Things I learned in graduate school, Part II

1.  Do not forget to eat food.

2.  Do not forget to eat food and then half a cup of coffee and a handful of Pringles for lunch.

3.  Do not forget to eat food, have coffee for lunch, and then take a full dose of antispasmotic.

4.  Do not forget to eat food, have coffee for lunch, take a full dose of anti-spasmotic and then nearly fall out of your chair from being high while your PI is explaining a complicated procedure to you which you will be expected to perform for the first time on your own the following day.

Raga Conductance

Remember the graphic projection from last week, folks?  This most recent set of 24 hr bins has not been good times all around either.

My most recent week.  Plotted as the slope of Raga current over Raga driving force.

The week began with residual driving force (V) from the one before -- roughly less than 0 enthusiasms.  As the week continued and midterms were confronted one after the other, driving force increased steadily as was demanded by scheduled events through the continued failure of lab projects, the continued battle with insurance for coverage, the increasingly aching body and cognitive blips (which are new) and the return of a particular midterm grade.  Driving force, still not in positive range, saw Raga current (I) approach 0 and Raga channels all but give up.

Then, on Friday evening, a peep of hope.  I learned that my particular midterm grade was actually quite reasonable when weighted through the class as a whole.  My trouble-shooting efforts in lab were rewarded with a high-yield experimental result.  And my insurance broker called to say that the appropriate paperwork was being transferred and that it should all resolve in the next few weeks.

And with that, Raga reversal potential (ERaga) was met, and current slowly began to creep upward into functional levels.  With Raga driving force now increasing due to internal and not external factors, it's off to mini-golf and amazing food that is bad for me in honor of H.K.'s birthday, which was so cruelly ignored last week due to recruitment and midterm prep.

I could survive this, yet.

Exponential decay

We are learning about neuron equivalent circuits in school.  In honor of said topic, I present my own example of exponential decay.

~

Last week was the most idyllic example of an exponential decay in condition that I have ever experienced.  Laughably so.  And thus, I share.

Monday (100 enthusiasms): Treated to a fancy dinner with a group of excellent people.  Up all night with epically bloody Throughput despite only eating beets and salmon.

Tuesday (10 ens): Receive denial of insurance coverage for the Remicade that I have been getting under new student insurance since October.  They just now decided it was "not medically necessary".  Morning spent on the phone with the GI, the infusion center and the insurance broker instead of doing science.  Experiment set back by two full days because I am a noob blundering about a new lab with no one to tell me to parafilm my culture dishes so they don't dehydrate.  Still losing irregular amounts of blood.

Wednesday (1 ens): Journal club blitz presentation for a particularly terrifying professor*.  Afternoon spent haggling pharmacy over whether or not my prescription renewals have been translated instead of doing science.  Fell, despite my greatest efforts, into behind-the-scenes mediation of a high school drama-esque conflict between two classmates.  Still losing irregular amounts of blood.

Thursday (0.1 ens): H.K.'s birthday, for which I could muster only a card.  Intense nausea all day long.  Managed to do some science.  Still trying to encourage adult resolution of a childish conflict.  TA'd a lab.  By late afternoon, running only on the fumes of media broth and some desperate hope of still being able to impress my PI this rotation.  Continuing to lose irregular amounts of blood.

Friday (0.01 ens): Wake up with an un-concealable budding stress-induced cold sore.  Recruitment day!  After an extra-painful extra-long 4 hours of class (instead of the normal 3), the afternoon was spent escorting/interviewing/socializing with fresh meat instead of doing science.  By the evening, cold sore noticeable, muscles aching from lack of oxygen, I couldn't even bike home.  H.K. had to pick me up.  I was in bed by 8pm, falling asleep on my study materials.  Dreamed of my two midterms coming up on Monday and Wednesday.



*Of my classmates, I was the only presenter that she said "good job" to, which provided a fleeting blip of positivity in my week.

Perspective

I just watched the documentary "Under Our Skin", which is about Lyme disease and the disgusting politics surrounding the insurance companies and medical boards (surprise) that prevent it from being properly treated.  One of my most favorite people in the universe has Lyme, and her perseverance has always been inspirational to me.  It's an important message about how biomedical research is just as susceptible to being stunted by corruption as any other major enterprise.

Consequently, watching these types of documentaries is incredibly depressing to me.  Though there is always a ray of hope at the end, I can't help but sink into guilt.  I am not earning my health, there are people so much worse off than I am that I must be faking it, I should be in toxicology or immunology or infectious disease instead of neuroscience, etc, etc...

