsettling clucking noises and ask if I'd told my Obstetrician.

And so, suddenly, I have been thrust from having a wonderful, problem free pregnancy with no worries at all into a world filled the terrors of PE and placental abruptions. I feel like I've really crossed that threshold now, between being one of "us" (doctors and medical people) to one of "them" (a patient). I know what I would say to a patient in this circumstances, and I know what all my favourite doctors would say to me, but somehow, it doesn't stop me from feeling very out of control. I'm not an "earth mother" type, and I'm not afraid of medical intervention when it's needed - but it's one thing to pay lip service to that idea, and a completely different idea to actually be living it.

Having said all that, I'm only 13 weeks, and I have a long way to go.

I guess until you really write it all out and look at it, you don't know what's lurking in your family. And that's the point of a good history.

A collection of interesting events...

2007-05-14T06:10:35Z

What do you call a collection of interesting events? Is there a collective noun for such a thing?

Interesting event #1
I was wandering through ED when a yound doctor I know called me over to see an interesting case. It was a Monday morning and a mother had brought her 2-year-old son in, primarily complaining that he was "yellow". Further to this, she said that he was no longer able to walk or talk properly. She explained that he had been given his triple-antigen shot on Friday, and had been getting progressively sicker since then. She was vehemntly (and loudly) blaming the vaccine for making her son ill. The doctor had sent some blood off to pathology. The results came back later showing that the little boy's liver was shutting down.

So, the doctor went back to the Mother and asked her about the "reaction" to the vaccine. She said that by Friday night he was complaining of headache and malaise and was mildly feverish. On Saturday he was no better, and on Sunday he "seemed to be getting worse". The doctor asked her what she did for the boy. She explained that she had run out of Infant Panadol on Friday afternoon, so she had given the boy half an adult tablet that evening. On Saturday, she continued giving him half an adult tablet every 4 hrs. By Sunday, the child was "getting worse", so she increased the dose to a whole adult panadol every 4 hrs. Which brings us to the Monday morning presentation - the mother had poisoned her son with a paracetamol overdose.

The experience was eye-opening for me for a number of reasons - firstly, the way in which the doctor handled the situation was wonderul. Secondly, the mother hadn't realised that infant's panadol was so different to adult's panadol - like many things, she thought it was just a gimmick to get more money out of people.

Interesting event #2
We were examing on the ward with our coach. He introduced us to a patient and asked one of the girls in the group (whom we shall call Jane) to examed the patient's legs. She began well enough, noting the hair loss over the lower portion of the legs, the cool but equal temperature of the limbs, and a degree of muscle wasting in the quads. Then, her brain apparently exploded.
"There do not appear to be any major scars or abnormalities"

We stared at her. The coach stared at her.
"Jane, are you sure?"
"Well, no, apart from the obvious..."

The "obvious" in this instance being that the patient had had half his right foot amputated. On closer inspection he also three very large scars on his legs from bypass surgeries. When Jane was asked why she hadn't mentioned this in her examination, she explained that she hadn't wanted to offend or upset the patient. Coach turned to the patient and said "Sir, were you aware that your toes are missing?" The patient agreed that he knew they were gone. Coach then turned to Jane and said "See, he knew they were gone, so it was probably okay to mention it!"

Interesting event #3
Our Coach recieved a phone call during our ward rounds, and we were suddenly rushing off to the "secure unit". This is a part of the hospital which is actually a jail. Bullet proof glass, triple locked doors, armour plating. It was intense... and sad. It was so... grey. The rooms were jail cells, and it was almost clautrophobic to be there. We went to see a patient who was presenting with complete lower limb paralysis and partial upper limb paralysis. We looked at the scans (which were a week old) and saw that he had a cancer, which had spread to the vertebrae in his spine, almost completely destroying them. Our coach explained that people in jail often don't present to hospital until too late, because their complaints aren't taken seriously - so many of the inmates are "putting it on". It was sad, because the patient didn't even know he had cancer, let alone that it could have spread. The experience has stuck with me for a while - the stark reality of the jail and then sadness of this man finding out he was dying, with only weeks to months to live.

I find that I'm learning so much in this course, that's not in the text books. Infact, most of what I learn can't be found in text books... When I was younger, I never understood what people meant by "medicine is as much an art as it is a science". Now though, I see what they mean - sometimes you have to "feel" your way.

Ohmigod....

2007-04-30T23:02:40Z

Last night was incredible.

