Andy's visit

Wow, I can't believe it's been two and a half months since my last update! Things have been busy as usual around here - actually busier than usual. I finished up my contact lens rotation and am currently working 5-6 days a week in the primary care clinic where I see a wide variety of patients. It's not uncommon to see patients with HIV, drug addictions, or personality disorders such as schizophrenia. One of my patients went off and was yelling at me because she thought I was killing her family and was afraid I would eat her eyes. Another patient had a seizure and had to be admitted to the hospital. There's never a dull moment!

In case you had be planning on bringing a grenade into the exam room...

Andy's been working at his new job in Washington for 2 months now and really enjoys it. He flew in this weekend to visit and while we had a wonderful time together, it wasn't long enough! While he was here we saw a movie, went out to dinner, made a trip to Miami, did some shopping, took Porter to the dog park, and relaxed at home. I had to drop him off at the airport this afternoon and I thought it'd be a little easier to say goodbye this time, knowing that we're nearly a quarter of the way through our time apart, but it was just as difficult as the first goodbye! Between now and his next visit I will be taking parts II and III of my national boards examinations so I have plenty of studying to keep me busy.

Family portrait: a day at the dog park! 

236 days until graduation!

Jamaica, Jamaica, ya mon!

So I've been back from Jamaica for about two weeks and am just now starting to feel caught up on everything. I had a good time in Jamaica, though I was really only there for two and a half days. Four students, including myself, and one doctor saw around 170 patients in Kingston. I got the chance to see a couple diseases I haven't seen back home which was pretty cool for me (less so for the patient, no doubt).

I wish I had lots of photos to share, but I didn't want to bring my camera since I knew I'd be busy and wouldn't be able to keep an eye on it while I was working. Hopefully I can get copies of the photos my friends took and share those later. Here's a photo I took with my phone from the plane right before my battery died - we took off over the water and had a great view of the mountains.

One of the reasons it's been a bit crazy since I got back is because Andy and I are planning a trip on short notice. I can't divulge when or where we'll be going just yet, but I will say it's the opposite extreme from Jamaica, in more ways than one.

Odds & Ends

I know I'm way behind in my posting, so here's a quick rundown of things I've been up to.

• I passed part 1 of the national board exam! They made some major changes to the exam content and format in response to a huge cheating scandal at one of the other schools last year. As a result, scores dropped 13% nationally, bringing the pass rate down to 72%. To say that I was relieved to find out I passed would be a huge understatement. Most grueling and stressful 2 days of my life! I'll be taking part 3 in October and part 2 in November of this year.

• Finals are over and I'm now officially in my fourth (and final!) year. I'm in clinic 5 days a week doing exams and vision therapy as part of my pediatrics rotation. 

• Made two trips to Orlando. Once for visiting family combined with a trip to Universal with friends and the second time to participate in Special Olympics doing eye exams.

• Andy and I celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary a few weeks ago. Woohoo! We did a photoshoot with our wedding photographers right before and got some nice up to date photos of us. 

• Just celebrated my 25th birthday this week. As I opened the door Andy blew a noisemaker in my face and Porter rushed up to greet me wearing a lei and a Happy Birthday hat! Andy had flowers waiting for me on my desk, along with some of my favorite treats. It was a very sweet surprise!

    

• Enjoyed brunch this morning with a few friends. We've been together everyday for the last 3 years of school and now we're all doing our own thing with externships so it's nice to get together and catch up from time to time.

• In less than two weeks I'm heading out to Jamaica, provided nothing comes up this time. *fingers crossed*

• I'm considering going on a graduation trip and am trying to think of places we could go. I'm kinda liking the idea of renting out a luxury villa in Thailand, but we'll see. 

It's Crunch Time

and no, I'm not referring to my abs. I've been in hiding for the past couple months because I've been studying like crazy for part 1 of the national board exam. Part 1 is the hardest according to most (all?) people you talk to. It's a grueling 2 day exam that covers everything we've ever learned. It's less than a month away now, which means I'm really starting to feel the heat. It also means that in less than a month I'll get my life back and be able to return to blogging!

Going to the Out House

Backtracking a few weeks... The day before Thanksgiving I got to choose the two externship sites I will be working at during my fourth year. I'll spend the first 6 months doing internships "in house" at the 3 local clinics associated with the school.

The last 6 months will be divided up into two - three month rotations away from school. I decided to do the first "out house" rotation at a private practice in Miami that has an emphasis on specialty contact lens fittings and sports vision therapy. My second "out house" rotation will be at a very large, multi-location practice in my hometown that deals with a lot of ocular disease and surgery. The practice has 8 different locations and a broad range of doctors and specialties, including optometrists, ophthalmologists, cosmetic surgeons, hearing specialists, and skin care professionals. I'll get a chance to visit as many of the practices as I'd like and even go into the OR to observe any of the surgeries being performed. All in all, I'm very excited to get more experience and to work in all the different practice settings. However, it also makes me a bit nervous to realize how close I am to graduating. It's felt so far off for so long, but it's starting to hit me now that it's only a year and a half away!

