Diary of a Doctor

  Happy New Year dear friends. We made it to the amazingly pregnant year 2023!  May it deliver to us the goodness thereof. May we be beneficiaries of its numerous blessings while the evil thereof will never come near our abodes.  It has been such a long time I showed up on this side of the world. My apologies for the inconsistency. However, I have decided to turn over a new leaf and steadiness of writing is one of my goals which would be equivalent to New year resolutions for believers of that. Now, we have a lot to catch up on. Last year 2022 was a very interesting year. It was full of numerous wins, pleasant surprises, answered prayers, some failures, a lot of tears, few disappointments, etc. I made new friends, re-connected with old friends. I finished residency training in Internal Medicine. My status changed. I became an attending physician or as we call it in my country of origin, I became a consultant. All glory to God. I am a woman of faith for those of you who do...

Hello World! It has been a long while I showed up on this side of things but I am glad to be back here. I want to share some very important tips that will be helpful for anyone planning to start residency program in the United States of America. You need to be aware of these things. I realized that we put in a lot of effort to prepare for the moment leading up to the match, but not many people are adequately equipped with all the right information needed before residency actually starts.  However, before I proceed, I need to say "congratulations!" It is a huge feat that you are at this point and you should never forget that. You deserve all the accolades. A few pieces of advice from someone almost at the very end of a journey you are just about to start. These are a bit unconventional because I do not typically mince my words. If you take to these pieces of advice, in the words of one of my favorite interns, ‘you will be in good shape’.  1. Get an index card and document this...

  It was a typical morning about two years ago when my daughter was quite younger. I was trying to get the children ready for pre-school. My daughter was all ready and groomed and I was trying to help her older brother get ready too when I suddenly heard a noise. It sounded like someone was in distress. It was my daughter crying loudly and frantically trying to open the door to her room because she had apparently  jammed the door and locked herself up. I ran to her rescue and mommy saved the day, in the words of paw patrol, by opening it with a key from my side. Words could not describe the relief written all over her face. She gave me the warmest hugs her tiny hands could give. I was so sure she would not be going near door locks anytime soon. When something goes wrong especially in an unexpected circumstance, most people start panicking as the default mode. It is kind of expected because the human body instantly goes into a "flight or fight" mode in order to protect the ind...

  Yes, face mask acne is now a thing. It is called "Maskne". I have always prided myself in having a very beautiful, smooth skin. Even as a teenager, I never had issues with acne at all. Therefore, when all of a sudden in the year 2020, few months into the pandemic, I noticed a number of pimples on my face. It was especially around the edges of the mask where it made contact with my skin. I also noticed quite a few just on my cheeks as well. Then, I realized it was attributable to the mask. The timing of when I started noticing the pimples tallied with when I started wearing a disposable N95 mask all day whenever I worked at the hospital. That is a very long time to adorn these masks. But safety over comfort is a wisdom nugget to hold in high esteem especially at this time. Another reason I knew it was the face mask that was responsible for the break-outs or acne, was because at the time I had stopped applying make up because there was no point anyway because it gets covered ...

  Happy New year friends. May this be a great year for you all. May you never have to describe it with the word horror . Rather, may it be filled with hope of brighter days. That is why I want to talk about hope today. I randomly decided to type in the word "hope" into my google search box and curiously awaited my results. The first thing that caught my eyes was the definition of hope. First was the noun which means ; a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen, synonymous with aspiration, desire, wish, expectation, ambition, aim, plan, dream, daydream, pipe dream. While the verb means ' to want something to happen or be the case'. This is synonymous with expect, anticipate, look for, wait for, be hopeful of, pin one's hopes on, want. This year 2021, you have to want something great and positively mind-blowing happen to you. You have to work very hard to make sure that happens. What have you written down in your journal as a list of things yo...

  I know this year 2020 has been a year like no other. It is the year of the Pandemic. We have experienced a lot of dimensions to this pandemic. A lot has happened.  A lot of tears have been shed. A lot of pain have been endured across the globe this year. I am not sure any dolorimeter has been designed to cater to the immense measure of pain 2020 has spewn on earth. Many have lost their sources of livelihood. Many have lost their homes. Many have lost their dignity.  Many have gone hungry. Many have lost their marriages. Many have lost their lives. It is almost too much. However, you made it up to this point! There is still hope. There is covid vaccine now available which is also reported to be quite effective.  The vaccine has been described as "A Ray of Hope". Some call it "A Shot of Hope". Wait for and wait on this hope. We know that hope is that ability to chose to see light despite all the darkness. I know you had high hopes for this year. Big dreams, dazzling...

Talking about my personal journey, I have lost count of the number of people that have ever made comments on my eyes. Some were nice, some were rude, but I really never cared because my eyes are one of the qualities that endeared me to my then fiance, now husband. You have to free yourself from the "people bondage". There is nothing that can be perfect in their eyes anyway, which is totally fine. As long as you are perfect to yourself each time you look in the mirror. As long as the person staring back at you makes you smile, people's opinions do not count. 'Your eyes are beautiful'. "You have 'cat eyes'". "Your eyes are big". "Your eyes are globular". "Your eyes are sexy". "Your eyes are huge". As far as I am concerned, my eyes are beautiful because God made me beautifully in His image and in His likeness. No one on earth contributed anything to the way they look until they discovered plastic surgery. So I...

