Written on November 2009
I miss writing blogs. I remember writing my last blog 5 months ago. This is so unlikely since I usually resort to writing an entry on my multiply or fb account whenever I feel blue. But Medicine barely allow me to express my thoughts: when you fail, you study, no other stuffs to fixate yourself into or you’ll fail again. And I am assuming that this write-up will take me more time to finish since I thought that the months I spent with no-blogs or not even a single entry on a notebook I bought which I supposed to scribble my thoughts on made me forget about articulating my ideas. And here I am again, making an attempt, setting aside my books, trying to breathe, and writing a blog.
Honestly, I don’t know where to begin this. I don’t know exactly what urged me to hit my laptop and scribble onto something I don’t know where to begin in the first place. Perhaps because I need to. Perhaps because there’s so much pain to contain. And sufferings. And unpaid hardwork. Perhaps because I can feel pang of tiredness enveloping the whole of me already. Perhaps because I’m near hopelessness. And I can’t be hopeless because I know I don’t deserve to be hopeless. And I need to do something.
3 months ago, I became part of The Outstanding Students of the Philippines, and I despised myself not to make it to the top 10 just because I messed up on my interview. But you know, there are always reasons behind everything. I believe that the reason would be I might put too much pressure on myself I might not handle it and break down. Because living and dwelling in mediocrity in Medicine and getting failing grades even if you dig your head on your books all night long are such typical scenarios I should have pre-empted already. It was a sad truth I should have prepared myself. I realized I wasn’t prepared enough.
Right now I am undergoing instability, what they dubbed as the coping up and adjustment period for freshmen students. There were moments I thought of giving up. And I am so much prepared to give up had it not been because of parents providing you everything and other people expecting A LOT from you. There were moments I thought I am stable and prepared to overcome the everyday hassles and bustles of Medicine life but the reality is, there’s a lot of preparation to prepare yourself into. There were also lot of fake moments – I tried to be positive even if I am drowning with the pessimism medicine life is bringing, I tried to be strong even if I am so weak I needed a lot of time to rest and reflect, I tried to be all-knowing and interested even if I despised the lessons.. All these just because I desperately wanted to survive medicine and at the back of my mind, excel. And the sad truth of not excelling or not even passing an exam is degrading, so degrading it can be enough reason (at least for me) to quit med school.
And there is also this issue of things you wanna do but you can’t do at the moment because you’re in the laboratory trying to comprehend every detail of your cadaver or at the library reading your thick books. For instance, I still wanna develop my skills in debating or resting from an exhausting college life or finding a job I could enjoy, learning how to play drums or reading books I am dying to read, or simply improving my English to read a much better version of this blog. These and hundreds of other things I wish I could have enjoyed. But Medicine necessitates me to discover the nitty-gritty of its world.
There were five months already. Five months of pure struggle. Of loneliness and frustrations. Of buckets of tears. Of hardwork and adjustment. Of starbucks overtimes. Of information overload. Of mistakes and failures. And these five aching months (again, atleast for me) are over. And this is just the beginning of another five more months and many more five months (hopefully if I survive first year) that are about to unfold. Am I geared up for this next stage? The truth is I don’t know because I don’t know what lies ahead and I don’t wanna know. This stage of my life has made me learn handful of lessons. To live the now, every single moment of your life, and making the most out of it. To not cram (AT ALL) and study atleast 2 weeks before in contrast to studying 2 nights before. To not go to Starbucks all the time and end up spending your last centavo to coffee without getting enough of your lesson. To be optimistic at all times even if you are at the verge of losing everything. To believe that there is always God to help you even if you once questioned His existence because you thought your prayers are not answered. To fill your day with happy moments, of friendship, of smiles, of positive vibes all the time because honestly, during rough times, these things will save you from the possible tendency of committing suicide (hehe).
Next semester will hopefully be redemption. A call for a change. A gradual change if not complete change because I know, it’s hard to change to someone you’re not in the first place. This is just the beginning of a rocky road I opt to trail and I don’t wanna lose this because this has been my dream, this is what I want myself to become, this is what I want my fate to lead.
