Changes I've noticed

Recently, I've noticed a change in my behaviour that really inspires me; it only takes two glasses of wine to get drunk and I struggle to drink beyond that, even when drunk I still crave and order salad or veges, I now consider tofu to be a special treat food, I look forward to my days off so I can go for a long run, the mornings I'm really tired from work I crave a peppermint tea as a pick me up, the caffeine in green tea is so strong I have beam ate sure I only drink one or two cups a day and before 3pm, and in my dream last night I coached Ellen Degeneres how to let go of old hurt by sending love and forgiveness to her tormentors. Lol I'm really craving a green juice right now but I'm still on-call and I have an hour to get in some exercise. I have my peppermint tea.....

Professional student

I'm a professional student, I've decided. It's official.

Today - paged to one patient. Job took about an hour. Rest of day - studying. I do love it. Is it possible to be addicted to studying? I guess that's what professional students are. I always considered them people who liked living off Austudy. Not me - I NEED the full-time wage.

Today I will get about 10 hours study done if it's an average day. That's the equivalent of a week's worth for one unit and that'll be the MIH subject today (research) and the MHSc (adv dermatology) one tomorrow, or more likely both spread out over the weekend with a dash of MD revision (neurology) and CM pre-reading (acupuncture), oh and paramedic revision too.

Currently enrolled in the following courses of study simultaneously:

• Doctor of Medicine - full time alternating terms
• Bachelor of Health Science (Chinese Medicine) - part time - two subjects only this semester thanks to credits
• Master of International Health - part time on-line - on subject only this semester (due to bored with this course so trying to slowly finish it)
• Master of Health Science (Herbal Medicine) - part time on-line - one subject only this semester thanks to credit

Mad?

I love it.

Except my back hurts from sitting. Think I need a fit-ball to sit on.

My future is in my hands

Despite the title, this isn't an update on which med school I've chosen to go with.

I had my palms read by a girl at TCM school. Turns out my suspicions were confirmed and there are a number of people with extraordinary talents in my class.

So apparently my palm(s) says something like - my career has completely changed from what I began out as (a hairdresser to paramedic/med student - confirmed), the person I am with now or just started seeing I will be with for life. I will have one or two children and possibly one is adopted. I will have a solid career in my current path but much later in life I will change course again but I will still use everything I have learnt from my current course.

Also, I will make changes to my health in the future which will provide me good health for the rest of my life.

I can deal with that.

another person in my class is a little bit psychic and I wanted to know about my Spirit Guide(s) and she said I had heaps and they were all good. I asked about the child one I felt I sensed once and she said it's an old soul and from a past life I lost a child. She then said in regards to West vs East that her spirit guides said I was to "swim in it". lol Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning in it. But, yes, full immersion is a good way to describe my relationship with health care and study.

OUM special announcement

Today, OUM announced they are reducing their tuition fees to $5000 per module.

Wow.

What a game-changer.

So, currently, my situation is it would be cheaper to remain at OUM.

Wow.

Right now I'm in discussions with OUM where I sit in regards to Good Standing etc so I hope to get some answers shortly.

Stay tuned.

Grateful

Tonight, I feel my life couldn't be more perfect than it is right now. I mean, there are still things I want, but I'm so grateful for what I have.

I have the most beautiful and sexy life partner, a rewarding and fulfilling career, I lovely home which is keeping me safe from this wild weather and includes a most excellent housemate and awesome cute pets, I live in a lovely town with nice clean air and plenty of green yet is close enough to the city for nights out, I'm studying three (!) courses which I'm absolutely passionate about and severely enjoy studying which I can study at work and just relax when I get home, and I'm going to Bali in three weeks for what is sure to be a fantastic holiday with thoughts on India for NYE. What else? Hmm...

Lots of things.

Oh yeh, my family is pretty awesome. I got a good one in the lucky dip of life. I have enough money right now to do things including building a second house (although slowly) and I feel relatively liberated from the grip of consumerism.

