I Can

Even though I can't be as good as them in communication skills (at least not yet), I should be competing only with myself to keep on improving.

It's important to believe that I can do it. That's half the battle won.

I must remember how I tried to muster any semblance of self-confidence in last year's exam. Cause I'm definitely going to need it this time around.

Believe in myself. yes.

Oxymoron: The Naive Cynic

It's ironically funny how I used to be such a cynic, and now I find myself appalled at the naivety within myself.

Really, at this stage of my life, I shouldn't be so surprised anymore at things like this. I thought I knew how things work, at least the big picture concept of it. But sometimes, hope gives rise to unnecessary idealistic thoughts.

I can see why people keep their heart guarded by imaginary walls. Just because it is such a dark scary world out there, and the best thing you can do is to protect your heart from getting hurt.

I know, I said before, I would like to be honest with people, with a true self as I can muster. That I do believe in, cause if you never let anybody into your heart at all, what's the meaning of living then?

But sometimes, you have to take a step back and think - is this person worth it? - before opening your heart to people.

Cause there are just too many people out there who are not worth it at all.

In The Air

I feel the days are passing too fast for my liking. Swoosh, and it's tuesday night already.

And the cycle continues every week. With endless list of things to attend, prepare and study for. :< I was feeling kinda stressed last night because was having some unforeseen trouble with my assignments. I even went for a jog even though I already did 2 in the past 4 days because I thought some exercise would do me good in terms of destressing. It did helped a bit, I guess post-exercise endorphins would be a good addiction!

I can't believe the anxiety was still lurking beneath the surface though, affecting my sleep. Made me woke up several times last night, wondering whether did I miss my alarm and was late. Needless to say, I was far from so.

It's no fun being a medical student. It's hard to have a life and yet be a marvellous gung-ho student. Unfortunately, I'm neither. shucks.

Stress - I can smell it in the air. And it's only going to get worse in the next few months. oh boy.

The P Word

Procastination should be one of the seven sins. Well, I guess it's quite similar to its brother, Sloth. heh.

I need to stop thinking unnecessary thoughts (cue to refer to my blog's motto just above) and start seriously studying!! le sigh.

And yes, the weekend is almost over. Too fast!

Despite Everything

Oops, been neglecting my blog again. Things are getting busy, so whenever I wanna blog, I tell myself, "oh I better do that thing first, it's due tomorrow."

Now I have 3 weeks' worth of laundry waiting to be ironed (I probably should get down to it soon, or will run out of clothes to wear soon - I know, I don't have that many clothes. Or work-suitable clothes anyway. Sponsor me? :P)

Anyway, as I said, things on the to-do-list are piling higher and higher up. And I see no hope of it dimishing soon. Or even plateau-ing. :(

This rotation is not slack at all. Who said so it was?? *stressed*

And the worst thing is I dunno what happened to my 'confidence'. I can't fake it that well anymore. I am so going to need it for the end of year exams this year. We need to be calm and confident when counselling patients.

Arggh. I hate the instances when I do kinda know my stuff but all my thoughts come out all tangled up and stuttering. HATE IT. Stupid.

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Okay rants aside. I must tell you this interesting event that happened to me a few days back.

I have been trying to contact a patient for a home visit for a case report. Kept calling about 3 times/day for the past 4 days or so.

Everytime when someone answered, I said: "Hi, can I speak to Mr. X please?" And everytime, the phone is left on hold for ages and nobody comes to the phone even though I kept waiting.

The last straw was when he said: "No" harshly before I could say anything and left the phone on (meaning I could hear the background noise of the tv for eg). When I called back again, the phone was engaged. I was quite frustrated by then and just left him a message detailing what I was calling for.

He called me back not long after, apologizing. Apparently, he has been hanging up on my calls because he thought I was one of the telemarketers.

"Because of your accent."

Why thank you. Isn't that nice? NOT.

Well, he did apologized many times so I know he didn't mean it. But I do dislike being discriminated against because of my accent, my looks etc. I will have you know that there are many aussie telemarketers too! And no, I do not even have a typical asian accent. I speak clearly, okay?? I don't mumble, I don't slur my speech, I don't simply give abbreviations to words and expect ppl to naturally understand them. AHHH!!

Anyhow, I did the home visit today. It was alright, I practiced doing a little patient education, which was good, despite the fact that at one part the cigarette smoke was blowing my way. Oh and I think I can't use him as my case report patient afterall. Coz he doesn't really have a new presenting complaint at this point in time. Really EPIC FAIL of me. after all that.