H.K. is kind enough to remind me of what pitiful condition I am in without the right medication -- how dysfunctional I was before Remicade started to work a year and a half ago, the concern for what will happen when I can't take Remicade anymore, and that even though the pain is now benign and infrequent I have acquired all kinds of side effects.  One of them is being in grad school.  For which, though I complain (because that's where camaraderie comes from), I am so incredibly grateful...

Bring it on, 2012.

Latency in Stress-Induced Crohn's Attacks

Folks, grad school is on hiatus for the next few weeks, so there is about to be a lot of straight up Crohn's talk up in hur.

Like most Crohn's (and IBS) attacks, mine have perpetually been the post hoc ergo propter hoc artifacts of stress.  As I have mentioned... somewhere... there is so much constitutively happening during grad school that what time one would ordinarily find to spend stressing out, one instead spends steeped in exhaustion-driven apathy.  While this is generally good for me -- as it would be for anyone with a type A personality in an incredibly demanding job -- there are residual consequences.

For instance, as soon as I stopped working in my new lab and traveled to my most dear childhood home, I was interrupted by a fairly large-scale attack.  Right in the middle of the restaurant.  Then right in the middle of the theater.  Then most of the rest of the evening when we arrived home accompanied by butylscopolamine, peppermint tea and a heating pad.  It was the worst episode I've had since the summer (non-opiate-grade).

It appears that now that I'm not in the midst of academic turbulence, I am beginning to feel the after-effects of the stress that was suppressed during the term.  There are some very serious defects in my program that were, naturally, not apparent until halfway through the term, and which cause a ridiculous amount of unnecessary stress in all of the students.  I had a nightmare last night that a department committee kicked me out of the program (despite the NSF grant, the Badass Student grant that they themselves bestowed upon me, the now five first-author publications, and the fact that three PI's are currently vying for me).  Yes, this is a real fear for most of the first-years in my department -- some of the brightest minds I have ever encountered.  It's why the program is so prestigious -- failing is less than an A-, for which one is put on academic probation and potentially booted from the program.  I never looked at the grades I got on finals because they are so arbitrary that they mean almost nothing and it was an unnecessary agony that I did not need hanging over my break.

These are the concerns that are suppressed during the ebb and flow of the active term, and which are now showing their might through latent Crohn's attacks so that I cannot fully relax during this brief and precious vacation.  Despite really not thinking about school.  I attribute the attack last night to having been asked "how school was going" and making the mistake of actually talking about it.

Crohn's v. Grad School Free Lunch

I don't know what all these penniless graduate students are complaining about.  Between the seminar snacks, defense sandwiches, Neurobeer meals and lab-mate bakers I hardly need to grocery shop anymore.  And that's in spite of only being able to eat half of the free food thrust upon the academic community that is my department.  Toss in a few holiday luncheons and it's enough to induce a constitutive state of Food Coma.

When I leave my house in the morning, I bring an apple, a bottle of water and a few tea packets.  Rarely are leftovers necessary to get through the day, for, invariably, lunch will provide itself.  There are instances, however, wherein I resist temptation to partake, knowing that I have a long 6+ hours of afternoon lab work ahead and will need to be able to stand upright.  Our department holiday luncheon this week was a tantalizing array of six different kinds of lasagna -- all with cheese.  Fail.  One poor tenured faculty member and myself were left sipping our [albeit, heavenly] lemony spiced apple cider alone while others bombarded the buffet line.

It's a slippery slope.  My inherent frugality and neurotic inclination to not let free things go to waste versus the Crohn's baby.  But even if I must decline lasagna and chocolate butter cookies, I am never starving.  And what's more, they have started to serve lactose-free hot chocolate at mini-seminars.  Soon there will be rice milk for my coffee... soon.

Remicade... I've lost count.

This morning, on a clear 70 degree day in December (no biggie), I sauntered into the Cancer Treatment Center on the beach [sort of] no earlier than 10am.  Within forty minutes I was in my corral, neck deep in stem cell litricha and racing along at 140 mL/min.  This was a smaller corral than last time, with only three stations.  And.  Guys.  There was a huge window.

My baller nurse convinced me to let her do an inner forearm I.V., at which I cringed in reflection of the last time I agreed to this (it was ouchy enough to require a warm pad for the full 3.5 hours, and this is coming from someone who likes needles).

 

              Isn't that an insane spot?  I thought it was an insane spot.  Although I did end up requiring a "warm pad", it was only briefly.

Two.five hours later with my brain and veins saturated, I headed back out into the sun to find groceries and prescriptions.