Final Semester!

It's been a while since I've updated this blog. Things were so crazy at the end of last semester that I actually had a post saved as a draft and completely forgot to publish it. And it seemed a little pointless to publish it now. But I survived another semester with about three surgeries a week, and I am one step closer to being done!

This is my last semester of actual coursework. It feels so weird saying that, and I can't believe that in May I'm going to be entering clinical rotations. I don't know what I'm going to do with myself. After the hectic schedule I had last semester, I'm excited to take it a little easier this semester. The best part is I'm done surgery! I completed my three assistant surgeon days, my three primary surgeon days, and seven days as the anesthetist. And then I survived my anesthesia grilling, which is where a surgeon goes over all the aspects of anesthesia with you to make sure you learned something, and you sit there and feel really smart for about 25% of the time and like a complete idiot for the other 75% of the time. But that's all over! I kind of miss my primary surgeon rotations, but not enough to go back. Since I didn't update anything on how they went, I'll just say briefly that they went really well, all six of my puppies are doing good, and it was probably one of my biggest accomplishments in school to date. But it was also a lot of work and I always left exhausted, so I don't mind having a break this semester.

This semester I also have my second introduction to clinics rotation, where twice a week we go to the hospital and shadow senior students on their rotations. I'm very excited to get into the clinics and start putting all this knowledge I've had crammed into my head to use! On the other hand, I'm a nervous wreck thinking about starting clinics. Right now I feel completely unprepared, so I'm really hoping that this clinics course changes that.

But even more that clinics at the hospital, I am beyond excited for my externships! I absolutely loved working in South Africa, and it pretty much solidified for me that I want to work in exotic animal medicine. Even though we did a lot of repetitive work, especially on our sable days where we did the same thing for about 14 sable per day for three days, it was the first time I didn't get bored doing the same thing. I lasted about 2 days in a small animal clinic before I started feeling claustrophobic and had to get out. I made it longer in equine medicine, but I was still getting bored. And it's crazy, because when I started vet school I was so sure I was going to practice in equine medicine, and any time a professor mentioned how some students always end up doing the complete opposite of what they saw themselves doing in the beginning of vet school, I always thought that will never be me. And now it is! I can't imagine doing any other work now. I love how each day you're doing something different with exotics, and how you never know what the day will bring. And I love feeling like I can make a real difference to conservation at the same time.

So following this, I knew I wanted my externships to be in the exotics field, preferably zoo medicine. The problem is it is super competitive, and they only take one student at a time. But I managed to get a 6 week externship at both the Philadelphia Zoo and the Oklahoma City Zoo! I can't wait for the experiences I'm going to get with 3 months in zoo medicine. It's going to be unreal. But as excited as I am for them, I also don't want to rush through my last semester sitting in a classroom. But only because I don't think I'm ready to end up in the real world yet!