OB/GYN Rotation – Day 25

Started off the day early with a C-section; my last one for a long time… maybe ever. Still didn’t go perfectly smooth. I forgot to grab my tag thingy and then when they reminded me and I spun to tie it, I dropped it. Turned out ok though. The patient, who I had seen before in clinic before was funny. As soon as the baby was out, she goes, “I want another one,” and kept alternating between sobs and laughter. After the surgery I ran home to hop into our Friday morning lecture on a very timely topic: professionalism and abortion. I won’t go too deep into it, but definitely had some thought-provoking conversations.

The lecture wrapped up and then I hit the kitchen. I told the clinic staff I would make lunch for everyone on my last day so I had to get cookin’. I had some food stuff to finish up so it kinda worked out, though I did have to pick up some ingredients from the store. I ended up making sinigang and adobo (and rice of course) and headed out to clinic. On one hand, sharing Filipino food with people who are not familiar is one of my great joys. On the other, I always get nervous when I do ’cause I’m not sure if people will like it. Everyone said it was good, but I feel like that’s just a courtesy thing, but people went back for seconds and some people packed to-go so I’ll take that and not think about it anymore.

Then after lunch was my last patient encounters of the rotation. Nothing too crazy. There was this one first time mother, who we had seen last week for her pregnancy test who came for her first prenatal visit with the father of the baby. They were both super excited which as cute to see, and the mom was funny, similar-ish vibes to the C-section patient from the morning, except she wasn’t on a boatload of pain meds. Once we were through all the patients (of course the last one didn’t want a student in the room as is only fitting) it was time to say goodbyes. Nothing too emotional, but I did want to get a picture with everyone. There were hugs and handshakes and well wishes. They told me to come visit if I was every in the area and I promised that whenever I go back to Sequioa that I would stop by and invite them.

Most of the emotions came as I was walking out that door towards my car for the last time. There weren’t any tears or anything (it was only 5 weeks for Christ’s sake I’m talking like I was there a year), but just the thought of this little adventure coming to an end made finding me way out the parking lot a teeny tiny bit harder.