 A major break through for me today was 1) I felt appreciated by my superiors at work which made me feel validated as a professional in my field (this never happens, except for my direct supervisor however we are really good friends) and 2) I've decided I don't NEED to be on a diet. And about an hour after that I decided that I still CHOOSE to do a workout tomorrow and to continue focusing on my nutrition. I choose to eat healthy because that's what fit and healthy people like me do. I have decided that I am already pretty darn fit and healthy. I mean, I can run 9kms. I don't always have time to do it but I've done it (well, technically run 4.5 and walked/run the last 4.5) almost every week with other workout sessions in between. It's not every day, but I think I can sustainably manage three times a week for life.

My diet looks pretty good even though I originally got upset about today because I ate about 100g of chocolate and about 100g of lollies, but apart from that it was all veges and herbal tea and muesli and almond milk. So maybe my clothes fit a little tighter right now, but I still look toned, tight, and healthy and I remain in my healthy BMI. Don't get me wrong - I still want to shed some of this weight, but I've decided I'm not going to kill myself to do it, put my life on hold until I get there, or hate myself for how I look right now. I am loving the 12wbt though.

The biweekly videos from Mish are inspirational, I'm loving the vege meals provided by her nutritionist, and I even do the set workouts with a smile on my face. What I can't or don't want to do includes waking up early from my fatigue break to workout when I'm absolutely stuffed, working out every day at all costs even when I feel my energy is low, spend a whole Sunday cooking in advance for the week, and going hungry worrying about if it's time for my snack. What I'm resisting right now but am willing to continue working on is: counting and recording calorie intake, staying away from soft drink (including diet soft drinks) and saving my alcohol calories to once or twice a week wines with dinner, being more organized and doing just one weekly grocery shop (howevere I'm finding even though I'm supposedly buying for "one" that im actually ending up with a large excess of food in my fridge each week, so I'll just buy 3 or 4 days work once and week and go from there).

 So, is that too much information?

Under pressure

Wow - what a weekend. Been at the BFs again. Got spoiled by him a lot. We also picked up a baby miniature donkey to foster for a while on his farm. So cute.

I'm back on the 12wbt bandwagon. I'm glad to say that missing last week didn't have any majorly negative effects.

This week - I'm at work all week until Sunday night. I will be: working out in the back room, cooking up a storm, studying for next weeks exams, and preparing my house after work for my parents who are coming to stay next week.

Today, I made a nice berry smoothie for myself and my housemate for breaky and a nice Thai pumpkin soup for myself and my workmate for lunch.

Oooh - exciting news. My blood pressure is down to 115 (systolic) now! Yay! Hibiscus tea must be working. I had a massive weekend (alcohol+++) and am feeling under pressure with these exams and my parents coming to stay, and I was nervous to have my BP read again, and I haven't been taking the three cups of hibiscus tea per day like they did in the study, but still I'm so glad to be "normal" again.

TV versus reality

TV: Dr Meredith Grey gets really upset and all dramatic and brooding about the fact that her patient has the same shoes as she does. She goes on some sort of self-centered rant about her terrible life while her patient is dying.

 Reality: Paramedic notices while cutting off the top of her patient in order to attempt resus that she owns the same top in two different colours that the patient is wearing and thinks to herself that is weird and remembers that horrible incident every time she wears that top.

What it takes...

...to be organised enough to be an on-call paramedic overnight and to get your workout done in the mornings before your CM exam.

TCM/Western med confusion

So as I mentioned a while ago, in Chinese Medicine, the organ names are the same as in English but they describe totally different things. Great. Why not just leave them in their Chinese names and it would make it so much easier to not get totally confused. Here are a few examples (of TCM):

• The Heart houses the Mind
• The Spleen is involved in digestion and absorption
• The Urinary Bladder is involved in filtration and reabsorption of fluid
• The Brain and spine are full of Marrow

But, like I mentioned before, in Chinese med the names are in either in capitals or have a capital first letter denoting that the Heart, for example, is not the heart. The heart is that thing that beats in our chest and is transplanted in surgeries etc. The Heart, however, is much more than simply the heart. It is even more than simply the cardiovascular system. I am starting to think the Kidneys are more like the adrenals or perhaps the entire endocrine system, and the Spleen is the duodenum and spleen combined. I reckon teh Urinary Bladder is the entire renal system, and Marrow is more like cerebro-spinal fluid.

