All good things....

I am a big person for being positive and being open to the big picture. When I find myself becoming to negative I try to take a step back and think of something positive. Usually because of this outlook I'm a pretty happy balanced person, but sometimes it all just falls on you, like this week.

I've been stressing about Histology, in which I'm suddenly floundering, when reality crashed in.
It all started Tuesday, when I get a text from my boss back at home (a vet) reading:
Charlie (my dog) not well. Lymes nephritis bun creatine high phos. 16 Very high. Call me when u can.

What this translates to for a vet student is: your dog is very sick, in fact dying, of renal failure. What this means in my situation is that what recently forced us to euthanize my childhood dog in August (renal failure) is going to take another beloved animal for me.

This text of course arrived half way through my classes, so as soon as I got it I stepped out into our lounge, the closest place where I could get reception and called home to have a chat with my stepfather about what he had been told. This of course resulted in me crying, and unable to leave a public place because I didn't want to lose my reception. Who doesn't love crying in front of people?

Several phone calls and lots of research later the verdict is in: treating aggressively does nothing for this disease, rather I and my vet feel it would prolong his life for a negligible amount of time and it would cause un-needed stress. We're doing what we can with him, but in this case it's not much. Lyme nephritis is also one of those boogey men of medicine. Some people whole heartedly believe in it and have big plans for treating it, some people believe it's a fluke thing and dogs don't get lyme disease. Regardless my dog is sick, but stable.

I'm taking this in a small way as a good thing though. This is why I came to vet school. Because I wanted to know how to treat animals and therefore be able to make things better to at least some extent, or provide comfort and knowledge when I can't.

I'm a great place as well, in that I have an appointment this morning to meet with the internal medicine doctor to chat about lyme nephritis and any ideas he might have.

Plus, my stress level is now very different. Oh, it's still there, but now it's more realistic. Histology and Biochem are not something to panic over. They are words on a page. I will learn them or I won't. A dying family member is something very different. That is something worth crying over.

Not a fun way to get back to reality, but it's effective. I'm going to work harder to remember why I'm here from this point on. Of course I'll fail at some point, but life goes in cycles and in the end reality always comes around.