I've seen LOTS of ultrasounds, and I remember the first one I ever saw and thinking "wow, that's a baby and it's growing inside this woman!" After a while though, that sense of awe and wonder kind of faded, and even thought it was always a thrill to see a scan, it was more of a "what will see today" kind of thrill, not a "miracle of life" moment. So, when our doctor assked us if we'd seen the baby yet, and would we like to, we said yes. I was expecting that Mr Scruffy would be amazed and excited and awe-inspired, but I thought that for me it would just be a kind of academic confirmation that i was really pregnant (because you know, the lack of periods, the morning sickness and the not fitting any of my clothes wasn't enough).

How wrong could I be?

As the little grainy, fuzzy picture appeared on the screen, I heard Mr Scruffy gasp "Ohhhhhh....... that's......" and grab my hand. I watched the little teddy-bear shaped figure gracefully flip over and seemingly snuggle into the placenta, almost like a soft blanket and suddenly my eyes were pricking with hot tears and my throat felt choked. That little, tiny teddy bear is my baby... I felt a sudden rush of love for the small, wriggling shape on the screen, and certainly nothing even remotely close to "academic confirmation".

Dr K point out the various anatomical parts for Mr Scruffy (head, arms, legs, placenta, uterus), and just lay there staring mesmerized at the screen. I was suddenly aware of the fact that I'm growing a baby - it's small (about 5cm long), beautiful and it SNUGGLES!!!

This was basically a "peek-a-boo" scan. We are going to the hospital in the next week or two for our "proper" screening scan (the "nuchal screen", essentially to calculate the odds of chromosomal anomaly), and at that scan, we'll get a picture to keep - so you can all have picspam of my beautiful telly-tubby shaped Squishy.

Things that are exciting...

2007-04-30T05:29:48Z

SQUEE!

I'm running out the door to go to my first obstetrician's appointment. I'm very, very excited....

(Somehow, I think hearing our Squishy's heartbeat is going to make this all seem so much more... real...)

*happy dance*

For [insert deity of your choice]'s sake, wear sunscreen

2007-04-27T12:11:31Z

We had the privledge today of meeting a former head of *insert specialty* surgery. Dr Surgeon was a patient, and we were sent to give him a mini-mental state exam.

The MMSE is a series of questions designed to assess the mental capacity of a patient by looking at recall and cognition. The test asks for recall of information like the date and location, a memory test, sentence construction, that kind of thing.

Dr Surgeon is a delightful gentleman of around 60, with a charming smile and a sharp wit. In a short conversation, he seemed prefectly lucid. However, only a few questions into the exam it became clear that his recall and cognition were markedly impaired. This is why, I guess, we do standardised tests rather than simply judging someone by how they cope in a day-to-day conversation. In the end, he failed the test.

We left the room and went to discuss what we had found. Our clinical coach pointed out that Dr Surgeon had been a man of supreme intellect, and although he was able to maintain a lucid conversation, something was badly affectinig his cognitive processing and his memory. Then he told us what Dr Surgeon has - he has melanoma that has spread to his brain.

For goodness sake, wear your damn sunscreen.

Little Babies are so Cute...

2007-04-15T23:59:49Z

On Thursday night, my friend Little Mother Meg had her baby - a not-so-little girl weighing in at 4.1kg and 56cm long (that's over 9llb and just short of 2 feet in the old speak!).

The birth was pretty traumatic, which a wicked little part of me (the part that is feeling nauseated 24-7, probably) though was a counter-balance to the fact that LMM had no "symptoms" of pregnancy what-so-ever!!! However, the part of me that is kind and compassionate and human (and maybe thinking "I have this to look forward to!") was very concerned. LMM's blood pressure rose dramatically on Wednesday night, so her doctor decided to induce her - she was 10 days over-due, so it was probably about time anyway. Unfortunately, things didn't go according to plan, and despite having pretty serious contractions, she simply didn't dilate. So, 24hrs later, they decided to go for an emergency ceasarean. However, this didn't go according to plan either! For reasons unknown, the spinal block didn't actually block - she could feel the scalpel! They topped up the block three or four times, and then decided to go for a general...

Despite this traumatic entrance, the little mite is gorgeous - perfectly cute with an adorable little face that she wrinkles up beautifully. She's very yellow at the moment, but every indication is that she's a healthy, happy little tiger and after a few hours under UV light, she'll be apples.