And just for fun I threw in a photo of me with some friends. This photo was taken after we gave a presentation to two high school classes about the profession. We all tried to maintain our composure when one girl, the first person to raise a hand, asked Johnny (far right) if he was nervous because he was talking so fast! We got bombarded with tons of other questions, some pretty off the wall. 

I'm baaaack!

As I was typing the title to this post Steve Urkel pop into my head with his signature catchphrase, "I'm baaaack!" (Hey! Don't those look like the same glasses I made and put on our pumpkin?!)

Last Sunday I flew to Jacksonville for a two day contact lens seminar put on by one of the major contact lens manufacturers, all expenses paid. Due to scheduling conflicts none of my friends were able to go and I ended up being the only student from my school there. It was a bit nerve wracking for an introvert like myself, but I ended up having a great time and am really glad I went. Not knowing anyone there took away my crutch and forced me to meet a number of really nice students from other schools that I may not have talked to otherwise. 

Wednesday, the day after my return, was my last day in clinic for the semester. In a couple weeks we will start our winter semester and I'll be back in clinic, but thankfully I'll be working a different day. That means no more 12+ hour days! Woohoo! 

Getting Shot... Again

The last time I wrote about getting shot I was referring to an upcoming photo shoot, but this time I'm talking about needles!

Yesterday I got some blood work done as part of my yearly physical exam and I blacked out. And tomorrow we are getting our injections certification which requires us to give (and receive) three different types of shots! Yikes! I'm pretty confident the blacking out was just my usual response to having so much blood taken since I don't really fear needles, but I'm still a bit nervous for tomorrow. My only solace is that it's just the arm and not the eye...at least not yet.

Wish me (and my partner) luck!

Four Eyes

I'm wearing my new pair of glasses as I sit here typing this. One of the things I learned in optometry school is that it's not a good idea to wear contact lenses for 18 hours a day, which I've been doing for, oh I dunno, 10 years now! I've always felt like I look horrible in glasses and I hate how wearing them doesn't feel nearly as natural as contact lenses, but I found a pair I'm pretty happy with. Now it's just a matter of switching into them when I get home to give my eyes a break.

Speaking of giving my eyes a break...

source

The other night Andy and I were browsing through recipes on foodgawker.com and I came across these beauties! They're called "Sin"amon Morning Muffins. I haven't gotten a chance to try making them yet, but they look absolutely delicious. Mmmm!

The Week Ahead

I'm not looking forward to this week very much. Although I've already had my first exam of the semester, this is when things really starts to pick up. I've got two exams this week, two next week, one exam per week for a few weeks, and then midterms. Around midterm time is when we get our certificate for injections - yes, injections. We have to practice intradermal, intramuscular, and subcutaneous injections on each other and then demonstrate proficiency to get our certification. Really though, I'm just glad we're not performing any of the ocular injections on each other. Oh, and to kick this week off I have to get four cavities filled after my exam tomorrow!

Vacation, Day 5

Sorry for my lack of posting this week. I was preparing for seeing my very first patients. I could go into all the interesting things I saw, but my guess is no one would have a clue what I'm talking about or even care. In a nutshell, I have glaucoma service on Tuesdays so I see only patients that have glaucoma or are at risk for developing it. However, most of these patients are older and have other things going on with their eyes as well so it can definitely be a challenge. Fridays I see "regular" patients, although they can come in with anything, including glaucoma as one of my patients did yesterday. Thankfully I survived my first week, woohoo! Now, back to the story...


Tuesday May 4^th

Andy woke up to a very unpleasant surprise - a tick latched onto his side! (You'll be glad to know I don't have any pictures to share) I tried to remove it, which involved lots of squealing and shrieking in disgust, but I was only partially successful in my endeavors. We spent two hours waiting at a walk in clinic to get the remainder of the nasty parasite removed and to get prophylactic antibiotics for Lyme disease. Since we missed our continental breakfast at the hotel (which Andy had been very much looking forward too) we grabbed a quick lunch at Rally’s, an equivalent to Checkers (hard to believe we still had an appetite after all that!).

We set out to Sequoia National Forest which involved another very windy drive through steep mountains.

I pulled over at the first sight of snow along the side of the road so we could get out and play. I was totally excited, even for this small amount. As we continued to drive up the mountain the snow went from a few inches to a few feet!


I didn't see snow until I was 20 and even then it wasn't much so I had to get out and frolic some more.

Andy took this photo as I was driving so it's a bit blurry, but if you look on the left it gives you an idea just how much snow there was.

 Part of a fence post and a sign peeking out of the snow.

A stream running through the trees.

Here we are standing in front of General Sherman, the largest tree in the world. It stands 275 feet tall and the diameter at it's base measures 36.5 feet! It's estimated to be between 2,300 and 2,700 years old.


We wanted to go to Moro Rock, but it was still closed due to the snow. Instead we went for a short hike and came across some deer. We also saw a brown bear, but didn't get close enough to get a shot like this!

This was a beautiful spot so we hung out here until the sun set.

Clinic, here I come!

On Friday I received a letter congratulating me for passing the pre-clinical proficiency exam! That means in 6 short weeks I will see my first patient!