Ode to a medical student: "Oh, semi-zombie".

Most people who follow my (admittedly sparse,) blog will know a few things about me by now.  So far I think I’ve divulged that my other half is a musician and – more personally – that I suffered the loss of my mother in 2013. In other news, I am also a graduate entry medical student. For those who care enough to question what that is, it basically means I’ve already done a degree. In 2014 I emerged victorious from Cardiff Metropolitan University as a shiny, elated, 1^st class honours BSC Biomedical Science graduate.  Understandably, I was thrilled, however, for me this degree was only ever a springboard into what I really wanted to do: medicine.  Fast forward to 2016.

I am currently a 3^rd year graduate entry medical student going strong on my 5^th year of higher education. I can confirm, in no uncertain terms, that I am no longer shiny or elated. In fact, most days I feel like boiled shit. There are multiple blogs out there that will tell you what to expect from life as a medical student, graduate or otherwise. A lot of these speak of the elation you feel when you single-handedly deliver a newborn baby (read as: you stand awkwardly in the corner of the room and look at another woman’s vagina and say a silent prayer for all her holes).  I thought I would make a more honest "10 point post" blog about the things they 100% do not tell you about being a medical student, particularly a graduate.

1. You will be absolutely exhausted

I think this has to be point number 1 for the simple fact it pervades every aspect of my life.  Any lie in must be taken, at expense of all other activity. Think Gollum level attachment to the ring to envisage the love I have for my pillow on a Saturday morning. Think Sophie’s Choice-esque breakdown whenever it gets too much and I want to quit my life and become a stripper. Yup. That pretty.

2. You will get fat

It is the unspoken inevitability. As someone who’s put on roughly a stone and a half since deciding to service the general health needs of the population in the future, I can confirm this to be true. This will mostly arise from point number 1. Having the general mental energy to attempt to conjure up some sort of nutritious meal is a thing of the past. Embrace the super noodles. Also, look forward to playing my favourite game around exam periods. Similar to "Snog, marry, avoid", but instead titled "Sleep, wash or eat?". 

3. Some days you will be sick of the sound of your own voice.

Anybody who knows me will probably argue that this can’t possibly be true, and Lord knows I do love a good gas. But seriously.  There have been times arriving home from placement that I have just sat in silence for a good 3 hours because the thought of striking up and maintaining a conversation with someone after approximately 8 hours of “So tell me about that then…” is literally soul destroying. Please, leave me sedentary, don’t touch me and feed me occasionally. Ta.

4. You will want to cry. A lot.

At good things, at bad things. At ugly things that happen to lovely people. Sometimes you will actually cry. Hysterically. Mostly in toilet cubicles on your own.

5. Your holidays are non-existent and probably extortionate.

By the end of July, as you are limping over the finish line of summer exams, a glimmer of hope will appear in the form of a summer holiday.  That hope will quickly be destroyed when you come to understand that you’ll have to sell a kidney into the black market to afford any sort of sun. At this point you’ll probably be severely vitamin D compromised (due to hours of revision) and to resist Rickett’s you’ll beg any family member who will listen to take you for free.

Oh P.S. Half terms and reading weeks? Not a thing.

P.P.S. In tremendous and unprecedented displays of cruelty, the UK’s 2 days of summer will occur smack bang in the middle of your revision session.

6. There is no room for illness. Or dental appointments.

I think this pretty much applies to any sort of full time job but please recognise the awkward struggle of being absolutely surrounded by clinical brains and being too petrified to ask for a medical opinion.

7. You will diagnose yourself with everything.

The extensive list: Scabies, IBD, Ankylosing spondylitis. More to follow.

8. You’ll be poor.

Everyone ever will tell you to not get a job as a medical student.  Personally, there is absolutely no way on this Earth I could ever afford to live on the pittance student finance and NHS bursary dole out. As a graduate student, people are not very keen AT ALL to give you any sort of funding. Bar work fits in quite nicely with your schedule (Grossly unavailable at any given time apart from unsociable hours). This leads me back nicely to point 1.

9. You’ll get sent random pictures of peoples’ bits.

“Is this infected?”

“Do you think I need antibiotics?”

“Any idea what this is?”

There are bits of people I should never have seen. Also, to all the people who I haven’t spoken to in roughly 6 years who feel it is appropriate to contact me to discuss their bowel movements. PLEASE Y.

10.  You will hoop jump better than a starving dolphin at sea world.

Tick this, do that, get this signed off, yadda yadda yadda. You get the point. If you are incapable of doing things as a means to an end, medicine is not for you. Yes, apparently, they do want to see you can wash your hands. Every year.

By no means am I ungrateful for where I have ended up, but today definitely required a good moan. Maybe in the future, when I’ve actually passed (fingers crossed,) Friday’s exam I’ll write another 10 point post about the plus points of medical school. For now they’re too buried under my 7 empty tea cups and the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine. 

Hakuna Your Tatas, Kim K.