  A while ago, before my residency program started, we drove to the gas station to get some fuel into the car. While my husband was sorting that out, I looked across at the convenience store within the gas station and saw a notice pasted on the window stating that someone had won $50,000.00 in lottery at that location. I found that quite interesting. Normally I do not even bother to try the lottery because I just don't do well with anything lottery-like. So, I decided to find out the probability of actually winning a lottery.  At the time, I realized that the probability of winning a jackpot was 1 in 13,983,816. You have a better chance of getting in a car accident, plane accident or getting struck by lightening than it is to win the lottery. I actually did a little research and found out that the lifetime odds of dying from a local meteorite, asteroid or comet impact was 1 in 1,600,000. Compared with 1 in 90 for a car accident, 1 in 250 for a fire, 1 in 60,000 for a tornado, ...

  I love writing. I derive pleasure in simply putting pen to paper. I have written a host of things that lie hidden and carefully stored away from prying eyes. However, I have made a resolve to share some of those hence, I share a piece I wrote over a year ago as I realized that it is quite relevant at this time. I call it " The Dark side of Choice". Choice is supposed to be a good thing. A gift in itself. Alas, it is sometimes the bane of many pursuits in life. If peradventure you make a wrong choice, then you are totally tangential to your destiny and that is rather unfortunate. So choice is a big deal. Choice is a serious business. Imagine my frustration when I went to the ice-cream parlour once to treat myself to a great sweet tasting, having crushed my health goals for the week and desiring to reward myself. I simply wanted ice- cream, that was all I wanted only to be confronted with a long list of options. You won't believe there were about 32 different options of i...

Hello World, it has been a long while. I took a short break off this blog to focus on life. A lot has happened since I last posted here; however, one thing I can say is that I am back and I am better. I have been through a process of refinement and now have a better understanding of who I really am. I am in a better relationship with myself and it can only get better. Thus, I am re-launching a new season of my blogging experience with this short poem I wrote below. Enjoy. What you become in the process is more important than the dream itself. The kind of person that you become, The kind of character that you build, The courage that you develop, The resilience you retain, The faith you are developing, Are all an integral component of your process of becoming. So, when life gets hard, do it hard, When life gets tough, do it tough. The process is an integral part of your story. The scars and tears along the way are only trophies that complete the story. It is like th...

The true narrative of this epic year began to unfold before our very eyes, initially like a joke, till we all realized we are in this drama for a long haul. Our only hope is that it ends as a comedy. However, that kind of sounds like wishful thinking in the light of what has transpired in these past horrific weeks. The world as we know it, our lives, will never be the same again.  As the year started out, words like “furlough”, “pandemic”, “N95”, “virus”, “surge”, “quarantine”, “ventilator” and even statements like “flattening the curve”, “stay at home”, “those fighting on the front lines”, “stimulus cheques” were not part of our day-to-day vocabulary as it has sadly become our reality. The abrupt change in routine is not part of the typical modus operandi. What is this micro-organism that has thrown the world into chaos? What is this contagion that has put nations on their knees and has snatched away our brightest in their prime? What is this plague that has torn...

Several years ago, I was a freshly minted medical doctor who found herself as the only doctor-on-call in the Emergency room of a JCI-accredited hospital deep in the heart of Lagos, Nigeria. I quickly realized early in my career life that the ER was not going to be my "thing". I knew pretty early to choose internal medicine. There I was, face to face with a middle-aged woman who was in acute painful distress from complications of cervical cancer that had spread around her body. I did all I could to alleviate her pain. I cannot forget the forlorn look on her face. The sad reality is that her clinical state at that time could have been prevented. If only she was equipped with knowledge and deep understanding about cervical cancer and it's prevention pretty early.  A couple of years back, my mom came visiting on holiday from Nigeria and I ensured that she had a cervical screening before she left back for home. I know that I am a good daughter, thank you. Apart from the ...

No matter how disappointed you tend to feel regarding all you had set out to achieve at the beginning of the year, but for some reason just did not happen, stop beating yourself up. Stop blaming the universe for your portion. Stop crying over spilt milk. Actually, it's high time you picked a mop and decide to dry up the floor with the moping stick and rid it of the wasted "milk". Stop dwelling on the mechanism with which the "event" happened and simply move on. At least try and give yourself some degree of credit for the things you did achieve, even if it is not much. Peradventure you had list of things you really wanted to achieve, but only sixty percent of that happened. Hey, celebrate! You are no longer who you used to be. You are 365 plus days wiser in experience, both on how things should be done, as well as how they are not supposed to be done.You have another opportunity in the coming New year to re-focus, re-analyze, re-strategize, and attain all you...

Many people, especially young professionals tend to live life in the fast lane with the associated pressures that come with it. You cannot blame them because a desire for success and a better future tends to drive most people. Therefore, there is this tendency to get carried away by the busyness of work and  have genuine excuse for not working out. I realized that you have two options basically - either to do something or do nothing. You either make up your mind to live healthy and sometimes practically drag your tired body to the gym. It might be hard and painful but at the end, you will have yourself to thank for that singular decision. Here are a few Tips to ensure a fitness lifestyle: 1) Choose the stairs over the elevator - You will be amazed by how many steps you get in by just making a decision to use the stairs and ditch the lifts. Apart from helping to keep you fit, this saves you time. 2) Register at the gym - Even for really self-motivated individuals, worki...

Having survived my very first quarter of internship, I decided to share some gained perspectives. I have never taken for granted for once the rare opportunity for a foreign medical graduate like myself to be able to take my residency training here in the United States of America. Even though this is like my third internship literally speaking, across three different continents, this is totally different. I do not know if the fact that the first time I did intern year, I was a young fresh graduate from a medical school who had just been officially "unleashed to the unsuspecting society" in the voice of one of my professors back in Nigeria ,who had this practical joke of a statement about interns. I approached and embraced life as a real doctor with great gusto. I aced intern year without stress or tears. I was by myself. The second time I did intern year, I was back in England. I have always been a soul passionate about medicine. Such that when the winds of life blew me...