Two weeks until semester break...I just keep telling myself that. The block itself hasn't been difficult, but having at least three classes' grades come down to one final exam worth 100% of the grade is stress-inducing, to put it nicely. I guess the silver lining is that we've only had four weeks of these classes, so there isn't a full semester's worth to be tested on...but I don't feel all that much better about it :\

I've also been busy with lab animal club stuff. Since three (of four) of our executives were in junior surgery and busy as all get out, we had a quiet fall semester. This semester, though, I've been making an effort to get stuff lined up. We co-hosted a lunch lecture today on the use of zebrafish in research (which ended up in some last minute scrambling as I was last-minute-delegated to get the food together) and have plans for animal handling labs and maybe, hopefully a micro-surgery lab at the end of the year. This means meetings with the executives and with our club mentor (and lots of emailing in between). I'm also trying to get our club to be a recognized student chapter of the American Society of Lab Animal Practitioners, so that's going to require some extra work, too. I'm happy to be doing it, obviously, but it's certainly been keeping me busy.

This weekend is going to be pretty chaotic, too. I have a pharmacology assignment to work on, studying for the FOUR final exams I have next week, cleaning up the house in preparation for a guest (a friend who's interviewing up here!) and watching the Superbowl.

Let's not forget that Friday I pick my preliminary schedule for rotations next year. I quite literally have done nothing to organize that and it's kind of a little bit important(!!) so I need to get that done sometime between now and Friday evening. Add a smattering of other stuff (animal care committee, blood donor cat enrichment, etc) and this semester is making me feel a bit frazzled. But only two weeks until semester break with Danny. I think I can, I think I can...

I was browsing some medical/pre-medical student blogs yesterday and noticed that a lot of them focus on admissions to med school and all that jazz. And I know some fellow vet/pre-vet bloggers cover the same topics. While I feel like I can contribute to that general conversation, I think it's kind of boring when the information is already all out there. I'm the sort of person that likes to know about the lifestyle when you're in more so than how you get in, so I try to make my blog more about my life than how to get to my point in life. It's probably worth an effort trying to tie things together for anyone that reads this blog looking for vet-centric content, but when you get into vet school it tries to consume your whole life. I try to fight that.

See? This post is getting boring already!

Anyway, my birthday was yesterday. All of the classes I had yesterday were my favorites, too, which is weird and wonderful all at once: diagnostic radiology, pharmacology and comparative med. Unfortunately I was definitely not in the mindset of paying attention but it happens. Danny sent me some gorgeous flowers at school that are now brightening up my kitchen (except they're kind of huge, so they take up a lot of space...) and I got calls, texts and emails all day from friends and family back home. It's nice to know they still think about me. My parents had a birthday party in my honor at their house - had my sister, her boyfriend and Danny over for dinner and cake; my sister sent me a picture :) I went to a house party that wasn't technically for my birthday but an extra thing to celebrate was cool with everyone. I didn't get home until 4:45am.

It is unfathomably cold outside today - the car thermometer read -10F on my way out last night - and since my furnace broke a few weeks ago I've been making due with a large space heater. Well, I had to turn that up and plug in my small space heater and even that wasn't enough, so I've got the oven on and open. Starting to feel right toasty in here :)

Plenty of stuff to accomplish this weekend: comparative med paper, fish health presentation and pharmacology assignment. And oh yeah, we select our internal rotation schedule on Friday - ack! I'm not really feeling like doing any of that right about now in my post-birthday daze but maybe I can convince myself later on today when my caffeine kicks in...

As predicted, yesterday was a snow day. I slept in late and was generally lazy, but got some productivity in there by working on my lab animal assignment (a paper about a specific animal model of a selected disease) and by reading over some documents in preparation for my very first animal care committee meeting today.

An animal care committee is a group of people from an institution who come together regularly and review the research being done at that particular institution. Researchers submit their protocols - documents with details on everything from how the study will be performed to what kind of animal will be used - for review and receive comments back from the ACC on improvements that can be made before it is finally approved by the committee.

I have been the student representative to the committee (as an alternate last year and as the actual representative this year) but due to conflicts with class schedule have never gotten to attend one! I was so excited about getting to go today, but also nervous because I didn't know exactly what to expect. Fortunately my default mode when nervous about an event is to prepare as much as I possibly can. So I read through all of the documentation provided for us, packed my bag with my iPad so I could bring up the documents during the meeting, a notepad and some pens to take notes if needed.

