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Newark, NJ, United States
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Saturday, May 12, 2007

EXHAUSTION

I'm exhausted..

Too exhausted to tink straight..

I can't talk, I can't walk, I can't sleep..

I son't understand how people may actually do ER BY CHOICE!

One day your shift starts at 08:00, the other it starts at 16:00, the next it starts at 00:00!! I call it social suicide.. I haven't seen my mom for a week, let alone my friends..

That is, until last Thursday.. I was asleep, and my phone started ringing uncontrollably.. It's like it got a seziure or something..
I kept on silenscing it, not having enough energy to turn it off.. 15 calls later I HAD to answer..
It was Oli, saying that Sara, Rash and herself were in Zee Noodle,and they wanted me to join'em.. I gave her my usual line in my usual sleepy voice:
"yeah ok, I'll try, really, I'll do my best, I have to take a shower and get dressed, it'll take some time.." to which she knows the translation: "I"M NOT COMING"..

She hang up.. 10 minutes later the same calling frenzy reoccured.. I HAD to answer once again..
It was Sara.. "Hey G, umm, we're by your door, can you buzz us in?!"

"WTF? loooooooool, yeah sure.."

You know when you stand up from bed too quickly you get a head rush? I was dressing up on the go, jumping on one leg to pull up the bermuda.. I buzzed them in, 20 seconds later they were at my door, smiling ridiculously.. And that's when I knew, tonight was going to be exotically exhausting..

Rash was holding her Karaoke apparatus, and I live in a small apartment, and I have neighboors, that until last Thursday never knew I existed lol..

We hooked it, and, ofcourse, Sara was set on auto-log on..

By midnight.. Oli had to leave, it was late, she never stayed past 11, 11:30 max.. so 12 in my home was an honor! lol

They left, and I was getting ready to go back to sleep in the same outfit, and then, not surprisingly, my phone started convulsing again..

It was Oli "Hey G, we're downstairs, waiting for you.."
"HUH? why? did you forget something?"
Oli:"lol, no, we're gonna watch a movie at my house, join us.."
"crap, ok.."

I was literally incapable of saying no that night..

I put on my Abaya, grabbed my keys, cigs, and down I went.. Not until I reached Oli's house did I realise I wasn't wearing a scarf LOL

We watched "The Prestige", which I saw in Italy in Jannuary.. and about 3 or 4 times since then.. I can't get enough of it.. so many twist, my kind of movie..

By 3:00 am.. I suggested we go to the beach.. loool I was kidding, but I saw some consideration in their eyes.. If I insisted a little bit more I swear we ould've done it..

The problem is, I had a day shift on Friday, that starts at 8.. I was going to either die or kill a patient if I didn't sleep the rest of the night..

I didn't sleep.. I didn't die, and thank god, I didn't kill a patient..

Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Beauty.. or is it?

I loved the new Dove commercial, where they ask why our perception of beauty has become so disfigured!

I hate make up and cosmetic surgeries..

People are no longer unique in anyway.. I started to really admire girls and women walking around with a light touch of lipgloss without the layers of founation and bronzers.. European women are attractive for a reason!

I admit it, I was a makeup junkie, I was overweight and I thought with painting my face I would divert the looks from my body.. And now I see how self-concious and depressed I was..
I used to wear makeup to the gym for god's sake!

Thank god, I got cured of my addiction after I lost the weight.. I look at my old pictures and think I wasn't fooling anybody.. If you're self-concious about something, that's the thing everybody notices.. Like when you try to cover a zit with layers of concealer and foundation, and end up calling attention to it..

I wish I could start seminars to talk to young girls about this subject..

Make up doesn't make you pretty, it makes you look unnatural, and sometimes totally disfigured! ESPECIALLY if you add colored lenses to the equation!
God gave dark skinned girls dark colored eyes for a reason!

And makeup is a vicious cycle, if you get used to how you look like with eye liners, mascara and blush, you would cry everytime you look at the mirror in the morning..

