What I did this Summer!

Hello MedHatters!

How is everyone? This will be posted incredibly late. But you know what? I don’t care. I will probably need a reminder to be grateful by the time this comes out. Or conversely, I’ll be sad that I’m not still doing these things. So, don’t judge me.

Anywho, we are the first class (or at least the first in a very long time) that we got 8 weeks of summer. The classes before us only had 4. Which really, doesn’t seem fair to them. And yes, a lot of the now third years (a class above me) were not very happy to know we got an extended summer. But I gotta say, having an extra month was G-L-O-R-I-O-U-S.

The goal for this, apparently, was so we would have additional time to do research. It is very hard to convince someone to take you on in their lab when you only have 4 weeks available to participate. I mean, it’s pretty hard to get much accomplished in 4 weeks in a lab. Unless you join an intensive research opportunity (which usually involves an application). And you really won’t have a ton of time to continue doing research once school starts again.

There are some students who will start working in the labs of professors on the KC campus over the summer (or from COB) and try to continue working during medical school. More power to you. I don’t care enough to do that.

BUT!

Most of us are definitely not using that time to do research. Some of us are trying to buff up our CV during the summer with other opportunities, but a lot of us really just want to relax.

And currently while on summer break, it is fantastic to have this much time off! We did have to suffer a bit during the year because we still learned the same amount of material, just in less time on some courses. Despite what they told us (which is that they took stuff out), I’m pretty sure they didn’t. I’m hoping they’ve taken our feedback about this and truly did look at the curriculum and changed it more accordingly to the new time limit. I guess ya’ll next year will find out if they did or didn’t.

Okay, back to what I was saying. Because we have a bit more time, this means I was able to fill up my summer with additional fun things outside of just chilling and doing nothing at home.

Which was great. I did have a few moments that after chilling in my apartment doing mostly sleeping and cleaning with my cat. There were times where it got a bit lonely. But, I definitely had plenty to do this summer!

First week off:

I’m not going to lie, it took a few days, actually almost an entire week, for me to accept that I didn’t have to study. I was constantly freaking out thinking I should be studying something. It took a week + to actually come down off of my almost 10 month streak of constant stress as well. I literally had panic attacks because I wasn’t studying. 

On the flip side, it was pleasant to be able to hangout with my significant other for an entire week without interruptions. No stress from school, looming exams, having obligations in our schedule, none of it. It was simply amazing to basically date him all over again and spend time with him uninterrupted for a week.

Why a week? Well, that was all I could get E to agree on staying past our final exam before he went home for the summer. Maybe I can bargain for longer next summer lol.

Our goal was to try to be active at least every other day that first week. The reason being is one, we like hiking. We haven’t really been able to hike or explore much since school started. Two, for the most part it is cheap to do! Minus the gas money to get somewhere, it was a relatively cheap activity that we spent a couple of hours doing. It was great to be outdoors for both the mind and body, doing some exercise. And three, well we are really out of shape from basically sitting on our butts all year studying. So we wanted to ease into it!

I have so many photos. It’s going to be hard to choose some of my favorites to add here.

Places we went:

• Lake Bella Vista/Bentonville, AR. They had a massive track around a lake which was flat, but they also had some bike trails in a more wooded area/hilly area. We definitely decided to go on the bike trails because they were more interesting. Totally got my ass kicked as I hadn’t done anything in a while. The flat track was a nice ending to the hike though!

  

• Springfield, MO. We visited the Nathanael Greene Park which had a small botanical garden area. There were also many other parks within that park. We were rushed out by the rain after

  

  only being there 20 or so minutes. But! We did get to see some cute bunnies nomming on plants and a ton of beautiful flowers!

• We also visited the Wonders of Wildlife National Museum & Aquarium while in town. We wanted to continue to explore/walk but wanted to get out of the downpour that occurred while at the botanical gardens. Great aquarium actually! There was much more there than I expected. Some lull areas, but overall really fascinating with a lot of different exhibits. E even had a standoff with a giant octopus (it didn’t like that another large red thing was in it’s space!).

  

• We did explore a bit in downtown Springfield after all of this, but we decided to grab a bite to eat and head home just because we were exhausted from all the walking.  We will have to come back next year and explore more!
• The last hiking spot we fit in was actually here in town in Joplin. We initially went to check out Grand Falls (a smaller waterfall) but there wasn’t much hiking over there. Looks like a great place to hang out though while hot.

  

• Instead we went to Shoal Creek (formerly Wildcat Glades Conservation). There is a large hiking trail that tracks along the river. The same river you can float down from Grand Falls. It was, incredibly long… I was not expecting the hike to be that long. My feet definitely hurt. As an FYI, there are only 2 spots to cross the river. If you don’t feel like doing the entire trail/oval, make sure you don’t cross the river. Otherwise, you will have to walk the entire length OR grab an uber to get back to the center. There were also two spots out on the trail as they are redoing a bridge. We started in the afternoon but finished in the early evening (after construction crews usually go home) so we just walked along the torn up trail anyways. I don’t recommend doing this while they are doing construction though.

Hanging with my BFF’s:

I really didn’t get to spend as much time up in KC my first year as I had hoped. I tried to make an effort during part of first semester of first year. I really did. But stress and life happened. The goal was to hang out with my besties as much as I could since they were all staying here and I moved to Joplin.