The meeting was a great experience in a lot of ways. I got to see how the campus attending veterinarian interacted with other committee members, what is expected of the veterinarian at the meeting (he talked more than anyone there), what kind of concerns everyone else had (which were pretty much all the same little things I had thought of while reviewing, which was validating) and just how the system worked in general. My work with AAALAC stuff over the summer was a nice thing to have under my belt, as I was familiar with the idea of protocols and what kinds of things committees were concerned about. Overall a really neat experience and one I look forward to repeating! It just further cemented my excitement for my future in lab animal medicine :)

Since I last posted, I've made an effort to do things that would make me feel more positive in general. I decided to donate at least one item per week to the local food bank, to buy more healthy food options and more food so that I have plenty to bring and don't resort to buying out as much and have kept the house relatively neat. I made an effort to go to bed earlier last night (even though I wanted to stay up and watch an extra episode of Bones) and have fought the urge to let my mind wander in class. All of these things have begun to be implemented since that last post. I've definitely been feeling better.

Another thing that has me excited is beginning to plan for residency applications. In a way, it's similar to applying to vet school - I need to narrow down which programs I want to apply to and then begin putting my actual application together (letters of reference, transcripts, etc). While the latter part doesn't come until the summer at the earliest, I spent a bit of time yesterday looking through the programs available and talking to Danny about them. (Which is another topic to write about all together! This is the first time I've actually "had to" consult with someone else about what to do with my life since he's, you know, a part of it and all. Crazy!) While we agreed that I should rank Johns Hopkins as my primary program due to its proximity to home, family, friends and his job, I think we've agreed that I will rank Colorado State as my second choice, which makes me over-the-moon-ecstatic. I have wanted to live in Colorado since I visited there as a kid and every time I've been back makes me fall in love with it even more. While I admit JHU would be the best program to attend from a logistics stand-point (to say nothing of their prestige and all that), I would love nothing more than to move to Colorado. I'd be thrilled to get a residency anywhere obviously, but if I could choose...

So yeah, things have been looking up. We're supposed to get up to 18" of snow starting tonight and into tomorrow night, which isn't so wonderful, but if school is canceled and I get snowed in, I'm stocked up on delicious good food, have some school work to get done and now a little boost of motivation from thinking about the future.

Lately I've been feeling kind of depressed. I can't exactly put my finger on why - I think it has stemmed from not sleeping well, which isn't usually a problem of mine - but it's definitely been a pervading feeling over the past week or so. Many of the little details are starting to snowball to the point that I have a hard time remembering the positives in my life. I feel like there is so much I want to do in my life in addition to being a veterinarian, and many things I want to change about myself in the name of self-improvement, to feel better about myself. Everything from health to interactions with friends to personal appearance weighs on my mind and I get to feeling overwhelmed when I think about it. I wish there were some door to close behind me and a new one in front of me to open to "start fresh" with a lot of things.

So I made a list of things I want to do. I included stuff like dress more nicely, read the news, keep my car and house clean, cook more meals at home, spend less recreational time on the internet, cook more meals at home, etc. It's a long list and it isn't even everything I feel like I want to do with my life, but I had to start somewhere. Since I have some nice chunks of time in my schedule Thursday-Sunday, I know I have the time to make some of this stuff happen. It's just a matter of having the discipline to take that first step and keep with it.

Nothing of note has been happening since I last posted. Classes carry on like usual: relatively interesting, but I find myself having a hard time paying attention, which hasn't been an issue for me before. I think the biggest instigator is the fact that a whole department has switched over to electronic notes, no more paper, and while I have very little problem with taking notes on my iPad (Notability!), it is painfully easy to flip over to Sportscenter, email, weather, Facebook, etc. I usually like to save browsing as a way to unplug my brain between lectures, but when I feel even the least bit of boredom in a class I've begun to abandon ship pretty quickly. I want to finish my academic years strong and be on that dean's list again, so I know I need to break the habit but ugh! I'm feeling pretty over the whole lecture-based learning thing by now. Only three and a half more months...I need a count down.

This semester we're on a block schedule - we have core courses throughout the semester and then a handful of electives each block. Well, there are three weeks left in block A - the last of which is final exams for those classes! So really only two weeks of lectures left, with a quiz and two assignments to do. Fortunately the assignments are fairly low-key (and one is for my favorite class, comparative med) but holy cow - two weeks! So I know I need to be on top of my studying this semester with the way the exams are laid out but I really just want to read, watch Bones and sleep. Also, the weather has been pretty nice here lately, at least by Canadian standards (over freezing every day) which would be nice except it feels like spring is just around the damn corner...hello, death to my motivation. Just need to keep the prize in mind and remember just how important this year is for me.

