Screaming.... and Waiting.

Today, old grandma at ward 3 kept screaming.

Today, old grandpa at ward 3 kept screaming for help.

Today, I feel like screaming too. :(

Lord, when I have trouble standing strong in certain

difficult situations, help me to not lose heart and fall into

discouragement. Infuse me with Your everlasting love and courage.

Enable me to be strong and whole in my mind, body, and soul

as I wait on You to move on my behalf.

To be or not to be?

Hello world, how have you been?

I have been well I guess. Mid-way through my pre-reg already, if you are me how would you feel? Time flies I always say, and I have to say it once again. Time flies, and I am going to fly too haha!

Spent more time thinking lately. Not that I've not been thinking, but lately the thread of thoughts have taken another path, a new path I have to say. Will let you know once it's confirmed.

It's my inpatient rotation now - inpatient means wards. So I am now dealing with patients in the wards already. Have you ever wondered what a pharmacist do?

Many people ask why am I so busy when all that you do is to tell patient 'This is panadol. Eat 2 tablets four times a day for fever and headache."

At times I felt insulted when I heard these.

But very quickly, my heart immediately feel at peace because I know that I do not care much about what people think or say about me or my profession, my greatest consolation is that God knows.

Perhaps it's this indifference that makes me more hesitant in commenting on stuff.

Perhaps it's this indifference that makes me want to do more for patients if it's within my capability, albeit nobody thinks highly of pharmacist.

I am glad, for God maintains this serenity in me. I still go to bed every day with a tired physical body but I always wake up with a soul full of passion and adrenaline to do what I should. I finally learn to live with grace alone.

Inpatient pharmacy is like a battle.

Doctor writes orders for medication --> medication orders sent to pharmacy --> pharmacy staff have to check if the medications prescribed are appropriate --> sometimes we call up doctors to discuss about better alternatives --> process orders and supply.

In the afternoon pharmacists have to review all patients' medication profile in the ward. If you think reviewing is easy then you're quite wrong.

Do you know what it means by an appropriate therapeutic option?

A drug can be an option for a particular treatment yet it can be unsuitable for patient. Do you know how appropriate a drug is to a patient depends on patient's renal, liver condition, his age, his intake, his output, his illness, how sick is he, is he able to take medicine orally etc etc.

Do you know how much considerations one has to go through before deciding to go forth with a particular drug? And do you know drugs interact with one another too?

And if 1 ward has 30 beds, do you know how long it takes to review a ward?

And if there are 2 wards to review and you only have 2 hours, it feels so awful?

But I must say I like inpatient. Although it's a mad rush during discharge time, but it's then that I appreciate the role of a pharmacist more. As a guardian of rationale drug therapy, like what doreen always advocates, I do agree we have to intervene until the best is given to patients.

I am in S3. Ward 3 is a geriatric ward. Ward 2&3 feel like a mini-IMH most of the times. You see very old people. You see quite a number of patients sent from IMH for critical treatment. You see a lot of old people lying down and letting you do all that you want. You see very pathetic scenes. Sometimes you will hear people screaming.

The world is so real. SO is a hospital. I have much consolidation of thoughts throughout my rotation in geriatric wards. All they need is not medical treatment, but rather, a healthy consistent dosing of loving tender care. They need love.

If one day I am an old and frail 80 year old lady, please let the doctor know I've signed DNR. Please also don't poke me with needles and tubes and catheters and pumping me with potent antibiotics etc etc. Let me go.

Sad things aside, lately I have quite a number of encounters with patient. Yesterday, this 74 year old Eurasian lady sitting on a wheel-chair wrapped her hands around my waist and said thank you for nothing to grave to thank about.

You might feel like vomiting if you hear this but I feel like crying then.

She said "You're like a flower. Are you married? You are always smiling, you look so loving and caring." - when all that I did was to explain the importance of lactulose in her condition and told her not to miss that anymore.

She held my hands and gave me a gentle kiss and said God bless. I felt like crying. I felt as if God has been looking at what I've been doing and am doing. I just felt so trembled within.

And I thank God for giving me this consistent bolus of passion to serve. For without Him I am nothing, yet through Him I already have everything.

It is also because of His consistent guidance that I know that my life has a greater purpose and I am walking towards it.

Pray for me :)

Cut to the heart

Lord, if these weakness of me cannot leave me, may You use them for Your Kingdom.

Lord, if these wandering emotions cannot leave me, please take my life away from me when I don't have the strength to die.

Lord, if these things in me bring sufferings to those around me, may You one day use the same things to bless them abundantly.

Lord, if this inferiority complex beneath the superiority complex in me cannot be removed, may You use it to teach me, nurture me, and lead me to greater stage.

