Chronically Fatigued

Medical school. Clinical years = chronic fatigue. Or so it feels so far. I've only been doing this for three weeks and I'm tired of it. I'm not sure if it's the environment or the people I work with, but I'm just not finding much joy in what I've had to do so far. I'm relatively sure it's not the patients though! Like I said before, a lot of it has been ultimately frustrating and infuriating. There are hardly any highlights to my extremely long days at the hospital.

This is the pivotal mid-way point of my 5-year degree. I'm halfway through to getting my Bachelor in Medicine & Surgery. In part, I feel like the past 2.5 years has flown by faster than the Enterprise at warp speed but at the same time i can't help feeling that time isn't moving quickly enough. Over the past 48 hours, I've been feeling very much like I can't wait for the end of medical school to come. I can't wait to graduate, obtain my degree and complete my 12-month internship. I look forward so much to a future in naturopathic medicine. All my hopes and dreams and prayers are in leaving Barbados to get that degree at Bastyr University.

Of course, I could just be feeling this way because I'm not enjoying my Surgery clerkship very much. Maybe it's because I feel discouraged as much as I feel encouraged. Or maybe it's my hormones and I'm getting emotional for nothing. I'll probably be able to tell you in a week or two when surgery is over and I start a new clerkship in Internal Medicine. Although, to be honest, I'm not satisfied with the service I've been assigned to for surgery. I don't feel like I'm being taught very much when I hear about the teaching that happens in other services. Of course, I should try learning the information on my own, but these things tend to stay with me better under pressure. From what I hear, that pressure's going to be pounding me from all sides from day 1 of my medicine clerkship.

I'm chronically fatigued. In a 4-week clerkship, I only got 2 days off and took a sick day. That's 24 days of being at the hospital for a 4-week clerkship from 7 am until...anytime. I generally spend about 8-11 hours at the hospital most days and approximately 15-16 hours there for on-call days (which are every 4 days). I've gone from sleeping up to 8 hours to sleeping up to 6; from sitting in a lecture theatre all day to standing and walking all over the wards and hospital. Such a drastic lifestyle change, how could I not be constantly tired? I pray it gets better.