But I was still glad I did the visit though. He seemed a little lonely and appeared happy with my (albeit temporary) presence.

If I could have make someone's day a little happier, I guess it was worth it. Certainly an experience. :)

Now to figure out how to bluff my way when I am on the telephone so people don't hang up on me ;P

Costly

Overall, I had a pretty good day today... but it ended badly.

Because of my own carelessness.

So here's the story. I was coming back from the train station, and was taking out my purse (my card is in it) to tag off as usual. Then I remembered that the train station that I departed on was out of electricity, so I didn't need to tag off as I couldn't tag on at the previous station.

That different motion from my usual daily deed must have put me off. Coz when I went to woolies to buy something, I realised my purse was not with me when I wanted to pay for something. Panic ensured.

I rushed out to the train station... Found nothing on the ground. Went to ask the officers if they had seen anything. A rush of hope gushed through me when they said they had.

And yes! I got back my purse. But the bad thing is I lost all the money in it. Probably around 60-70 bucks. He/she even took all my coins!! O.o Sigh, just my luck to have withdrew money a few days earlier. :(

All this happened in the span of 15-20 mins.

The irony is that the person who returned it probably is the person who took the money. Of coz, I can't say for sure. But to be honest, I had great trust in aussies to return lost items. But I guess, you can't have everything.

Can you believe the officers summore joked and told me that there was a fee of 50 dollars to collect lost items?! I told him I don't have any money. -_-"

I know, on the bright side, at least all my important cards are still in the purse. Credit card, debit card, student card and the list goes on. So at least less trouble for me.

Although it was a costly lesson indeed, I had learnt it. To be more careful in the future (I haven't been too bad, to be honest) and to use my debit card more instead of withdrawing most of the cash out.

Okay. Rant finito.

Honesty

People who know me personally may wonder about the things I write in my blog.

But I have decided to be honest about my feelings as best as I can. We spend so much time in our daily lives putting up imaginary walls when dealing with other people. We are afraid to venture out of our comfort zone as we get older.

I would like to be a bit more honest with myself here. In my very own space.

Besides, I believe a lot of the emotions I write about are experienced by many people too. Just that they are reluctant to admit it to themselves. They are afraid to come face to face to what they are feeling.

Now, what I need is to recapture what I had in the earlier part of this year. Maybe it's called distraction.

Meaning

This blog looks cheerful at first glance. I told myself that I will try to be more optimistic in my outlook on life, hence the blog transformation at the beginning of the year.

But old habits die hard. They recur. I blog more when I'm emo. That, I do realise.

I apologize for those expecting merry frivolous posts while visiting this blog. Sometimes, what you see is not what you get.

I went to look at friend's Facebook profile just now. A friend who passed away tragically in a bus accident a few years ago.

Her profile page was filled with numerous people writing on her wall still, proclaming their affection for her in various ways. Missing her. Wishing she was there.

Despite her tragic early death, her presence is still dearly missed by so many people. Her years on earth might be relatively few, but she have touched the hearts of so many. She was someone who shine whenever she was.

This might be a morbid thought, but I wonder, if I was not here anymore, would I be dearly missed by so many people as well?

I want to do something meaningful with my life. I want to form meaningful relationships with other people.

Isn't that why we all are searching for that elusive meaning of life?

4/12

I can't believe I'm saying this... but I need a bit more STRESS to keep the momentum up! Apathy is doing me no good.

And I have so much to catch up from the previous postings...why oh why. Why didn't I finish everything in their respective postings?

I remember being stressed out at the beginning of the year (yes the irony!) but the stress slowly dissipated as time passed (as per usual -_-). But now it's about 4 months till end of the year exams. One of the most MAJOR ones that I will ever sit for.

Get this into your brain, you silly girl. 

FOUR MONTHS left.

Good!! Time to start freaking out!!


PS: For those who are not medically in tuned, this post's title is written in the way in medical notes to mean 4 months. For eg, 6 weeks would be written as 6/52.

PPS: Right, what's with the recent title obsession with numbers. lol.

PPPS: Since we are on the business of post-scripting, have you realised that I'd just updated my profile description. Thought that this one sounds cooler than the previous one :P

3.5

Happy three and a half years anniversary, dear dear! Wish you could be here.

We have been walking this journey together for quite sometime now. I hope we will be able to continue it for a long long time more.

Faith will see us through.

Thank you for being my lover, my best friend, my confidante, my supporter, my cheerleader and many other roles in my life. :)

Most of all, thank you for just being there.