The only sour note in this whole extravaganza is that LMM named her baby "Eleanor". Elly for short. Eleanor has long been our number one name for a girl, and now Mr Scruffy and I are at a loss. Our child and Miss E are going to spend a lot of time together, so we really can't use the name anymore (it's actually a traditional family name in my family, which is kind of sad). However, when we look down our list of names, a great many of them are similar to Elly in some ways... Mr Scruffy now tells me we can't use any names with "el" as a prominent accent (such as Elsie, or Ellen or Elise) and we need to be careful with names that even sound SIMILAR to it (like Emily or Nell). And apparently this applies to all our future children! I think this is pretty extreme, but I'm also willing to accept that my crazy hormones are to blame...

Having said all this, Little Miss E is adorable, and has totally stolen my heart.

When do you learn to make decisions?

2007-04-11T06:28:14Z

At some point in our development, we learn to go from wanting everything that is nice/tasty/chocolate/feel good/cuddly/belongs t our sibling, to prioritising these things in some sort of order. The things we want or need more than the other things... We learn to evaluate the pros and cons of having our cake, or eating it and decide which way we are going to go. We may still want everything, but at some point we learn to appreciate that we need to decided between things.

This is a process which takes time, and which, in my experience, is largely acquired by trial and error - "learning from our mistakes" as our parents tell us, is character building. We learn to make decisions on small things first - which present to unwrap first, which teddy we want our Grandparent to buy us, which peice of chocolate to have. Regardless of our choices, we are always the winner in these simple choices. At some point, though, we learn to start making decisions where our choice means that someone doesn't win - do I eat the last cookie, or do I give it to mum? And then, one day, we are making life changing decisions - do I apply for med school or not? Do I agree to marry this person? Do we want to start a family? And somehow, it's not until we have to make these big decisions that we realise the complexity of what we are doing.

And then, one day, some people have to make even bigger decisions.... Life and death, as opposed to life changing. Do I run into the burning building to rescue that child? And suddenly, every other decision you make seems paltry and insignificant... How do you learn to make these kinds of choices? To be honest? Deciding to invest your life savings in Telstra III or not seems pathetic incomparison... And yet, there are people out there who are expected to make these kinds of choices daily...

I've just read this little article: "Doctor 'too tired' to help injured girl"

It's about a girl in Sydney who died after a doctor "opted out" of a decision. Unfortunately, there really is no such thing as "opting out" of a decision - our inactions are as important as our actions. In this case, there was confusion as to whether or not the patient was allergic to the prescribed medication. A junior doctor asked what should be done, and the more senior doctor said nothing. In refusing to answer the question, the doctor sealed the fate of the patient - the medication wasn't given, and the girl died - possibly as a result of this. On the flip side, she may have died if the doctor HAD given her the medication. Were there other options? I can't say, but the doctor has told a Sydney court that they were too tired to think of this, after 9 hours in surgery and many days of long hours at work.

In hindsight, it seems too simple - prescribe a different drug, phone a consultant, track down medical records which might have told if she was allergic or not... And yet... in some ways...

Flipping a coin was so much easier when I was a kid.

Can I get off this ride?

2007-04-10T06:15:43Z

You know that feeling in the morning when you had one too many glasses of wine the night before? Or when you've been on a really super rollercoaster right after a lunch of hot dogs and coke? That's how I feel. Only it's not morning sickness. No, it's all-bloody-day sickness. The only time I don't feel queasy are when I'm sleeping or physically eating.

Not that I'm whiinging too much - I haven't actually been physically ill. Yet. I just feel gross.

I'm 8 weeks pregnant now, and that means that Squishy has arms and legs and fingers and toes (of the webbed variety at the moment). Squishy has lost his/her tail, and has gained skin! S/He has a pancreas and a beating heart and the beginning of a liver. Their little brain is starting to form, and the eyes have rudimentary retinas and lenses. By the end of the week, s/he'll have eye lids, and ears (but won't be able to process sound until about week 18). There is a skeleton, made of cartlidge and taste buds on the tongue! My uterus is about the size of a large orange, apparently. And Squishy is about 1.5cm long.

I'm finding this all very exciting and weird too. I'm revising a lot of embryology, which is good but I'm also hyper-aware of all the places where things can go horribly, horribly wrong. It's a miracle we make it to birth in one piece, let alone adulthood. I know i should be trying to seperate Scruffy-the-mum-to-be from Dr Scruffy-the-doctor-to-be, but it's hard.