Eating and more eating!

I have been meeting up with a couple of good friends lately :)

Went to cafe iguana with pc and mindy on last saturday night. Mexican food and margaritas.

Don't really like the food, but the peach margaritas is really nice and i drank 3 glasses without me knowing, and soon realized that margaritas = alcohol, and got a bit giddy. Enjoyed chilling out with these 2 girls so so much. We bought our very first margaritas! Haha! So funny... we've been talking since our uni days that we should celebrate when we are finally able to earn our salaries etc etc... and now we're celebrating our very first hard-earned margaritas. So cool right :D

Mexican food again just now... this time was Holland Village's El Patio.. the food was average I thought, but I enjoyed the companies. It was pre-reg + shak + gerry. Free dinner somemore :D Haha! And then we hang out at NYDC wheRE I recommended them my favorite Boo-boo! Ate mudpie too!

It's ALL ABOUT BINGING and EATING!

I need to start running before I die during my coming race!!!

Met up with Linda just now and we chatted for very long too. This good friend of mine always has never-ending stories to tell... But the weird thing is, despite many scoldings from me, many scoldings from her, and many stupid things we did, we still enjoy sharing our stories to each other. I really like the way God brings the both of us together :) Anyway gal, the taxi uncle just now was very weird. He drove at 30 km/h throughout and sometimes I caught him staring in blank space/ slightly slow in response --> I was quite terrified by him!

I need to start preparing for my VIVA next week.

Need to start NOW.... like STAT!!!

Goodnight :)

Showers of blessings :)

Met up with Hanwen for movie and dinner last Sunday. I needed to cover the floor on Sunday, but it was half-day and I met Shak awhile to go through project stuff, and she offered to drive me to PS to meet hanwen. So lucky and blessed of me :D It has been a long time since we both watched a movie and I must say that the movie we watched that day was nice and we had a good laugh throughout the movie. The Ugly Truth! Haha, yeaps it's not for kids, but it's funny hee :) After that we had our expensive dinner at LaoBeiJing, eating Beijing duck these and that -- Such a big transformation from student life to working life :)

We have known each other for 9 years already! How time flies :) And every now and then, as I look back, I am always grateful for her presence in my life. I truly miss the foursome gang, and I miss being there for her when she needs me. I must say that university life was a total shock and 100% change for the both of us - we went to different universities, we had different encounters, good and bad, and we grew up a lot during the past four years. No longer as pure and innocent, we've become more complex I guess.

The photo above was taken during our JC2 - when we were the Dance, Deco and Cheers IC of TJC Council. So young and innocent right??? Oh i miss my braces :D

A collage of what happened during my birthday. I had flowers at my doorstep in the morning! It's from my old good friend daniel! We've known each other for 10 years! My gosh I am getting old -_- Yea, he knows me pretty well and knows what I like about flowers too I must say. Thank you friend, truly surprised and I appreciate the thoughts and come home soon! :)

My sister brought me to a nice dinner and I must hereby recommend this restaurant to all of you. It's called DOZO. Don't need to find out more about it, just Go and See for yourself. River Valley Point. Nice Nice Nice! It's a Japanese fine dining restaurant, 7 courses.. Nice :D

Yeaps, I have had a good birthday :)

A Series of [UN]FORTUNATE events

It's October already...

The weird thing is, I often visit my own website and it's actually quite a silly thing to do - because I am just seeing it and not updating it despite there's countless things which I want to say. Time flies, and things happened. And before you knew it, you're over that series of things. More will be coming ahead of you.

How have you been?

Truthfully, I know I have been myself and only myself ever since long time back. Sometimes I really have no time to organize meetings and hanging out with people, simply so loaded. Sometimes, I choose to not go out and just stay home - because all that I want is just being away. I know it's kinda weird, but this is something that happens episode after episode. Somehow, I am so used to it already.

OP rotation had officially come to an end in mid August. I honestly love it loads. Love the team dynamics, the adrenaline rush, the not-so-nice patients, the very grateful patients (and it's these patients who will make your day and give you reason to keep on going), the random stress and incidents here and there...

Something that I hated myself most was to leave with such a bang. I knew no one was there to blame me, but I really felt like crap when it all happened. Such a marvelous history that a pre-reg who's not even 3 months old had so many "incidents". A big part of me was so ashamed by myself, yet a small part of me was telling myself it's ok, what doesn't kill me make me stronger - at least for all that I've done not so correctly, I will make sure I won't do that the same way again.