Oh, and don't get me started on the highlights! It's like an epidemic.. I'm not saying it's ugly on everybody, but it IS ugly on some people! The rule is:
If it suits your best friend, it doesn't necessarily suit you! live with it!

I was reading the post on the Solar Alchemist blog, and I got so moved and I hadto say what I think in detail..

Monday, May 07, 2007

It's been a whiiiile..

I've been away for a while, and everytime I try o get back on track I think I missed ALOT.. So I end up procrastinating..

Today, I thought I'll drop anything, even if a couple of unrelated sentences, just to push me back on track..

So what interesting news have occured these past 2 months?

1. I finished my surgery rotation..
I love surgery.. LOVE IT.. I hate the paper work, but once I'm in an OR, I feel like the queen of the world! The rotation was through Febrary,March, and April.. The first month was crappy in KFSH.. 2nd & 3rd was in the university hospital, I took every on call with Oli and sara.. It was the best 2 months in my whole internship! I did plastic surgery, and cardiac surgery.. (yes, heart surgery..)
Needless to say, by the end of those 3 months, I literally crawled back home to sleep..

2. On Mai first, the university threw us a graduation party.. it was huge, and I was chosen to be the velleydictorian.. Yup, I stood up and said the goodbuy words infront of thousands of women.. It was mazing, I thought at first I might collapse, but then it went so smooth and I became famous lol..
My mom got me 2 gifts, I was so touched, she said one is from her, and the other is what my dad would've given me had h been alive.. I almost cried.. She got me a beautiful diamond ring.. and the other gift was diamond studded rosary.. It belonged to my dad, amd just the idea was mind-blowing.. I was so happy and definitely in tears..

3. With the beginning of Mai, my ER rotation began too.. the system in ER is as follows:
You mustattend 15 shifts in a month..
You must have 5 of each, day shifts, evening shifts, and night shifts.. Days being from 8 to 4 pm, evenings from 4 to 12 am, and nights from 12 to 8 am..

My brave husband, suggested that if we took consecutive shifts, we could finish our total requirements earlier, so we took a double shift from 12 am yesterday, til 4 pm this evening.. I WAS WALKING HOME DEAD.. ZOMBIE.. I hit the bed, and I went into a deep coma..

I think that's enough for a catch up.. I really forgot how this works lol.. I had to change almost everything to exite myself a little.. guess it worked.. Thx ahmed for the inspiration ;)

Sunday, March 18, 2007

Job Hunting!

Why did they call it hunting? Why not fishing?!

As interns, this is the first time we actually start applying for jobs/residency programs.. I don't know if my experience as a cashier in Mc Donald's in London counts or not, especially that I ended up cleaning tables cuz I flirted alot with cute customers lol..

Anyhow, during this past couple of weeks I had to give birth to my CV.. My first official CV saw the light a couple of days ago, and by official, the one that didn't include watching Bugs Bunny in my hobbies.. You know you must sound professional even if ur not quite so..

Job hunting, to my surprise, is so much like treasure hunting.. You usually go to one of the older -wiser- fellows, and talk to them for a while, show them what ur made of, and when they see in you a promising person, they confide in you the secrets of this job hunt.. they give you what I call "The Map".. it's usually a small scrap of paper, cuz atthe setting, u don't expect it to happen, so when he or she starts confiding in you, u pull out the closest thing to a paper, it could be a chewing gum wrapper lol.. you write down the steps.. Go see so and so, then talk to so and so.. attend so and so, show so and so ur interested, and no matter what, don't do so and so..

Funny thing is, most of the information they give are usually very well known, and you are very familiar with.. But still, when spoken bythe "Wiser", you treasure it.. You guard that scrap of paper with your life, you don't show it to anyone, you move carefully from step 1 to step 2, and you never trespass.. It's funny if you're watching from outside the box.. but inside, it's really serious, intense, and nerve wrecking!

Then comes the backstabbers.. those that wanna jeopardise your moves.. Either simply for the sake of jeopardising you, or to make themselves glow on your stake..

