At the end of the day

Day one of exams study is coming to an end. What did I achieve?

• I ate two chocolate bars
• Had two cups of coffee
• Watched an episode of Scrubs and 30 Rock
• Made a QR Code and stuck it on my door:

BUT I did manage to take detailed notes on six Micro lectures – that puts me about halfway through the lecture notes. It was actually quite cruisy because a lot of the information I had already learnt in preparation for the practical exams last week.

Tomorrow I start Haematology study which may be a bit of a drag.

I remembered to tell my parents tonight about the Thalassemia screen I had done. Even though I have a tiny deletion – 3.7 kb – my mum did freak out a bit – obviously because she has no idea what it is. For those of you playing at home, that tiny deletion of the alpha globin chain only means I have an alpha Thalassemia trait. It has absolutely no clinical effect on me – just possibly on my offspring (which is rare) - although at times I do wish I could attribute my unfit nature to the fact that my MCV is low. I theorise that the slightly smaller Red Blood Cells carry less Oxygen and thus I pant and flail and complain when I do moderate-intensity exercise.

On the topic of exercise, yesterday I moved beyond my comfort zone of jogging laps down the deserted street near my house in favour of going onto populated streets - with cars driving down them, people walking their dogs and even other people jogging as well. You see – I have a bit of a complex when it comes to exercise. I wasn’t the greatest athlete at school and people paid me out quite a bit, and so doing something physical in a public environment is a bit daunting. Even going to SportsFest was challenging for me – hence not going in previous years.

I’m pushing myself out of my comfort zone – I refuse to let intimidation overcome me.

What are you overcoming?