Confusing? Try being me.

So if anyone ones anyone that has studied both and any consolidation information please let me know as I'm finding it difficult to find resources. I am already a member of the Australasian Integrative Medicine Association.

I would love it if they would just say "Hey, we're going to only use the Chinese names now so noone gets confused" but that's not going to happen any time soon. I mean "Qi" is so much better than "life force" and we seem to be able to handle that. But that's because there is no English word for Qi in western medicine right now. Energetic medicine is looking into this as we speak so stay tuned.

Western med - really good and specific biological processes and isolating individual functions.

Chinese med - really good at observing the body as it relates to nature and putting together the smaller pieces of information to form a pattern of diagnosis.

Is it becoming clear why I want to do both?

IUHS app

I'm doing my IUHS application today. I don't know how many times I've stuffed up filling out the application form. I wonder if it's an automatic rejection if I put my surname as my first name and my first name as my surname. Fail.

Anyway, it's a bit exciting. All balls are in motion and are rolling now. I've even applied for the August 2012 intake after going through the tuition fees and dates etc. Jan 2013 is ok too. I'm just so keen to get back into it now.
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I had a fellow student at TCM school describe some symptoms of a family member and I was amazing even myself the stuff that came out of my mouth. It wasn't exactly something I'd been taught, but the way my mind could manipulate the new information (particularly that I leant in endocrinology) and formulate a reasonable hypothesis based on the information I was given. It really showed me how far I had come, especially being around people new into health care in the TCM course.
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And then yesterday we had a major road accident with a traumatic PEA arrest and another with major compound fractures and it required all of my emergency paramedic training to that point and it felt amazing to use my skills at their peak. In that moment I was, like "I so need to be an ER doc!".......

Meh

So, today I'm back at work. So far I've revised my revision from yesterday and I will be continuing to look at my CM Literacy stuff and Foundations stuff.

I also have to cook my 12wbt food and so a workout, although my motivation for this is low despite me reading my "Commitment" that I wrote to myself in the pre-season.

I'm also trying to sort out my application to IUHS that I've sort of put on the back-burner for a bit but now I need to get stuck into it.

I'm also dealing with buyers remorse after a stupid internet impulse purchase last night, but oh well. I'll have to suck it up.

PS I have a new label "med school". Before I was just using "study" but now I need the new label to differentiate between TCM school, the Masters, Western med school, and all the other things I'm doing.

Aura

I got my aura photographed and read at the Mind Body and Spirit festival on the weekend. I was amazed at how accurately it represented me right now. For anyone that knows me or has been reading this blog, how much does this sound like me; *Large yellow "thinking/intelligence" aura over head meaning I think a lot *Orange aura to my right meaning I'm currently ambitious and highly driven *Purple aura to my left meaning a more spiritual side of me is coming in *Yellow aura over my heart indicating a good heart So, yeh, the lady reading it said something like "Are you in (internal) conflict right now?" She could tell my mind was grappling with the two sides of me - the scientific and the spiritual. When I explained how I'm studying western med and Chinese med and natural medicines she said the aura describes me trying to come to terms with them. Her sage wisdom was that I would eventually be able to find a way to make sense of the scientific and sporitual and have them coexist in my mind and that I'd be able to apply my combined knowledge in my own unique way. Excellent! So now I feel reassured that my path is, although slightly unconventional, at times hypocritical or conflicting, and perhaps hectic from the outside observer, is my path. So excited. Ok back to revision for my TCM foundations exam. I have two TCM books in front of me, a biochem text and a molecular bio text too for when I need to mix things up in my own special brew.

Me right now

FT4

TCM school today. Got up early and did the Michelle Bridges toning DVD for 30 mins only (I slept in until 7m), got my new bronze Polar FT4 delivered by courier at 8.30am, started school at 10am, handed in my last essay for the semester at 2pm, got the last of my groceries as per the 12wbt shopping list at the Fitzroy Coles at 3pm, home with no work, no homework, minimal housework, and feeling ridiculously relaxed by 5pm. Having a nice cup of chamomile tea while figuring out my new watch.

