Oh my God it has been years, truly years. I have never not written on this blog for more than a few months and it has officially been 3 years! But apparently, I’ll always be back, so here we are! And here’s what happened in the meantime…
1. We hit 1 million reads!
Over 1,200,000 to be precise. and I totally missed it! I had actually been thinking that maybe it’s time to wrap this up this blog and close this domain down because I wasn’t really spending much time on it now that life has become much busier (turns out working as a doctor does take up a lot of time). I mentioned this to someone and their response was: absolutely do not do that – your blog help me so much when I was applied for medical school and throughout medical school. So that got me thinking again I opened up my admin page (for the first time after many years) and that was when I saw we had amassed that many readers! Since when?!
I love looking at my website analytics, and I did a comb through that and saw just how many times the advice posts out here were being read daily! I suddenly felt a spark of motivation to get back into blogging again so here we are.
I will be accepting a lot of guest posts to help keep ‘Life of a Medic’ alive, so if you’re interested, head on here for all the details and submit any ideas.
2. I graduated medical school
Yes, the big question in the room. This blog started with me documenting my reflections of work experience as a medical school applicant, to then me sharing my journey through the highs and lows of medical to now! So after all that I made it to the end of this journey that felt like it was never going to end and have graduated as a doctor Alhamdullillah. I’ve actually been working for 2 years now, crazy, how did that happen?!
3. I chose my specialty
I may have finished one journey, but with medicine do the journeys truly end? Short and sweet answer: no. You finish one and stumble right into the next and here I am having (almost) finished my 2 years of foundation training, about to embark on to speciality training in…Paediatrics! Could’ve you have guessed? I am so excited to start Paediatric training in September inshallah. Some of my very first reflections on this blog were written by 16-year old me about her experiences of volunteering on the Children’s Ward. And 10 years later, I’m about to actually train to become a Paediatrician. I’m so grateful, I cannot express. And if you’re curious, here are these reflections – they’re probably not the best so don’t pass too harsh a judgement if you do decide to feed your curiosity and read them.
4. I did my medical elective
Rewind about 3 years and you arrive at the highlight of my medical school experience: the medical elective. I did mine in the UAE and it was such an incredible experience! I had every intention of telling you all ALL about it, in fact I’ve got so many draft posts I started saved here, but then finals, then graduation, then work…now here we are! I put this on this list because I have received soooo many questions about it, and still do so I wanted to say, I will share everything there is to know on here soon now that we are back up and running. But in the meantime, if you get the opportunity to do your elective abroad or just experience healthcare in a different setting – take it without a second thought!
5. I travelled a lot
Elective aside, I’ve managed to tick off quite a few places off my bucket list Alhamdulillah again. But we know what travel bucket lists are like, you tick one, you add one. Gosh, I love travelling! Sometimes i wonder, should I just drop the medical blogging and become a travel blogger instead? Hmm…tempting. Jokes aside, if you’re interested in what work-life balance looks like in medicine or what a foundation doctor gets up to in her free time (besides blogging ofc), you have to join me over on my instagram. I share all my travels and just day to day musings on there.
6. I designed my first planner!
If you’ve been around for some you’ll know about my joy, my soul, my little stationery brand: Paper Daisy. Right from the start, the vision was to create a bound planner for everyday use, one that keeps you for the whole year and is much more personalised than those you see out there these days. And…we did it! Introducing you to the floral abstract weekly planner! I adore this planner, I use it regularly and it keeps me as chaos free as one can be! It’s got lots of special little templates inside too, so not your regular planner.
7. I learnt how to make rugs
Seeing as we’re here sharing all the fun things that’ve gone on over the last few years, I can’t keep my latest hobby from you now can I! I’ve got into hand tufting rugs and made a grand total of 3 big rugs and several other smaller ones. Totally random, but it’s fun and I’m my current project has been underway for some time! This below was my first completed one:
8. I have worked a LOT
I suppose that goes without saying, it’s part and parcel of being a foundation doctor. The days are long, and the weeks are longer. If memory serves me right, the most number of hours I’ve worked so far in a week is the long 71 hr and 45 min week I worked on Neonates, and that was with one day off in the week. I’ve worked my fair share of 7 consecutive day weeks too. I’ve got so much to tell you about what it’s really like working as a foundation doctor, all for another post!
So here we are, a quick 8 things that have happened over the last few years. I have every intention of telling you more about them and hopefully being more consistent in sharing posts on here.
If you’ve made it this far, I’m curious who my readers are and what you’d like me to write about:
Life of a Medic 