Mr Scruffy and I moved into the little cottage the weekend before Easter. It was exhaustive. Things were made more hectic by the fact that one of my oldest friends arrived from Sweden. Terry the Blunt is one of my nearest and dearest friends, and he and I have a kind of mutual adoration society going on. A few weeks ago, he rang me from Sweden and told me that he was going to be in BrisVegas for a wedding, and his girlfirend was piking out on him. He asked me to go with him, and I agreed. Then, by a series of unfortunate circumstances, this turned out to be the weekend we were moving! Ye Gads. So, Terry the Blunt came to stay, Mr Scruffy and I moved house (with Terry's help) and then Terry and I went to a wedding... The next morning I started getting morning sickness. Coincidence? I think not.

The wedding was one of the oddest I have ever been too. It was in a church, but a church that was disowned by the Catholics last year, I think. The priest wore a bright purple tie-died t-shirt. It was a nice ceremony, with everyone crowded around the bride and groom, rather than sitting in pews, but it didn't feel "churchy". The reception was catered by the Refugee Association, which meant that all the "staff" were refugees, which was really cool. They also cooked traditional food from their home couontries. It was lovely to know that instead of spending thousands on extravagant food and wine, the money was going to help these people make better lives for themselves here, away from the horrors of their homelands. Finally, instead of a DJ to have music at the end, they hired a Scottish Folk Dancing Troupe. They had two accordian players (I actually have a soft spot for the accordian), a pianist and a folk-dance caller. They taught us all kinds of folk dances, and it was actually heaps of fun. Odd, but fun.

So, now I'm on holidays from uni for the week. And we've kind of settled in, but it doesn't yet feel really like home. That will take time, I guess. And all the parental units now know about Squishy - my mother-in-law burst into tears, but I think she's going to be happy. She's just a teary kind of person, I guess.

I'll be really glad when this nausea wears off. It's not as much fun as it sounds.

Cover Art Swooning...

2007-03-28T11:27:14Z

What a night!!!

The cover art has been released for the two most anticpated books in the World of Scruffy:

The Stone Key by Isobelle Carmody (all my base belong to minnn for letting me in on that!)

The Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

I'm off to study both for clues that might let me know what's going to happen next!

*giggles insanely*

Never Rains... But It Pours!

2007-03-25T22:33:48Z

So, despite the fact that the people at the real estate at infuriatingly stupid and seem intent on making my life difficult, we have in fact been 'granted permission' to live in the cute little cottage. It's very sweet - it has a pretty bay window at the front, which I think immediately makes a house much more romantic. It has 3 bedrooms and TWO bathrooms! I think this is extravagant - that's a lot of tile and glass to keep free from soap scum. The kitchen made me happy - for a rental place, it was actually very well set out, and also nice and open so it looks out over the entertaining and family areas. The back yard is small (why does it not surprise me that we get the house with 2 bathrooms (my job to clean) and only a handkerchief of lawn for Mr Scruffy to mow?), but has a lots of shade and a lovey pergola with a creeping vine...

We've spent the weekend packing, which is less fun than i remembered. I have decided that I want the next move to be into my OWN house. We seem to have collected SO much crap - how can two people amass this much stuff? Somethings are wedding presents, which we decided were too "nice" and therefore were left boxed up in the spare room... Somethings are wedding presents that were a little too... um... unique and therefore were left boxed up in the spare room ;)

That, however, is not all. Remember I wrote my care off at the end of January? Well we FINALLY bought a new car on Friday! Yay!!! He's very sexy - I call him Hank. Hank is a 2002 silver Rav4 - he's just lovely. There is plenty of room for a baby capsule in the back, and whilst he's practcial, he's far too much fun to scream 'Soccer Mum!' at people as I drive by. We have all the important safety features that a family car apparently needs (which makes Mr Scruffy happy), and is very fast and zippy in traffic, which makes me happy! After the Charade, I feel very tall in this car.

And finally, we've now told 2/3 of the parental units about Squishy. The overall reaction has been very happy and positive, especially after I convinced my Mum and my F-i-L that I won't be dropping out of med. We haven't told Mr Scuffy's mum yet - she and I have a very strained relationship (she ran of of our wedding in tears), and I'm not really looking forward to telling her. She has a tendancy to meddle, and I find her tolerable when she's diluted by the extended family - Auntie R, Grandpa and Nannabel. We had hoped that Easter would be the perfect time because not only would we have the dilution factor worked out, we would have nailed the problem of making sure that everyone knew. But it appears that the extended family are going to Sydney to Easter! So we'll probably be telling her this week. It's not that I don't want her to be a part of this... it's just that she's inclined to make everything about her.

Squishy and I have been very well - we are 6 weeks today. So far no real morning sickness, just a vague sense of headachey nausea this morning actually, which went away after buttered toast.

