It is often said that if there's
anything at all that is constant in this world, it's change. It can be
such a heartening thing as well as a depressing thing at times - no
matter how good or bad the moment might be, it's never going to be
repeated again. Many of us loved our school days, but ultimately the
goal of school is to learn from it and move ahead with life. I'm a
twenty year-old who's been living in the same city since kindergarten,
hence for someone who's viewing me from outside, it'd be rather
difficult to pinpoint one particular moment in my life that was a
paradigm shift or something which set me on a totally different track.
However, when I look back upon the rather short course of my existence
on this planet, I find that change has indeed hit me - in a gradual yet
very substantial manner - my 20-year old self would find it hard to
recognize my 15-year old self; and no, I'm not talking about appearance
of course. Which forces me to think - what was so great about the past
five years that led me to, if I may put it that way, "start a new life"?
Well, the biggest visible change is of course - joining medical college. In a lot of ways, college has changed me and opened me up in a way I never thought was possible with me. Let me share with you what really goes on in the mind of a student when he/she is in medicine and is on the path to getting that "Dr." prefix before their name. Of course, each profession has their uniquenesses, but since I'm in medicine and have experienced it, I choose to articulate that here.
Well, the first day you walk in to medical college and bam! You find yourself in a room full of dead bodies lying on tables. Let's be honest - this might sound scary to some but once you're in it, it's actually intriguing. The feel of having to cut open those persons - yes, real persons, who once were full of life and had their own stories to tell - to observe and learn what literally lies inside us, is well, surreal, when you think of it. And then you get absolutely submerged in the ocean of anatomy, physiology and biochemistry - the syllabus is enormous. It's when you actually begin to have real respect for doctors - for having gone through so much, and well, that's just the first year. Those who were toppers in school are now more than happy to just scrape through over 50%. In the first ever internal assessment test which I wrote after joining college, a grand total of nine students passed (out of 150), yours truly not included.
Then comes second year. It's comparatively more relaxed... and by this time, you're quite familiar with the college; you've made friends with the seniors and the newly arrived juniors... and you get closer to your classmates, so college feels much more familiar. If you're lucky, you get to go to Pulse, an annual fest at AIIMS, Delhi - we couldn't go, but I've heard it's pretty amazing. This is also the time when you start going to the hospital and start interacting with patients - and for the first time, get face-to-face with real people's problems and poverty, and how far we need to go before we can call ourselves a developed nation. You get in touch with different types of people from varying cultures - the beauty of our country - and how all those barriers stand absolutely nullified in the doctor-patient relationship. You also get acquainted to the challenges you're about to face... get to see a few surgeries, a few people dying right in front of your eyes, a few postmortems. It becomes commonplace. You talk to your female classmates about medical stuff which you'd get slapped for if you were to talk about that to any non-medico.
Well, the biggest visible change is of course - joining medical college. In a lot of ways, college has changed me and opened me up in a way I never thought was possible with me. Let me share with you what really goes on in the mind of a student when he/she is in medicine and is on the path to getting that "Dr." prefix before their name. Of course, each profession has their uniquenesses, but since I'm in medicine and have experienced it, I choose to articulate that here.
Well, the first day you walk in to medical college and bam! You find yourself in a room full of dead bodies lying on tables. Let's be honest - this might sound scary to some but once you're in it, it's actually intriguing. The feel of having to cut open those persons - yes, real persons, who once were full of life and had their own stories to tell - to observe and learn what literally lies inside us, is well, surreal, when you think of it. And then you get absolutely submerged in the ocean of anatomy, physiology and biochemistry - the syllabus is enormous. It's when you actually begin to have real respect for doctors - for having gone through so much, and well, that's just the first year. Those who were toppers in school are now more than happy to just scrape through over 50%. In the first ever internal assessment test which I wrote after joining college, a grand total of nine students passed (out of 150), yours truly not included.
Then comes second year. It's comparatively more relaxed... and by this time, you're quite familiar with the college; you've made friends with the seniors and the newly arrived juniors... and you get closer to your classmates, so college feels much more familiar. If you're lucky, you get to go to Pulse, an annual fest at AIIMS, Delhi - we couldn't go, but I've heard it's pretty amazing. This is also the time when you start going to the hospital and start interacting with patients - and for the first time, get face-to-face with real people's problems and poverty, and how far we need to go before we can call ourselves a developed nation. You get in touch with different types of people from varying cultures - the beauty of our country - and how all those barriers stand absolutely nullified in the doctor-patient relationship. You also get acquainted to the challenges you're about to face... get to see a few surgeries, a few people dying right in front of your eyes, a few postmortems. It becomes commonplace. You talk to your female classmates about medical stuff which you'd get slapped for if you were to talk about that to any non-medico.
My third year has just begun. Let's see how it goes :D
So yeah, in short, medical college has really made start a new life. What's your story?
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