After nearly 3 months off, I'll finally be getting back to the medicine mindset with the start of intern year tomorrow (actually, it's just orientation tomorrow, the real intern year won't start for another week or so). I'm a little worried (ok, terrified might be a more accurate description). I've been calming myself down with the thought that lots of people have been through the same thing and have done fine, but with a 3-month break, I'm sure I'll be a little rusty. I suppose I took a 4-year break from medicine during graduate school and did ok when I got back into things, but med school is not the same as being an actual doctor who's orders actually get carried out. I was thinking of spending some time studying medicine, but there's little motivation to pick up a book and I figure that anything I could have learned on my own during the break would be minimal compared to the vast amount of information I'm about to get forced down my throat.
My mindset right now consists of many conflicts: I'm looking forward to actually starting work (I'm getting tired of being home all day), but at the same time, I know I won't have much of a chance for a break for a long time. I'm excited to see patients, apply my knowledge, try to help people and maybe have some fun along the way, but I'm also terrified I might make a mistake and hurt someone. I'm looking forward to meeting new people, but I'm afraid that they actually might know medicine. I'm terrified that I won't be able to handle the workload, but I'm calm because life at the community-hospital based intern year that I'll be going through won't be anything close to that of the academic-hospital based interns that I got to vicariously live through during my recent sub-I. I'm hoping for starting with something light so that I can get my bearings before getting slammed, but at the same time, I want to get the tough months over with before I get burnt out.
I figure it's no use worrying too much about it. It's not like I can change anything.
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