So let’s talk about Kim Kardashian’s international women’s day post.

Before anyone begins reading this article, let me first clarify that this is not meant to slut shame anyone and the general message can be applied to most influential female ‘celebrity’ figures. I don’t believe putting pictures of your naked body up online makes you a slut. I don’t care what one woman does with her vagina, be that whether she offers it up to many sexual partners, or whether she guards it like her prized possession for the majority of her life.

I do not think Kim Kardashian has done anything so horribly shocking that she should be publicly flogged for her mistakes forever. The sex tape for me isn’t an issue. In fact, I wholeheartedly agree with you, Kim. It’s not your fault that a sex tape you made with a trusted partner got leaked to the entire internet. I agree, you should not be made to feel ashamed for performing fellatio on your boyfriend at some point in your relationship. I’m sure many of us are guilty of doing the same (Not me obviously, am shining beacon of chastity).

But what you are guilty of, I’m afraid, is being so self-absorbed that you can’t even see why you annoy people so much.

So we come to your international women’s day post.  Can I just start by asking what platform you think you have provided to young women anywhere that has been so rewarding for them? Of the suffocating weight from the media on young women, yourself and your aesthetically pleasing family are probably prime contributors. Admittedly, not your fault. However, are you honestly so naïve to think that the hundreds of young women pouring over your photos wishing their boobs were a bit bigger, their waist a little smaller, their lips just a tiny bit fuller, come away from watching your TV show feeling empowered?  

As Pink said, “Kudos to you Kim, for feeling sexy as a mother, daughter and a wife”. You should do. You’re very lucky that with your team of personal trainers, nutritional experts and army of beauty moguls that they can give you all the advice you need that you can get back to your personal best after your pregnancies.  I am so glad that you are empowered by your body and proud to be a woman. I am also proud to be a woman. But not because I have a vagina, or (admittedly) painfully average breasts. Because I know, as a woman, I am not disadvantaged. Because, I too, have been brought up by empowered, brilliant women who have –admittedly – told me I am beautiful. They have also taught me that there are no limits on what I can achieve. That my sexuality does not define me. That I can be whoever I want to be.

Can we think, just for a second, about the women who aren’t empowered by their body? Those women who have suffered any form of sexual assault? The women who are so psychologically scarred by their experience that they go on to self-mutilate, to blame themselves? To resent themselves for something that they could not prevent. The women who feel, not empowered, but imprisoned, by their sexuality? A woman who cannot see themselves as anything more than a body. People work every day to protect those women and to teach others that may suffer in future that is not your fate or your duty as a woman to come to expect the blatant derogatory comments and inappropriate advances.

What about the women that society labels ‘ugly’?  I don’t resent you for being attractive at all, but I wonder how empowered you would feel if you were considered ‘ugly’?  Were you really always that self-confident? So self-confident in your body that you’re so terrified of ageing and the natural aesthetic that you botox yourself into oblivion? Real women get older. They get wrinkles. Their boobs sag. That is real. That is embracing your sexuality and all it is to be a woman. It is looking at yourself in the mirror one day and realising you’re not 18 anymore, and you don’t look like Claudia Schiffer, but that’s okay. Because you have more to show for your life than a portfolio of 300000 selfies. Why aren’t you posting your naked selfies and telling women that this is how you look, but this is not the only version of beautiful that exists? I appreciate that for you, it really is about your body. But if you want to start earning respect from other women, why don’t you try using your fame and fortune to spread a greater positive vibe?

You have a captive media audience on international women’s day, as you do every day. A massive influence (for reasons I cannot fathom) on millions of women. So what do you decide to do with your influence?  This is your chance to use your massive ‘social platform’ that you speak of to do something good. If you had asked each one of your loyal followers to donate 1 dollar to any charity, support of domestic abuse victims, women’s aid shelters (The example used is a female charity in keeping with the theme of the day, but it could have been anything).  You have 41.6 million followers. Imagine the capital you could have generated to put towards a beneficial cause.

And that is why Kim Kardashian, you annoy the ever loving crap out of me. Because on international women’s day, you chose to put up a small essay that was so thinly sprinkled with girl power it was almost laughable. I don’t berate you for being beautiful, Kim, I berate you for having the power to spread a message so far and so wide, and instead, using your ‘platform’ to once again validate yourself. No, you should not be slut shamed. But you should be ashamed, that you have the potential to give so much back to your fellow woman, but you don’t.

Do you know what Kim?  I hope you are so naked and happy every day of your life. May you never have to buy a single item of clothing to cover your hooha ever again. But for goodness sake, can we all stop pretending that you getting your chesticles out is for the benefit of women kind everywhere? Because I have to admit, lovely, no woman I've met as of yet feels directly empowered by your cheeky nip-slip on the back of ol' Kanye's motorbike. 

In the words of the great Biebs, if you like the way you look so much, maybe you should go and love yourself.  In private. Because you are doing my 'ed in.