I logged on to Facebook this morning and saw a couple of friends had "shared" a link that was very strongly anti-animal testing. My fingers itched to write out a reply in their comments section, but I knew that would only end up in a fight (and I am not one to plaster my views all over Facebook or start fights in the comments section. Not a fifth grader.) I debated a civil status update; I debated a passive-aggressive status update. Knowing that none of these things were the solution and that they would only afford me an ephemeral sense of "take that!" I went to go pick up the pizza I had ordered for today's football games.

On the way there, safely unable to take any rash social media action, I thought about what I should do. I feel irritated, frustrated and sad. I wish that people were able to know the world of lab animal medicine that I know - where it isn't always rainbows and unicorns but is no where near the garish, knee-jerk-reaction-inducing scene painted by animal rights activists. Yes, animals undergo experimentation. Yes, there is allowance for certain experimentation that may cause pain and/or distress to those animals. No, NO, it is not animal torture. There are strict guidelines that researchers must follow from the very start that minimize the distressing stimuli that these animals undergo. Some animals (such those used in behavioral research) live a life no different than one in a zoo and undergo no direct physical manipulation for the purposes of the study. Animal research is not just about toxicology testing (cosmetics testing being one of the more prominent ones). It is about finding cures for diseases, about ensuring the efficacy and/or safety of medications, about understanding certain processes better so that other studies can have a launching point. It is, at its heart, about helping both humans and other animals to live longer, healthier, happier lives. Without the sacrifices of animals in research, the world would not be as we know it today.

One of research's main tenet's is "the three Rs": replace, reduce and refine. We all agree that the fewer animals used, the better. So we aim to have researchers justify themselves before moving on to animal testing - is there any other way for them to get the information they need without an animal model? If they must use an animal, how few animals can they use to achieve statisical significance? And no matter how many or what kind of animal is used, how can we refine their protocols so that the animals used experience the least amount of distress possible? It isn't like a bunch of mad scientists congregate and decide how best to torture these helpless animals. And these protocols are monitored closely to make sure the researchers are doing what they're supposed to be doing and that the animals are not suffering. All of the lab animal vets that I know are compassionate individuals who have the animals as their very first priority. They are the first to go on the warpath if there is any question. To dismiss this aspect of research is just...staggering to me. I can't believe that these animal rights groups would not put effort into understanding the protocols in place for animal welfare in research. And if they have, what do they propose? Stop animal testing and test humans? Not allow any new products (like live-saving drugs) to be marketed? Where is the compromise past our own voluntary efforts to improve animal research in the three Rs?

What I have to ask myself now is how would a lab animal vet address this? How do they cope with this resistance on a daily basis, knowing that even as they argue with these people, the same people have lived a life privileged by animal testing? Knowing that these people and their pets have been vaccinated against disease - by vaccines tested on animals! That these people have taken medications to alleviate their pain or illness - by drugs tested on animals! It's certainly a challenge that I don't look forward to, but one I must become adept at handling.

It feels like forever since I got back to school, not less than a week!

We got settled into the rhythm of our first block (three for the semester) and I'm more or less enjoying all of the classes. Comparative med is my favorite (of course) but the others are all interesting in different ways. I think the most brutal part of the schedule is having three hours of fish health on Mondays, and not because I don't like fish but because three hours of anything all in a row is just too much for me. The rest of the schedule is good - I get to sleep in an hour on Wednesdays and Thursdays and for two hours on Fridays.

Since I don't have junior surgery this semester, I'm excited to have the lab animal club be a little more active. We have our first lunch lecture planned: zebrafish in research. Fish are getting to be more and more important in the lab animal world (as I learned while doing AAALAC stuff this summer) so I think it should be really informative :)

In miscellaneous news, I picked Fergus up from his fish-sitter on Thursday and it's nice to have him back in the house. I got him a floating log toy for Christmas - basically a hollow log that floats near the surface. He's been in it and near it quite a bit so I think he likes it. (Am I becoming a crazy fish lady...?) I've also been touching up the last of my external rotations stuff (letters, resume, etc) and should be able to have everything on its way by next week! Unfortunately, I think my original plan of having all of my internal rotations before winter break aren't going to pan out, but on the flip side, it means I can do some of my lab animal rotations before residency applications, which isn't a bad thing.

Our class had a night out last night, which was really fun, but the rest of the weekend should be pretty low key - rotations stuff, NFL playoffs, miscellaneous academic stuff.