But because life never goes as planned, I tried to spend as much time up here in KC with one of my besties over the summer. Practically every weekend I would drive up on Friday afternoon/Saturday morning and stay until Sunday night/Monday morning. There were a couple of times where I came mid-week, usually because I had to come to KC for something else. But it was fantastic to get to hang out with her as much as I did.

Most of my medical school friends were not in town as they all went home, travelled abroad, etc. I definitely enjoyed being able to just chill by the pool with friends this past summer and chat it out. Or drink. Or both. In general, it was nice to catch up with some of my friends either on campus (again, I have really shitty internet) or bumping into them outside in the community too!

Prepping for kenya:

Honestly, this took up most of my time. There was a fair amount of prepping and shopping that needed to happen before this trip. This trip was expensive to begin with (to cover costs of flight, lodging, food, and travel while we are there), but there was a fair amount that needed to be done and paid for outside of that. Mostly including immunizations and obtaining things on my packing list that I did not have, thought would be good to bring, or in order to take care of my cat while I’m gone.

It was all very expensive. Lots of shopping. Lots of traveling. Lots of packing!

I will be starting a Kenya series that goes over all of this after I come back from my trip. Stay tuned!

How I filled the rest of my time:

Well, one this blog. lol. I finally got the writing bug! There was a time last year where I was writing because I wanted to document and put things out. However, in doing so it almost burnt me out more. I took a brief break from it and thought that as soon as summer hit I’d be motivated again.

Wrong.

I wasn’t motivated until about a week before I left for Kenya. And in all honesty, that might have been just because I was super excited to go to Kenya. But thankfully I had a lot of great ideas that I had stashed away last year and never wrote about. So I’m going to try to write as much as I can before school starts, so I can just focus on school when it gets here.

I played so.much.sims. OMG. I haven’t played this game in forever and I forgot how much I enjoyed it? My computer that was gifted to me in a previous relationship does not have a CD rom drive unfortunately. But E was kind enough to leave his laptop home so I could use his to play! I had a lot of fun just doing this for hours. I know, sad. But I needed a way to veg out seeing as I don’t play video games.

For most of the summer I didn’t read. I wanted nothing to do with a book. My brain didn’t want to think, and for some reason it thought that if I read fiction I was all of a sudden going to have to use my brain…

I know. Doesn’t make sense. I’m realizing that now.

I did bring two books to Kenya with me though. They are the last two in a murder mystery series that I started last summer and just couldn’t get around too. I was pretty positive I wasn’t going to ever actually pick them up. I brought them as a just in case, but low and behold when you are stuck in a car for 6+ hours for a few days, music gets a bit old. So I picked one back up and we will see if I can finish it before school starts!

I did however do some light reviewing. But honestly, I mean super light. If you can call it that. I wanted to relook at some basic skills before going to Kenya. We had a bit of a refresher course while there, but I wasn’t positive that would happen before leaving stateside. I did not however, review anything in first aid OR pre-read for class. This lady wanted all the time not related to school as she could get.

Another thing that took up a large chunk of time was cleaning. Oh Lord Jesus I did so much cleaning. You don’t realize how dirty your apartment is when you are constantly focused on studying. And you also don’t realize how much your cat sheds in the summer until you are actually home and it is on literally everything.

I mean everything. How does she even expend that much energy to shed that much?

Aside from being slightly annoyed by the cat hair, I actually enjoy cleaning. I’m a stress cleaner and I grew up with a mother who was pretty strict about keeping the house clean. So it is nice to have a thoroughly cleaned apartment. That way I can start on a clean slate.

The surprising thing this summer that I was involved with included the mass amount of dealings with my school club. I honestly didn’t think I would have to be this involved this summer. It’s not a bad thing, I will enjoy the fruits of my labor next year. But really, there were quite a few things that boiled over from the year prior. I guess that’s what happen when you run the largest club on Joplin’s campus?

The last thing that I really enjoyed filling my time with this past summer is not characteristic of me at all. I made banana bread. I made it from scratch for the first time ever. I won’t call myself a baker, mostly because I really can’t do much without a recipe in my hand that someone else gruelingly made so I can easily follow it. But I was pretty happy at how well it turned out.

It was very delicious by the way. And very filling.

Much dense. Very banana.

What to do the summer before 1st year:

If you are reading this before starting medical school, I do have some advice on what to do or what not to do. You will likely hear all of this from several current students or former students. But the common theme is this: Enjoy yourself. The summer before is when you will be the most excited about what is ahead in your journey.

• DON’T prep. You will have no idea what you will need to know. Even talking to prior years, they change the curriculum so often at KCU that even though we just went through it, it likely isn’t the same anymore. So, enjoy your last summer before the craziness begins.
• DO do whatever it is you want. Cross off things on your bucket list. Hangout by the pool all summer. Go on adventures. Travel. Read leisurely. Do all those crazy crafty things you’ve always wanted to try. Whatever it is you’ve wanted to try or haven’t had time to do, now is the time to do it. You likely won’t have time to do it in school.
• Eat all the delicious food you want. Because why not? You will definitely stress eat. A lot of us gained weight our first year. We sit most of the day, stressed out and studying. We eat I would say a fair amount because we use our brains so much, but a fair amount of us just don’t have time to go to the gym or are so stressed out that we can’t balance the weight we gain with our current lifestyles. And honestly, when you are stressed you don’t crave great food. It’s usually crappy stuff you want that is comforting while eating it but not good for you later. That’s okay. Enjoy the guilt free eating or all the delicious food now. LOL.

Thanks for sticking around! If you like what you read feel free to leave a comment, send me an email with questions, or share on social media.