But the day when it was rolled out during Roll call, it sank deep down into my heart. Trying so hard to look up at the ceiling so that nobody would know that I was tearing. It was just so hard. I just hated myself so so much. For everything. I sat in the toilet and all I could do was just cry and cry. And telling myself I'd better stop crying STAT cos I needed to attend a meeting immediately after roll call.

The period when everything was just oh-so-wrong.

Yet the amazing thing is, it didn't swing me to my lowest point. And my only guess is because I've been through worse shit than that and nothing seemed comparable to that.

And to Shak, Gerry, and every pre-reg, I just want to thank you all for being there to encourage me and reassure me that I would be fine and nobody was blaming me for anything.

I know you were all standing outside the toilet when I was tearing inside. I just wanted to hide and pick myself up, and I just want to always look strong like how I always did. Thank you for believing in me.

Shak, even though you're not reading, I am really grateful for who you are and everything you've done. Thank you for listening, over and over again. Thank you for accepting me the way I am, understanding me that I am human and everyone makes mistakes. Thank you for telling me that it's ok to have emotions. Thank you for being such a friend and preceptor.

To Gerry, I am sorry, but at the same time, I am thankful for what have happened. I know it hits me hard and I have been a little negative at that point of time.

And to Claudine - I really miss OP and seeing you FM-ing, and I don't know why.

Perhaps it's just me. When you said that it's because I never avoid problem and no matter what comes along, I will just go forth and take it, that's why I am predisposing myself more to such incidence. I don't know if it's wrong, but I know if the same things happen again, I will still go forth and take them up, because I should learn to take them up and handle them.

Whatever it is, I am glad that they were bygones and I know I grew up a little..

A break back home was definitely light-heartening and I was so happy to see my niece and my sister.

She is really very adorable :)

I am officially an auntie! oh so old already :(

And my sister surely had a tough fight delivering the baby I know. She's a little weaker. Maybe it's me growing up. I feel that I have more responsibilities. I want to be there for my sister so much. And realizing that I am working and able to provide some support to her and her family made me feel so relieved, and happy at the same time. I like the new mission in me, and I really start liking providing for others, just like how God has always been providing me everything that I need.

After my short break was my first case presentation. It went quite well, and I was relieved and happy. I am deeply comforted by the feedbacks, and I know that God's telling me that when gave me a bolus of sadness, He will ensure that I will have an infusion of peace and blessings later on, as long as I hold onto His love, die to myself, and have my visions right.

Oh and I attended AH's DND with the others too. We won the best-dressed table k! So cool - pre-regs made such an impact wahaha... so happy...

The ever-so-cool and fun-loving pre-reggers :)

Me and Shark

Pre-reg with Gerry - she's my inspiration and ONE of the big reasons why I joined AH

With Claudine!

Yea, so we really had loads of fun :)

AH culture is so different from other hospitals' - we work very hard, and when we play, we go all out too :) I like being at where I am, there are so many things I can provide, give, share and learn. What more can I ask?

So after OP I went to clinics, IT then finally 4 weeks of DI.

Honestly, DI is another favorite!

Enjoyed the challenging stuff the doctors, nurses, pharmacists asked. Finding the answers from the shelves of references and product inserts and online literatures are really very challenging, yet rewarding at the same time. There's so much that you could learn in DI and tomorrow is my last day in DI already. :(

Some questions asked these 2 weeks were - how to treat elephantiasis and do we have these medicines in AH?

How about leprospirosis?

Bactrim for acne vulgaris - severe?

What is nesatidine?

And many many more! Although sometimes people can be nasty too - but it's ok, at least I learn about all the things they asked! So exciting right :)

Tomorrow I am going back to the ward. I really hope things can be better. Somehow, I have started to enjoy the 8 flights of stairs that nobody seem to walk. It gives me moments of silence, secret hideout to pray, I need to listen to God's whispers of encouragement.

Hooi Ching, don't forget that no matter how big how bad how horrible the situation is, it won't be as real as the fact that God is with you and He knows about tomorrow. Do not forget Hooi Ching.. that the God who has been to your tomorrow is here to lead you today. Do not forget that He will not let you suffer more than you could. Do not forget that come what may, all I need is to stay focussed on the only direction. Hooi Ching, just do not forget..

God, please give me courage - to accept things that I cannot change.

Help me to refuse to let what appears to be happening to distress me and cause me to doubt.

Enable me to get my eyes off the things that make me afraid and put them on you instead.

Help me to pray about everything and then, once I have prayed, to leave the answer to that prayer in Your hands.

Amen.

Serenity Prayer

God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time,
enjoying one moment at a time,
accepting hardship as the pathway to peace;
taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is,
not as I would have it;
trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His will;
that I may be reasonably happy in this life,
and supremely happy with Him forever
in the next.

Amen