One of the things I've wanted to do (now that it's a new year and I should be setting myself to being better than ever, right?) is log posts with more substance to them. I tend to use the blog as a place to just empty my mind when I'm particularly stressed but a blog should be more than just a sounding board - it should be a place to reflect and hopefully help or inspire others. I don't know that I've found my "blogging voice" yet all these years into having this thing, but I certainly hope someone out there enjoys reading whatever I haphazardly toss up from time to time.

Sometimes, over the years slogging through academic stuff, I'd think to myself, "Is this really worth it? Do I really want to be a vet? What if I don't? What if I just did this because I never wanted to do anything else and ohmygosh how many people would be so disappointed if I just threw in the towel?!" I don't know if this is normal or whatever, but I figured it was probably just one part of my brain trying to pysch out the other parts. But then I go to work over the summer, or do lab animal stuff, or sit in my new favoritest class ever (comparative med) and I feel like someone injected me with happy juice. Every single aspect of lab animal medicine is for me. It's like whoever made up jobs said, "Oh yes, and this one will be for [mynamehere]." It just resonates with me and I wonder how I can ever have doubted my place in this field. I am so, so excited to get to my lab animal rotations (I'm also terrified that I'll make a fool of myself, but that's probably that Negative Nancy section of my brain working again).

There, I've given myself a motivation pep talk. Now it's time to crank out this last external rotation letter and send it in. I can't believe that after all this time I'm sending in rotations applications. Won't be but the blink of an eye before I'm blogging how I can't believe it's time to apply to residency or it's time for graduation or it's time to start residency or time to start my first job...crazy.

Back to the grind...arrived back on the island around 4pm Sunday afternoon. Fortunately the weather was good, but the backroads of PEI leave much to be desired in the way of a snowplow. There is plenty of snow to go around - I imagine at least 18" in my front yard, blech - and I don't forsee it all melting any time soon. Today wasn't bad temperature-wise, though.

I dragged myself out of bed early this morning, as it was the first day we could attempt to switch the rotations we've already been pre-assigned and the office opened at 8am. Many of my classmates were in line ahead of me (I heard someone say people had gotten there at 6am?! WHAT.) Unfortunately I didn't get any of the ones I wanted, being toward the back of the line, but did get a better position for anesthesia. While waiting in line I managed to miss the first class of the semester (whoops) but made up for it in classes the rest of the day. So far so good, although I think the block schedule will take a bit of getting used to.

Not much to do tonight other than look over potential topics for my lab animal paper and put important dates on my calendar like I did last semester. I should really put my clean clothes away and make a grocery list for tomorrow, but I can't be bothered right now. I'd much prefer a warm shower and my book before hitting the hay early. Last semester of classes, here we go!

Winter breaking is coming to an end. I leave Saturday morning, stop over in Portland for the night and get to school (hopefully at a decent hour, and with as little driving in the dark as possible) on Sunday evening. Classes start back up again on Monday.

We're doing more of a block schedule this semester, since this is the first time the majority of our class will be in different courses (electives and such) and I'm hoping it's more manageable than last semester (since surgery is over and done with). Looking at our schedule is stressful on its own, though. I'll be taking: food animal anesthesia and surgery, equine preventative medicine, topics in advanced equine medicine, health of aquatic food animals and ecosystem, topics in small ruminants, topics in poultry and swine, bovine lameness and welfare, bovine herd management and nutrition, production&infectious diseases of food animals, exotic pet medicine II and comparative animal medicine. THEN I have my normal course load, including renal/genitourinary/immunology, clinical pharmacology/toxicology, GI/hepatic/dental diseases of small animals, dermatology/endocrinology, diagnostic radiology and medical exercises. Broken up into blocks it shouldn't be quite as bad as it looks, but we'll just have to see how it pans out.

As if that all weren't enough to deal with, we'll be sorting out our rotation schedule this semester. I've done some groundwork/planning that should be helpful, but I'll probably have to do more up at school as things shake out. Worst case scenario, I don't get the schedule that I want and I have to bounce back and forth between home and school. Even in that case, I'd get to be home earlier than planned (if it works out the way I want it to, I won't be home until next Decemeber - yikes) which isn't a bad thing at all.

I remember last New Year's Eve looking forward to the year ahead of me; getting married was the big thing on my plate. This year, rotations and residency applications (due in November) are the big ticket items. I'll probably forgo the resolutions this year, but I definitely have goals for myself academically: get on the dean's list again (so far so good with my first semester grades), put in solid work for my rotations and make myself the best possible residency applicant with the time I have left. Easy peasy, right? :)