A Lot to Be Grateful For
Happy Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, everyone!!! I hope everyone up North is enjoying the long weekend and eating all the Thanksgiving food they can reasonably consume. While I am not in Canada, I did celebrate with my friends down here in NOLA. Like I said last week, I was going to host a little Canadian Thanksgiving, and I did just that. I prepped some Nanaimo bars and maple cinnamon buns for all my friends to try. They also brought tons of yummy snacks and sweets. We spent Sunday evening watching the Canucks vs Rangers game and ended the night off with a Canadian-themed Kahoot created by yours truly. Feel free to play it here. It was so nice to have so many of my friends show up and really embrace the Canadian of it all. Genuinely, it made my heart so full to spend Canadian Thanksgiving with them. They definitely learned a lot from my trivia (bonus for me was that it was super entertaining to watch them take the quiz). It was also just a really nice break from studying, since we have our MSK 2 exam coming up on Friday. The exams come so quickly in medical school. It is really just a never-ending cycle of preparing for an exam, taking an exam, and enjoying the 2 days of post-exam freedom. I am really excited for this block to be done since one of my best friends from undergrad, Katie, is coming to visit and spend the weekend with me. I have some fun things planned for us, so tune in next week to see what we did! Side note, I won my fantasy matchup for the second week in a row, so I am very thankful for that, especially since half my team was injured this week.
Besides studying and prepping for Thanksgiving this weekend, I also took part in a full-day Reproductive Health workshop on Saturday that was hosted by the Tulane and LSU Medical Students for Choice. If you know me, you know nearly all the academic research work I did pre-medical school was in equitable access to family planning, so workshops like this are something I am incredibly passionate about taking part in. I was extra grateful for this one since it was my first time doing any kind of learning about the landscape of this field in the US, specifically in the deep South. I got to learn so much about the legislation around pregnancy termination in Louisiana, and what I can do as a medical student to continue advocacy in this field, as well as what physicians here can actually do to support patients in making choices for their bodies regarding pregnancy. I also got to learn how to perform a vacuum aspiration on a model and on a dragon fruit. It was so cool!!!! It was genuinely my favourite day of medical school so far (even though it technically doesn’t count as a day since it was completely optional), but I learned so much, engaged in such amazing discussions, and learned from some incredibly intelligent and amazing leaders in the field. I truly hope we will get more opportunities like this, given how important it is for us to learn this information as medical students, especially here in Louisiana.
The night before the workshop, I went to a party hosted by one of my classmates. It was super chill, and a nice start to the weekend.
I realize this blog is working backwards from my weekend into last week, so bear with me. The school week was pretty normal, meaning I went to all my classes live on Zoom and reviewed the lectures. This week was also a really good gym week for me. I actually worked out at the gym nearly every day this week, including another workout class with my friend Edith on Wednesday night. We did a yoga sculpt class that felt a lot like the Oxygen classes I take back home. The instructor also had a banging playlist, so we are going back this week. I also got to take part in a self-defence workshop hosted by one of my classmates, Nick. It was so amazing that he led this for the women of our class, considering how crazy the world is right now. I learned some super useful techniques to defend myself, and I am so thankful he made it free and accessible to us, since a lot of self-defence courses can be super expensive and inaccessible.
On Tuesday, I also had my first RSJME meeting this week, where I got to meet the rest of the members and learn about the initiatives we will be taking on this year to improve our curriculum. It was so great to hear all the amazing ideas already being worked on, as well as pitch some new ones, so I am excited to see where/how the next four years go for RSJME. I also had another SCiM session this week on Monday night. Dr. Ferdinand, a world-renowned Tulane Cardiologist, spoke to us about the Social Determinants of Health specific to the people of New Orleans. He is such an amazing speaker, person, and physician. He cares so deeply about the community since he was born and raised here, and works tirelessly to make guidelines and medicine more equitable. He also views medicine from a preventative lens, advocating for better social services and programs to support people before they become sick. If you have time, I highly recommend reading up about him and the incredible advocacy he does, specifically for marginalized groups. I linked an article here in case you’re curious (and I hope you are).
Looking back on this week, I think the word that comes to mind is grateful (fitting for Thanksgiving, I know). I am so passionate about learning the social determinants of health and finding ways to get involved in work that aims to improve access and care for people, so all these activities I have the privilege of taking part in are something I do not take for granted. I am grateful that Tulane has so many different things I can get involved with, like workshops, learning opportunities, and committees. Each of the things I did this week gives me a lot of hope that positive change towards equitable access, care, and education is being made around me. It’s a good reminder that while sometimes things feel very bleak in society, there are always people advocating for improvement. Doing things and taking part in initiatives that allow me to make tangible changes is really exciting.
Anyways, I will end this week’s blog on that high note. Have an amazing week, and see you here next week, post MSK 2!
