Everyday Shennanigans

Preemptive excuse the word vomit.

I realized that I haven’t actually posted in half a year and have only posted four times since I started med school. Well, I have my last exam of the school year in a week and ofc I’m doing what I do best - procrastinating. I should probably do a reflection on MS1, but I’m just gonna uncork some feels rn, as you can probably tell from the title.

Two weeks ago, my best friend broke up with me after five and a half years (would’ve been exactly 5.5 two days ago). At least it was on good terms and at the end of the day it was essentially the product of going long distance again and this experience was significantly more.. distant (in all intents and purposes of the word) than it was in undergrad. Nevertheless, breakups still suck big time and though I basically mentally prepared myself for this (anticipated it coming) for the month prior, I’m basically just an embodiment of a turbulent emotional abyss. I’ve had the past two weeks to process my emotions and I don’t even think I’ve scratched the surface. I’ve probably experienced a full spectrum of emotions these past couple of weeks: sadness, heartbreak, grief, anger, frustration. However, I think the emotion that’s dragging me down like an anchor in this sea of newfound singledom is loneliness. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so lonely before. I still don’t have a close group of friends here - a product of my own introversion and misfitting in this bar and club culture of my generation. Living on my own doesn’t help the situation either - no roommates to talk to everyday this time. To my own demise, my ex was my sole daily support system, but can you blame me? She was my best friend for almost 11 years and was my girlfriend for half of that time. I thought she was the one, but I guess life loves to pull the rug from under you once in a while, huh?

I feel so dumb. I’m not failing the weekly quizzes or anything (doing ~average overall), but when I hear my classmates talk about stuff in our small group stuff or in labs, I wouldn’t know what they’re talking about half the time \o/

I’m sitting here on an air mattress in my new apartment [my mom and sister are sleeping in my room on my actual mattress (my furniture is being delivered on Friday \o/)] and orientation (week) starts tomorrow. This whole “starting med school” thing didn’t really hit me until just now, even when I was packing up my life to move across the country.. I guess I’ll always be a procrastinator (oh lordie, I hope not..), even when it comes to feels.

I spent like a third of my life to get to this point? I committed myself to becoming a doctor in the second half of high school, spent all of college chasing this goal, and spent the past two years applying trying to get in and I finally did it! Registration’s tomorrow and the first actual day of classes is in a week, shouldn’t I be ecstatic? Why do I feel anxiety? Why have I been worrying I won’t be good enough? Isn’t imposter syndrome a bitch? I talked to friends and family about this and they all have confidence in me: “You’ll do great! I mean, they wouldn’t have had accepted you if they thought you weren’t smart enough, right?” Well yeah, that’s true... but the self-pessimist that I am always loves to cling to that tiny possibility that I might crash and burn and all that effort was for naught.

I can’t believe it. It’s finally happened. After 10 years, 2 application cycles, countless personal statement drafts, 84 secondaries, 2 interviews (1 last cycle and one this cycle so far, with a few more coming up), and thousands of dollars, I was accepted into medical school this morning. I did it, ma!

I want to thank all of the people that have helped me throughout this process and were there for me when I was at my lowest point. After those 40 rejections last cycle, I wasn’t confident in myself and was starting to doubt my ability to become a physician. Thankfully, I had a great support system that lifted me back up. I’m sorta thankful that I went through the application process (besides spending all that money), because I learned to not be so damn neurotic and just accept the fact that this whole thing is almost a crapshoot - only ~40% of applicants matriculate, so the odds are definitely out of the applicant’s favor.

Originally when I made this blog, I wanted to document my journey throughout the application cycle. Sorry that didn’t happen, but it wasn’t that eventful \o/ It would have just been me complaining about those endless secondaries.

[Cooking]

My Quest For The Perfect Pancakes - Attempt 2: Fluffier, But Not Quite

Ingredients:

200g Flour

2.5 tsp Baking Powder

0.5 tsp Baking Soda

0.5 tsp Salt

3 tbsp Sugar

1.25 cup Buttermilk or Milk +1 tbsp Lemon Juice or White Vinegar - room temp

Splash Vanilla Extract

Dash cinnamon

1 Egg - room temp

3 tbsp Butter - Melted

A few strawberries

1-2 small bananas - sliced thin

Also, please excuse the unsightly pancake photos.

