Farewell to MSP

I taught my last MSP session tonight. Potassium balance. It's hard to believe how fast the monthes have gone by. I've grown with my students, walking them through the first week of anatomy through the cardiovascular block through pulmonary block through the last renal MSP lesson. Tonight I bid farewell to MSP.

Teaching has always been a fresh breath of air in my learning and an opportunity to tell really unfunny jokes. Thanks to teaching MSP session, the first years actually know my name and invite me to their parties (I even received an invitation to an upcoming End of the Organs party on Saturday). It's like being a popular nerd. In a way, I have been reliving the first year vicariously through teaching and interacting with my students, as I address their questions and concerns about exams and life as medical student. The first year has become something of a blur, but becomes more clear when I interact with my students, who take me back to the first year.

It has been a privilege to work with such talented and bright students. They have taught me so much of myself and my capabilities; I can be funny (usually this in unintentionally and still deliver an education message). I will truly miss MSP and my students. Teaching has definitely been one of the most rewarding experiences of medical school thus far. I walk away with some new friends and a unique set of experiences that will ground me through my future educational endeavors.

On Tuesday, while I was teaching about potassium disorders, such as hyperkalemia and hypokalemia, I was thinking about the stages of development through pregnancy, infant and childhood. The reason being, I was in the process of studying for our second Lifecycle midterm that was on Wednesday. So, Tuesday was one long night, as I bounched from teaching renal physiology of potassium balance to studying the physiology of labor and congenital heart defects.

My mind is still racing. The exam is over. MSP is over. Surgical Skills, the elective I am coordinating, will wind down next week with the final lecture and scrubbing and gowning session. As I relinquish all my responsibilites, I still feel as though there is always something that needs to be done. Perhaps, I was just born this way-- born to be persistently active.

I am also in the process of inventing the perfect third year schedule, which involves ranking my preferences for the order of rotations and site. In the end, the schedule will be generated by a computer through this elaborate "lottery" system.

There is this one other thing that requires my complete attention-- studying for the boards. This has been a challenge, like no other, more a test of mental endurance. My strategy has become to minimize memorization and maximize understanding through integration, which is almost impossible with lots of memorization. It's a Catch-22. I knew that.

My mind is always trying to make sense of all these floating facts and trying to find the logic behind the complex disease processes; some have clear pathways, while other explanations make little or no sense. And sometimes, what we learn boils down to these bizarre mnemonics that are just memory tools to remember all those details we will inevitably forget. Sigh.

Studying continues. At least I will remember somethings from teaching MSP.