Tonight on the menu - I need to attempt to cook tempeh for the first time in my life, on a nice bed of mash sweet potato (yum! - good for the Spleen in TCM) and baby spinach (another fav of mine). I have frozen cauliflower and chickpea curry for school tomorrow (and a second batch for the BF), except this time I'll take my own cutlery as there were about 100 knives and no forks or spoons in the school's dining area today.

I might:

• have a bath
• watch a movie
• prepare my workout gear for tomorrow
• do some laundry

I have exams to prepare for and some biochem to look at but I refuse to do any study at home these days. I do it all at school or at work. It's amazing how much I get done these days....

I can hear the biochem calling me but I must resist!

Fresh

My potted herbs in my kitchen.

Pharmacognosy

I just learnt a new word - "pharmacognosy". I'm not sure how to pronounce it yet, but it may be what I've been looking for. I'm going to start teaching myself some basic plant medicines and post them on my Lotus Jewel Health website which I've neglected during this exam period at TCM school.
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In other news, I feel slightly more positive today about my workout and nutrition. I ate 200cal too many yesterday, but I had forgotten about the link to the Snacks page the 12wbt program provided and I ended up eating chocolate because I didn't know what else to eat. Two tiny Timeouts and I was over. Apart from that, everything went on-track.

I did this mornings workout after breakfast which helped somewhat.
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I've pretty much finished my Chinese Literacy assignment for Thursday. It feels weird to be reading and writing in Chinese but I kind of like how the characters are pictures of the description of the word. Reading pinyin (Chinese words written in Roman alphabet) is fairly easy with a few pronunciation exceptions.

Then, I only have two exams to cram prepare for.
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I still haven't done my application for transfer to IUHS. I feel so lazy about not doing that. But I think I'll still put it off until after exams.

First day of 12wbt

Today is the first day of the 12wbt. Already I've run into some obstacles and hiccups. I was going to rant about them here but I'm feeling a bit down and I think it would only perpetuate my mood.

I'll give a brief overview:
Interrupted sleep+++
Slept in
No money to get all of the groceries
No food weighing scales at work
Didn't print the Intermediate workout and only had the 1/2 marathon one (which wasn't going to work today)
Did my workout not knowing what exactly I was supposed to be doing and go frustrated without having a goal

I did 40mins cardio and I've just checked I only need to do some ad stuff and I've done the Beginners group workout for today. So that is ok. I'll do Intermediate tomorrow.

I did my measurements last night before bed and I have a lovely "before" photo to take tonight.

I feel very supported by my BF but not so much by a few of my friends.

Yep, low mood today so I'll leave it here for now.



Starting weight (14/05/12): 67kg (BMI 24.6)
Current weight: 66.0kg

Goal weight 1: 65kg

Goal weight 2: 63kg

Goal weight 3: 61kg

Goal weight 4: 59kg

End goal weight: 57kg (BMI 20.9)

Ultimate goal weight: 54kg (BMI 19.8)

Early workout

So I got rudely awoken by my pager at 05:09 this morning. Doh. My alarm clock is one of those where the light gradually comes on before the alarm so you wake up "more naturally". I think it works. I set the light for 30 mins before. It's starts fairly dim then gets more intense. Then my alarm is birds chirping. There's other sounds but to me they all sound like night-time of going to sleep sounds like rain falling, waves crashing etc. Going to bed at 9:30pm also helps a lot too. So anyway I was partly starting to wake up anyway.

As I was up already and partly dressed before we got cancelled, I figured I'd come to work and do my workout really super-early. I ran 1km intervals then 1km flay-out run on the treadmill (I hate the treadmill). I had to do the 1km run for the 12wbt fitness test. You're not supposed to do it on a tready but I didn't have any other options as I'm back at work and it's dark before and after work and my town has an unsafe level of lighting (broken ankle material) and I don't have a head-torch yet. Oh yeh and I don't get lunch breaks like regular people as I'm a paramedic. So I had to make a judgement call on that one, I'll do it on the road on my first day off in sunlight.

Now I'm off to study my work CPGs before starting on my Chinese Literacy and Terminology assignment.