Then comes the competition.. my game.. my true source of energy.. If something was given, I don't want it, I wanna fight for it! But I wanna fight clean, why doesn't anybody else fight clean? Why is there so much pushing? lol

Thursday, March 01, 2007

BORAT!!!

For those who have seen it, continue..
For those who haven't, what the hell r u waiting for? (spoilers ahead)

"Borat" is the kind of movie that you would hate to laugh at, but unconciously you're laughing ur a$$ out..
Has there been anyone in the world that wasn't offended from that movie?

I couldn't find anything to humiliate lesbians, but other than those everybody has had their share, ESPECIALLY jews.. If I were a jew I would hunt him down and torture him looooool

It's the kind of movie that leaves u shocked in disbelief, torn between laughing and shutting it down for it's obscene scenes and paroles..

Sacha (the producer and the actor playing the role of Borat) is a genius, the idea of making a comedy in the form af a real spontaneous documentary is overwhelming.. Imagine being the only actor in an 80+ minute movie? where everybody else's words are 90% genuine?!

Hillarious, no wonder he got sued by so many people!

I recommend watching it unless you are:
Jewish
Christian
Muslim
Gay
Straight
Elderly
Youngster
Animal *especially a turtle
White
Black
Gypsy
Poor
Rich
American *texan in particular
Uzbekistani
Kazakhistani
Prostitue
Pamela Anderson (LOL)

In short, if ur human, u shouldn't watch this movie..
Actually, u shouldn't watch it even if u weren't human for all that matters loool

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Capuccino con Panna

So I'm in my on call room, sipping some capuccino con panna (with whipped cream).. Anyway, I decide I wanna visit the ladies room; u know coffee has a diuretic effect, so I walk out of my room towards the toilet which is around the corner..

In this 10 second walk, I run into 5 people, all of which look at me and give a very exagerated grin, I smile back and keep moving..

In the lady's room, I look at the mirror, and there was it.. The reason of the suspiciously nice grins!

On my upper lip, a very obvious white mustache, stretching from a corner to the other..

Damn you whipped cream!!! How embarrassing :$

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Surgery is Out!

You know the feeling when you have so many options, one of which you will never consider, but then something or someone explains to you that you're not allowed to choose that particular thing, and you all of a sudden become interested? Yes that feeling, what do u call it? lol

I think that's why I had such a crush on surgery.. yes, I'm so sad to say it was an infatuation, no more no less.. Something like Eve's apple, the forbidden fruit lol..

Here's what happened on Wednesday..
Wednesday is OR day (operation room).. I was running a bit late, so I headed directly to the the OR, changed into my scrubs, wore the head piece and off to surgery..
1st case, no biggy, just some axillary lymph node dissection, nodes were out and sent to pathology.
2nd case,
A middle aged woman, for thyroidectomy (removal of her thyroid).. This time, the consultant asked me to scrub in (this is the process of peeling ur skin to reach a less colonized layer lol).. I was thrilled, now I get to touch and watch closely.. So not even 5 minutes into the operation, I started feeling funny; lightheaded, with some funny ringing in my ears.. I tried to overcome this feeling and resist my urge to move away from the operating table.. Thinking it would go away with time..

VERY wrong decision, it only got worse.. next to be lost was my eyesight.. I suddenly blacked out, I only remember putting eveything in my hands down, and taking 2 steps backwards, then saying as calmly as possible: "I can't see!"

That's when I felt numerous hands holding me as my knees gave out!

1 hour later, I wake up.
I found the resident in front of me, so I close my eyes again thinking:
This doesn't make any sense, when I wake up I should find my husband in front of me.. Damn it, I'm fantasizing again lol..

I open my eyes again, yep, still the anesthesia resident.. I start to get recollections of what happened, I find I'm hooked up to IV fluids, with numerous OJ cups to my side..

The resident tells me I had severe hypoglycemia and severe hypotension, then deliberately asked me if I were pregnant.. At that point I started to freak out, I don't know why.. it was like he was asking me if i had an incurable disease or sth lol..

