Notice that my title did not reference the top 3 things I learned FROM anatomy. I don’t want to bore anyone with those lovely minute details of the intricacies of the ridiculously complex machine that is the human body.
No. Let’s not go there, friends.
Instead, I’m just going to detail some of the life lessons I learned during the medical school hazing ritual otherwise known as anatomy. In no particular order, they are as follows:
1) Any exercise is better than no exercise. Anatomy was one of the most time-consuming endeavors I’ve ever encountered in life. More so than work. More so than my college studies. It just consumed EVERYTHING…we generally started class at 8 and then continued with lab until 5 after which I needed to spend 4-5 hours studying at night trying to learn the massive amount of material we were expected to know. It was like a job that never ended, and the amount of time required for studying really unnerved me. I sacrificed a lot of the leisure time I was accustomed to during my previous working life.
Those long training runs I normally did on weekends? Gone. I didn’t have the time to train for anything. Somedays, I didn’t even feel like I had the time to workout at all. But ultimately, I made the choice to do what I could with the time I had. It wouldn’t kill me if I didn’t do the traditional 45 minutes of exercise. I could do 25 minutes, and that was enough. I always felt better afterward, and it meant a lot to me that I was doing something good for myself.
2) Being kind to yourself is the key to dealing with times of immense stress. This relates to my previous lesson. So you know how I tried to exercise when I could? Well, sometimes I felt so stressed out that I just bailed on exercise for multiple days in a row, particularly right before exams when it seemed as though every waking second needed to be devoted to studying. I always felt sorta guilty about it, but it seemed like the right thing to do at the time. You know what the nice part about this exercise skipping was? I realized that I will not DIE if I skip a workout. Heck, I won’t DIE if I skip it for three days in a row. Ultimately, my body craves exercise, and if I don’t fit it in for a few days, my body lets me know. After a few days of relative inactivity, I always wanted to exercise….mostly to relieve stress and get rid of pent up anxious energy. It was like an itch that needed to be scratched.
That said, even with my slightly diminished exercise regimen during anatomy, I didn’t gain weight. Nothing terrible happened. Yes, I might have lost some of my physical fitness, but it wasn’t the end of the world if I didn’t adhere to my original workout goals for the week. I forgave myself and moved on. And honestly, I’m a better person for it. Life will go on. I think the body has a remarkable way of finding its way back to equilibrium if you just listen to it. That’s what I believe anyway.
3) Life balance is waaaaay more important to me than being a medical student machine. One thing I learned about myself is that I am not a studying machine. I just can’t do it.
Some of the kids in my class are honest-to-god study machines that can just go and go and go for days without surfacing for air or any outside relief. I am not one of these kids. I am not going to be the number one neurosurgeon in the world simply because I want a life outside of medicine. One that is fulfilling and enriched with all the things that make me happy. Don’t get me wrong. My studies are incredibly important to me, but it is simply not worth it to me to sacrifice my health, my friends, and my overall sanity to achieve Honors designations in classes.
This is kind of a big deal for me because I’m type A. I like to be the best, and throughout my life, I’ve always been toward the top of my class. Anatomy was a different animal because of the amount of memorization that’s required to do well. The more hours you put in, presumably the better you do. But where do you draw that line? I decided to draw the line such that I did not honor the class. I did well, of course. I learned an immense amount and showed mastery of the vast majority of the material. But I did not honor, and that was a bitter pill to swallow at first. I’ve been told numerous times that the first two years of grades in medical school are a very small factor in what hospitals look for during residency applications. But still, there’s a part of me that wants to do the best I can in everything.
Prior to medical school, I could do what I felt was my best without sacrificing my happiness. Now, I don’t feel that’s quite as achievable. During anatomy, I did my best within reason, I figure. I could have chosen to study for hours and hours and hours on-end, and then maybe I would have honored. But I didn’t, and I honestly feel that I was happier during this block than some of my fellow students. I feel like this whole balance thing is a big deal for people in my profession, and it’s something that I want to always keep in mind going forward into other time-consuming endeavors like residency.
This is my promise to myself going forward….I will not expect perfection from myself in all areas of my life. I will do my best, and I will focus on what I need to do to achieve a reasonable balance between life and work. If that means being less than the best, then so be it.
Ultimately, I want to be a doctor who is fulfilled in both her career and her outside life….and as much as I would like to be the best at everything, I simply can’t. Something’s gotta give. I would like to think that being a good doctor doesn’t require spending hours and hours learning every possible minute detail of distal sites of nerve innervations in the brain. I think being a good doctor requires taking care of yourself first and your patients second. In order to give the most of yourself in your work, you need to be a happy, fulfilled person first.
I hope to keep these lessons in mind moving forward through the rest of my medical education: I am human, I am not perfect, and that is just fine with me.
