my first patient

Yesterday I met my first patient.  She was kind of the best first patient I could have ever asked for.  She lives in an independent living facility, is 96 years old and still sews.  In fact, she had sewn the very slacks she was wearing during our visit!  She warmed my heart, and overwhelmingly reminded me of my grandma.  Mostly she said she couldn't really complain too much (despite multiple medical problems that might hold a lot of people back), thought that people should really use their common sense more often, and said she must not have done too much that morning (aside from getting dressed, showered, ready for an appointment, making and eating breakfast, taking her meds, dusting her living room and raising the hem on her daughters skirt), because she hadn't even made her bed yet.  I told her I hadn't made mine yet either and she got a good kick out of that!

So you know what?  I think I can handle this whole patient thing.  I know I made some mistakes, and there were some questions we didn't get to or that I forgot to ask, but overall it went pretty well and really felt great!

She told my advisor that I was such a nice little girl and that I was doing a great job, but to be fair, to a 96 year old I probably still am a little girl.

white coats

We are knee deep in this semester by now, maybe even waist deep at this point with six exams behind us, and things are starting to heat up!  Just in school though, in life it is actually starting to cool down a lot and fall is in the air!! In any case, my attention span for things outside of school has gotten pretty short lately so I wanted to post some picture from my white coat ceremony before I forgot forever! 

My pops came into town for a long weekend at the beginning of September for a number of reasons, but come Monday afternoon chief among them was my white coat ceremony!  My school did an odd job of helping recognize us for our accomplishments, which was frustrating, and a lot of my classmates didn't have family come because the ceremony was at 4:30 on a Monday, so the presence of my own family meant that much more to me.  Emily came up from Vermont, Joe rushed back in to town from a gig, and JP even took the day off from work!  It was such a great feeling to have some of the people I love the most in the audience supporting me.  JP always tells me that I don't give myself enough credit for the things I have accomplished, so I really tried to take that evening as a time to recognize for myself all that I had done.  It was a long and extremely hard struggle to get to that point, and even though I know I am not even close to being done, putting on my white coat was such an honor and really helped to remind me what I am doing this for, and why I am right here in Portland right now.  I am just so grateful for all the support I have gotten from so many people in so many different ways! 

My dad brought his first white coat from Wake Forest as a surprise, and we proudly wore them to dinner together!  Having my dad at the ceremony was such an incredibly special gift for me.  It's hard to put into eloquent words how his fight with cancer has touched me, but to be able to share such a special moment with him, a moment that he shared with us when we were younger and he was in school, was just so moving for me.  My struggles and triumphs with PA school have brought our relationship to a different level somehow, and I am so grateful to have this time to experience this part of my life with him.  I am so, so fortunate.  If only my mom and Micah could have made it, the night would have been complete!  Although... since the ceremony was completely solemn and formal until they called my name to cross the stage and a small crowd loudly called out BOOOOOP! (in the Walsh/Buboltz tradition of embarrassing the graduate) I'm not sure adding two more voices would have helped the situation!