Anyway, I was sent home on my first OR day, how sad is that? Funny thing is, I'm so bored doing surgery and feel like my brain is on a vacation.. am I watching too much "House M.D"?!

Bad news are: I have to decide very soon what specialty I wanna be doing, cuz the acceptanse exams are only 2 ~ 3 months away, and we are each allowed 3 choices.. As much as it hurts me to finally spit it out, surgery out, u were a nice seasonal boyfriend, but I don't think we can commit.. I must throw 3 new cards on the table, and I can't be any more clueless!

Current options I'm evaluating (but not final nevertheless):
1. Immunology
2. Neurology
3. Diagnostic Radiology

I need professional help :(

Sunday, February 11, 2007

OJ, you rock!

And by OJ ofcourse I mean orange juice lol

Yep, I'm on call again.. It feels like I'm still hung over from last time.. But don't worry, I'm not gonna bore you -dear diary- with the minute to minute details.. Now that I look back, that post was laaaame lol looks like i did nothing but eat! (like SOMEone so kindly pointed that out :P)

I;m gonna talk instead about the the 8th of February..
My sisters' friends were planning a surprise birthday for the both of them.. They wanted it to be in our house to dramatize it.. So since my mom is out of town, I had to escort the baby sisters OUT of the house, to give the mischivous friends a time to pimp our home lol

We went to balsamico, me, my husband, and the twins.. As soon as we sat, my husband threw an arm around me and pulled me close, in a very casual way.. Then suddenly, the waiter comes sailing across the restaurant shouting: la la la ma yenfa3 keda, mosh men awwalha! (loosely translated to: no no no, this won't work, not so soon..)

We all stared back at him trying to decode the loud yet not so clear message!? are these seats taken? what the hell is he upset about..

Long story short, he thought I was with my boyfriend, and that he was up to a night of PDA.. My face turned purple with rage and embarrassment, we weren't the only ones in the restaurant, and now everybody was looking our way! He is insane, and if I had the whole night, I would've had him fired and sent back to his home town.. He left all the "actual" dates, and came to us? He then goes on saying: This is a public place with no partitions as u can see!

WTF are you talking about?
Then my brave sister Ache starts shooting back: She's his wife!! what the hell are u talking about?

My husband and i were still under a spell of mixed anger, rage, and embarrassment.. So ache takes the matter into her own hands and starts yelling back: Don't you think that if we had something to hide we would be in a less "open" place, with probably more partitions as u put it?

The stupid waiter then asks if we could prove that we're married if the hay2a showed up!!!?!?

I was speechless, but i managed to gesture to everyone that I'm leaving this sucker to ride up his own ass.. But then he's probably too constipated to do that!

Anyway, they tried to calm me down, I made it clear I don't wanna see the loser's face for as long as I'm in the place.. He never showed up..

Anyway.. The stupid guy set the mood for a perfect "dont expect us to be doing something unusual for your birthday" day.. lol

Hold on a sec..

Ok back.. Morphine? Anyone? ;)

Anyway, so after balsamico, we head back home, my sister pulls out the key to open the door.. The key gets stuck.. it's like they're trying hard not to have a surprise birthday! So I knowck the door hoping their friends would seize the moment and take advantage.. and oh yes they did.. They jerked the door and screamed "SURPRIIIIISE"!!! I was so jealous I wished it were my birthday too lol..

They were so shocked, they couldn't talk for like 5 minutes! one of them started fixing her hair and the other one kept a hand on her mouth for like 5 more minutes! Honestly, their reaction? priceless!

then there was cake, then there were gifts! They got them a set of KARAOKE! totally cool, I'm gonna move back to my parents' house lol

We ended up playing bidoon kalam, which is the one where you act a movie and your team has to guess the title.. You would think it's easy, but next time u play this game use the following movies:

Chronicles of narnia (yup, that's right.. they had to act that title, any ideas?)
The Shawshank redemption
Amistad
Hansel and Gretel
Stigmata

It was a nice game.. some of the girls were really creative, some were dumb & boring lol I had a really good time although I met most of them for the first time.. I'm glad the twins had a blast, and I'm REALLY glad they didn't see it coming!