Directions:

Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and sugar

Combine the egg, buttermilk, melted butter, and vanilla extract

Slowly pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients while gently whisking to combine

Heat a skillet or frying pan to ~medium heat and wait until it’s hot enough for a drop of water to “dance” on the surface of the pan

Spray with some non-stick spray (or spread some butter on it)

Pour ~0.25 cups of batter onto the pan and place some slices of banana and strawberry on the uncooked side

Once the edges firm up and bubbles appear on the top surface, flip that bad boy

Wait for ~30 seconds or so (or whenever that bottom side turns brown - I cheat and peek) and transfer that sucker onto a plate

Repeats steps 6-8 until you’re out of batter, spraying when you feel like the pancakes are sticking

Drizzle with syrup, garnish with fruits, and enjoy

Pro Tip: You achieve and even surface on your pancakes when you don’t use spray/butter. Butter causes those unsightly splotches. I usually spray after every 5-6 pancakes to make sure my skillet isn’t sticking Pro Tip 2: Having the wet ingredients at room temperature makes a huge difference - the melted butter doesn’t suddenly solidify and make you sad this way. If you pull them from the fridge, you can stick them in the microwave and warm them up slowly in 10 second intervals (try not to cook the egg in the microwave) Pro Tip 3: Make sure you mix the batter gently. Over-mixing the batter causes it to form more gluten, making the pancake tougher and less fluffy.

Notes For Myself:

Looks like the ingredient changes (more flour + baking powder, adding baking soda) made an appreciable difference

Overall: 8.5/10 - Noticeably fluffier. It’s getting there, but I want to refine the recipe. Maybe MORE baking powder???

QOTD & Handwriting Practice (09-18-16)

“Perfectionism doesn’t make you feel perfect; it makes you feel inadequate.” - Maria Shriver in Ten Things I Wish I’d Known - Before I Went Out Into the Real World 

Matte Black Pilot Vanishing Point (Fine) Pilot Iroshizuku Ku-jaku Tomoe River Paper My cursive’s getting there. Still trying to find some capital letters that I like and my current priority is working on spacing.

So this quote actually hit it home for me and made me realize where a lot of my insecurities stemmed from. I always considered myself more or less a “perfectionist” and as a result, everything I did never felt good enough. I always felt inadequate and this inadequacy seeped its way into my psyche until it made me even hesitate to try new things - probably why I always felt awkward at school dances and absolutely refused to express myself through bodily motion. “What if I mess up? People will judge me because I messed this or that part up.” These voices in my head would just take over my consciousness and plague me - that’s why I’ve always been jealous of people who can dance or whatever without a care in the world. Even in activities I thought that I was pretty decent in, band especially, were affected by that mentality. I (and I’m pretty sure all my band directors) remember my habit of just stopping after one mistake in an exercise, releasing an audible sigh, and then trying again from the top. I HATED THAT. Why couldn’t I accept the fact that mistakes were necessary steps into achieving something excellent?!

Yesterday, I realized that pursuing perfection was totally irrational. How could I be perfect at something when humans aren’t perfect? If perfection isn’t achievable, then why don’t I just pursue excellence? I think this shift in mindset will really affect how I critique myself. Hopefully my line of thinking will change from “I messed that up. That part’s wrong. Why do I suck?” to “That was pretty good, but how can I make it better?” “Which part can I improve on next time?” Changing from the pursuit of perfection to one of excellence is literally going from something of Herculean impossibility to something more fulfilling. I think now I can enjoy the journey rather than nitpicking and belittling my efforts throughout it. I do think that high school and college drastically helped me improve my self-confidence, but I still have quite a way to go before these bad habits are gone. No one’s perfect, right?

Funnily enough, this whole revelation happened while I was answering a secondary prompt asking what advice I’d give my younger self. Thanks, Quinnipiac.

[Photography]

Wassat? 12-18-15

[Photography]

Portland International Rose Test Garden 08-02-16

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[Photography]

Day & Night - 06-23-15, 06-25-15