New Year Resolutions

my playground, originally uploaded by sharonhappymorgue.

Will probably be celebrating new year in the OT because I'm on 3rd call new year's eve. No problem with me because what's new year celebration without my family. The only unfortunate thing is that I'll be oncall with the 1 MO that currently everybody's (my team la) bitching about. Just hope that there'll be no emergency op tomorrow so I don't have to spend hours of uncomfortable silence with him while retracting some obese abdominal wall.

I've picked up from my slight stumble the other day before Christmas. In fact I'm deliriously happy at the moment. I'm in Mr. V's ward, and everyday is a great learning experience. I did my first excisional biopsy of an inguinal lymph node yesterday! So super cool, at the expence of 2 veins and 1 artery, and Mr. V's shirt. :) Mr. V patiently guided me through the supposedly 10-15mins procedure which I took some 1hr+! But he was so encouraging and nurturing. And I dropped 2 instruments. :)

He was like, "Very good. There goes another instrument..."

But my 2 envious colleagues observing me noted that I was calm and collected throughout my first "baby laparatomy". Hehe.

Because of the festivity at the moment, our ward is reduced to 3 patients! It's just sooooo amazing. It's difficult to accept looking into an empty ward. It's more familiar when it's ridden with some 30-40 patients.

But Mr. V won't let us take turns to come for morning rounds and insisted all 3 HOs to come eventhough there's only like 3 patients. So he would be discussing each case in detail with us and make us go back and read up on some topics for discussion the following day. And that's just really cool because I've learnt so much in these few days compared to my 3 months in the other wards.

So for tomorrow we'll be discussing on Starling's forces and oedema in a patient with Fournier's gangrene, SIRS, adrenal tuberculosis and urobilinogen and bile in the urine.

And Mr. V let us take turns to do peritoneal tapping on an uncle who has malignant ascites who's currently in the ward. It's no joke waiting almost 2 hours tapping 2L of blood-stained fluid. Mr. V insisted that we must be bedside throughout the tap until the end.

I'm learning to convert my infatuation for Mr. V into respect. I think the progress is excellent because there's nothing but respect I have for this fine man at the moment. He's such a great teacher, on top of a being a great doctor. Many patients I see everyday praise him for his compassion and personal touch. He would always grab a chair and sit next to the patient and ask how he was doing and always explained whatever management to the patient.

He's the only surgeon doing that.

I think my colleague W is suspecting some chemistry between Mr. V and I, but he can suspect all he wants. Mr. V would always have a special place in my heart, and I wish him all my very best. I know I'm going to miss him when I finish surgery in a couple of weeks time.

I was telling my friend this morning that what I'm feeling now is rather sad, but hopeful.

I feel the situation with Mr. V is like as if I've met my soulmate, but I can't be with him because someone else needs him more than me at the moment.

So my new year resolutions:

1) To be healthier physically
2) To be more inquisitive and eager to learn more of my field
3) To have more empathy
4) To appreciate what I have and not sulk over what I don't have

Happy 2007!