Packing calls, and I must answer.

Oh, For Crying Out Loud!!!!

2007-03-18T23:49:37Z

We put an application in for a new rental place last week...

So, on the application form, they wanted to know what my occupation was - and I put down "Medical Student - fulltime." I don't have a job, and because mr Scruffy earns a tidy amount, I'm not eligible for Austudy. However, because he earns a tidy amount, I don't actually need to work.

So, today the real estate rang me up and said "there seems to be a problem with your application..."

"Yes?" I ask.
"What do you do?" asks the silly woman, who clearly has my application in front of her.
"I'm a medical student... I'm at uni," I add, just to emphasize it to her.
"How do you support yourself?" she asks.
'Well, Mr Scruffy earns too much for me to get Austudy, so he supports me entirely," I say, slightly bemused - he earns more than enough to cover the rent....
"Oh, Mr Scruffy supports you?" she asks, clearly surprised.
"Yes,"
"Oh..." She pauses. "Um, can I ask what your relationship with Mr Scruffy is?"
"I'm his wife."
"Oh. Oh, I see you've said that here.... Okay, I'll just make a notation and then contact Mr Scruffy's employer. Thanks for your time!"

Honestly, a trained monkey could have been more intelligent than her. My surname is double barreled, and the second barrel is Mr Scruffy's!!! AND, I clearly stated on the application form that I was married to Mr Scruffy, just in case they didn't get it.

Honestly.

"I shall call you Squishy, and you shall be my Squishy"

2007-03-15T23:17:08Z

Okay, so my post yesterday was a bit light on information and a bit heavy on gobsmackingness.

Firstly, big, big thanks and hugs to everyone for being so wonderfully supportive! :)

Let's begin at the beginning. Mr Scruffy and I had a bit of a chat around christmas last year, and thought that we'd like to have a baby. I'm getting closer and closer to 30, and as some very wise people pointed out, once I graduate I might not be in a position to do it. The advice of one wonderful midwife I met over the summer kept ringing in my ears: there is never a "right" time to have a baby, just some times that are better than others. On the balance of things, this seemed to be a better time... I hope I'm right!

So, without becoming super paranoid about it, we decided to just wait and see what happened. And this is what happened!

On Monday, I was due - but I'm often a day or two late, so it wasn't concerning. What was concerning was that when I jumped in the shower, I noticed that I seemed to be losing fistfuls of hair. My hair seemed to be falling out faster than Pumpkin's! On Tuesday morning, I ate breakfast and then immediately felt like a bowl of pasta. This was decidedly not normal for me. I decided that it couldn't hurt to "pee on a stick" and see what it said.

As I sat there, staring at it, two little lines appeared. I rechecked the instructions, which clearly stated that two lines indicates pregnancy. Feeling a strange mixture of elation and shock and a sudden overwhelming desire to burst into tears, I went and sat on the bed and told Pumpkin, who was the only other one home. He gave me that knowing look that cat's do, and then curled up into my lap.

I rang Mr Scruffy, and he was absolutely delighted. Honestly, he sounded happier than when he found out I had made it into Med School, which had previously been the most exuberant he'd been. This made me feel so much better - he hadn't changed his mind!

So, on Wednesday we went to my friendly local GP, who confirmed the test. At this stage we had to work out how pregnant I am... This is usually pretty simple if you have a 28 day cycle or similar to it, but I have a 37 day cycle. So, even though it was 5 weeks since my last period, they've decided to call me 4 weeks pregnant. 4 weeks and 4 days to be precise!

Little Squishy (Baby Scruff? Mini Scruff?) is due on the 19th of November... which is 9 days after me, 11 days after his/her grandfather and 14 days after his/her uncle. It's also just days after my end of year exam.

Which brings me to the point - school. Prior to finding out I was pregnant, it seemed an easing thing to juggle med school and a baby. Now, suddenly, it seems so incredibly daunting. I'm not upset... I just... daunted by the prospect. I'm lucky - I have an incredibly supportive family (who I told on Wednesday) and a wonderful group of friends (who don't know yet), and all of you out there to listen to me when I panic... I'm not kidding myself though, this is going to be tough. I'm not the only one doing it though, which is nice - there is at least one other girl in my year who is pregnant. And to be honest - I've never been frightened of a challenge...

So. 4 weeks and 4 days down, 35 weeks and 3 days to go. I'm feeling great - just tired and a little overwhelmed.

And I really mean it when I say that I appreciate all your hugs, love and support. Thanks guys....