I got them a pair of necklaces, one had the symbol of their horoscope, and the other one had the first letter of her name.. They say they like it, I hope they're being honest!

That's it for now.. who knows what this on call has to offer..

Seriously, no more coffee for me, it's OJ all the way!

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

KFSH 1st oncall..

I figured the best way to display my on call is to put it on a time line.. Easy reference and easy on the eye lol

08:00 am
Reached the hospital, took my mini suitcase to my oncall room, and headed to the morning meeting.. I was late, but so was the head of the department, we went inside together, so no one can say a word to me without it hitting the big boss *evil grin*..

08:30 am
Morning meeting over, one of my consultants had a conference and left, the other one had a kidney transplant in the OR, and he only wanted one resident.. Bottomline, I'm free to go!
I went to starbucks, had my cheese sandwich and toffeenut latte (double shot espresso, ofcourse). Solved the sudoku on Alsharq Alawsat..

09:30 am
Went back to my room, turned on the PC and checked my facebook homepage.. after being lost in pictures for about an hour, I thought I should blog about my apparently empty day..

10:45 am
I still found myself ridiculously bored, so I went down to the gym - yes we have a gym in KFSH.. There's an outdoors room, and since the weather is absolutely charming, I took a turkish coffee and a cig outside..

11:05 am
I went back to the 3rd floor (Surgical floor) to head back to my room.. Then I was startled to find that my team was rounding on a patient! I joined and they all looked mad at me.. So I asked why didn't they page me? They said they were paging me for almost an hour and I wasn't responding.. THAT'S when I knew my pager was not working!! BUT before I could take advantage of that, a resident took me to the communication engineer to fix the problem PRONTO! :( I didn't celebrate the broken pager!

01:15 pm
We went down to the clinic.. a couple of patients, nothing serious.. But then that can't just be it..

ok I need a huge TIME OUT here.. WTH?!
LooooooooL
I'm sorry I can't share that, but one patient was talking naaaaaaaastyyyyyyyy describing what's wrong! Due to adult content, I'm gonna have to pass.. But jeez it was embarrassing to meeeeeee my face turned purple~green! looooooool I can't get over itttt!

1:45 pm
I was called to the ER (I'm on call remember..).. What's the case? an acute appendicitis.. (now ur supposed to be picturing an extremely ill patient, who's unable to stay still in bed, who's feverish, vomiting, and most likely dehydrated..) Ok, I head to the patient room, there's a guy standing in the corner arguing with a nurse about his IV cannula.. I walk right past him and the room was empty.. I go out and call his name, and surprise! It's the perfectly looking gentleman who's upset about the IV cannula!
Here comes the difficult part: How do u explain to a perfectly healthy-looking guy that he's got appendicitis, and that we must operate immediately otherwise it might perforate and kill him? the answer is: you can't.. he started questioning OUR knowledge.. and by the way, our diagnosis was based on CT scan results, not on psychic reading, i swear!

2:00 pm
Skeptical patient left against medical advice.

2:01 pm
I was starving by this time, and I had a radiology meeting at 3.. so I have to find whatever, buy it, and stuff it into my mouth in half an hour! I did, but i didn't stuff it entirely, I had to take it to go (yeah our cafeteria has chinese chicken with fried rice to go.. rn't u jealous? lol) Sooo I had to take it back up to my room and run to the radiology conference..

3:15 pm
Once in the Radiology department, I started looking for the conference room, which by defenition is a room full of angry people disagreeing with each other, and each totally convinced he's the smartest of the bunch.. Well, i couldn't find it.. I called my resident, and guess what? yep.. the conference was cancelled!

3:20 pm
Hopping back to my room, I bump into my angry consultant..
Where have u been?
*smiling* I was in the ER..
ur lying, I was there and i didn't see u..
*still smiling* oh u mean just now? I was in the radiology conf. room..
but the conf. is cancelled.. anyway, I don't care where u were *which totally means he's angry*, We have a consult, come with us..

