Posted by F1doc 3rd October 2017
Cannot believe 2 months has passed by since I was shadowing the outgoing FY1’s and finding myself consumed by fear at the prospect of taking on that responsibility myself.
Turns out that all those people who said to me “you’ll be fine”, were actually right.
We’ve had medical students start this week and it is a really strange experience to be on the other side of what used to seem like such a massive divide.
I remember that horrible awkwardness I used to feel, always standing in the wrong place, wondering how many questions I can ask before I annoy someone. The nerves building before feeling able to ask someone to sign my logbook…
And I also remember how it made my day to have someone smile at me and make me feel welcome or try to include me as part of the team. There were plenty of junior doctors who gave up their free time to teach me as a student and I promised myself at the time that I would make sure I did the same. So I taught a group of students this week and it was great fun but definitely surreal to be on that other side.
My ABG success percentage has increased to around 80% which I am extremely happy about, I finally feel confident enough to prescribe paracetamol without looking it up just in case the dose mysteriously changed overnight and I can write a discharge summary during board round.
Just when I’m starting to feel settled in and comfortable everything is about to change, the registrars switch over next week and I am nervous in case my new reg. isn’t as nice as the current one. Then not long after that my SHO switches over and then there will only be a month before I move to my next rotation. I think that is one of the hardest things about being a junior doctor, you start to build good working relationships and then it all changes and you start over again. On the upside it means there are always plenty of reasons to have farewell drinks!