The guy doesn't go for the elevator, he goes for the stairs.. I said:
aah ok ur punishing me.. not funny, he wasn't joking, He took me up 5 floors :( I couldn't breathe! I felt like someone pulled a plastic bag over my head!! He did choose the perfect punishment! lol

4:00 pm
Q: How do you avoid telling a 60 year old that she has cancer and she's gonna die cuz it already spread to her liver? and that we have to cut most of her bowel out and leave her with a bag hanging out of her abdomen?
A: You don't specialize in surgery!

5:45 pm
I'm back in my room, eating my to go lunch.. enjoying a bar of Galaxy Caramel given to me by a fellow intern.. If life could just hold still for a while.. let me at least enjoy this caloric explosion!

6:30 pm
I have a date!
I'm to meet my husband in starbucks for some coffee and a lil' chat.. He's on call on Thursday.. How sad is that? Anyway, we sip our coffee, enjoy some small talk, some flirting too.. We get the looks from everyone around, I just love provoking people, I wish I could kiss him in public! I guess some eyes would literally pop out! people, mind your own god-damn business..

7:30 pm
I discover I don't have my pager on.. I left it in my room! I freaked out, thinking they must've been paging me for a while now.. So we say good bye, I still wanna hug and kiss, but too bad, my husband is rational! anyway, I rush to my room, and thank goodness the pager had no new messages..

9:00 pm
Got called to prescribe some meds..

11:00 pm
My senior ame to my room to see if i wanted to have dinner with her.. So cute of her.. We ordered a couple of sandwiches, we had a very nice lengthy chat about her trip to Tunis.. Very pleasant girl..

02:00 am
I went to bed..

04:00 am
Called to the ward for some more prescriptions.

05:00 am
Called to ER for an emergency: abdominal pain..
me: Is it acute?
pt: no it's been there for 2 months..
me: then how's this an emergency?
my senior pinches me and whispers in my ear: It's a VIP case..

ooooh i got it.. no comment.

06:00 am
Called to prescribe meds for the VIP pt.

06:35 am
Back to bed..

NOW --> 7:30 pm
I overslept, my mobile run out of battery, so my alarm didn't go off..
I woke up at 10 am, to miss the morning meeting.. no big deal..
I went back home to sleep, and since then, I'm sitting in front of the TV in denial LOL

Sunday, February 04, 2007

Say What?

A new month, a new rotation, a new hospital, a new me..

It's february, full with Valentine's day, my sisters' birthday, me switching to surgery, and moving to King Faisal Specialist hospital..

I'm used to being an intern along with a dozen other useless interns.. but now, we're just 2! floating like ghosts in the surgical ward.. anonymous to say the least.. My senior asked me like 15 times about my name between Saturday and today!!!

The hospital is so luxurious.. TOO luxurious.. If I'm ever sick I wanna be admitted here.. it's a 5 star hotal, if not more.. But the doctors are ~ weird..
I'm experiencing the true meaning of medical business.. Nope, that's not why I'm in medicine.. no can do.. can't incline myself financially, I'm sticking to the good old fashioned "art of healing"..

My senior today told me I'm not a surgeon, I'm too rational!

Say what? I'm gonna let that pass till future reference..

Then comes a patient to the clinic.. now this is a healthy, aware patient, who's sufering of an embarrassing condition.. there were three of us in the clinic (senior, junior, and myself --> sub junior, barely existent lol) Anyway, so for the sake of the poor gentleman's dignity, I decided to pass on the clinical exam, it's enough that he's having 2 people staring at "private areas".. So my senior then comes to me surprised: What's wrong with you? Don't you wanna be a surgeon???

Say what? To become a surgeon I must strip myself of respect and patients of dignity? I'm gonna also let this pass.. no hard feelings, he wants to push me into the real world..

But what's with the "too rational" part?
I'm I labeled a physician if I use my brain, and a surgeon if I don't?
As much as I love surgery, but I would pick my brain any minute! A resident literally told me, if you like to think, you're a doctor, if you like to cut, you're a surgeon..

Come again?