Day 137 - Almost There

One of my classmates said that whenever I mention anything lately, it's about the time off we have. Yeah, I'm a bit (a lot) excited about it. One more final tomorrow night.
Anyway, about tonight. I have been studying for this pathology quiz we had tonight for the last couple days. I think I did ok. I won't know the results until probably the new year. I may have actually gotten my first "B" out of this class. Wow. I'm just preparing myself for the possibility.
One thing I wish: I wish that when our Pathology "Textbook" talks about an abnormality, it would talk not only about what it is, where it came from, the functional significance, and the stuff it has in it now, but also how the Massage Therapist handles it - do we work on it or not?
After the quiz on the nervous system, we began learning about pathologies of the endocrine system. By the way, our "regular" teacher (still trying to figure out who our regular teacher is) was out sick so we had a TA teaching us the material. Since we aren't being quizzed or tested on this, and I was/am tired as an old coot, I left at the last break.
I'll have to make sure that I study endocrine pathologies before I take the national certification exam.

Day 133 - Pathologeez

I have to say right now that I enjoy my classes, my classmates, and most of the teachers and even some of the substitutes. And as you know, there is always a BUT. BUT I'm really looking forward to not seeing any of them for two weeks over Christmas break. I need to just sit and stare* for awhile and not think about massage, anatomy, pathology, shiatsu, russian, acupressure, structure, cranialsacral, or professional development. If that's wrong, sorry.
At any rate, our teacher - I'm not really sure is supposed to be our "regular teacher" for Pathology anyway - wasn't there, so we got the joy of having one of our favs teach us tonight. She definitely knows how to handle our class, and I think that she is one of the only teachers that all of us respect and enjoy at the same time. And I'm not just saying that because I know she reads my blog.
Anyway, in our class tonight, we had a quiz first thing. Apparently, the majority of the class didn't do so well on it (I got seven out of 15), so she gave us the option of retaking it. I took the lifeline.
And ended up getting a 14 out of 15 in the re-take!
I have to say, Pathology has a lot of diseases/abnormalities that all sound the same, and it's really hard to remember which symptoms go with which name.
We then learned some pathologies of the nervous system. Some of them were very familiar, like ischemic stroke and intracranial inflammation - which is what happened to my dad almost exactly three years ago, but that's a whole long story in itself.
We also learned about seizures and some symptoms of the different types of seizures. Like muscle spasms or staring*. When we were talking about the symptom of staring, all I could think of is one of my frequent status updates on facebook: *blink*blink*stare*...meaning that I'm just so tired or out of it, that's all I can manage to do right at that moment.
Also of note, since we got CC (the Commuter Car), I fill it up with gas every night right before class or during the first break. Hey - with 200 miles a day between WGH and me, go figure. Anyway, oddly enough, the gas station I usually frequent next to the school was out of gas tonight. So I went to one down the street and found that it was also out of gas. What's going on in Linthicum that there is no gas???
There are a couple of guys that work at the gas station I normally go to. They are a trip. I was minding my own business a couple months ago, pre-paying for my gas with cash, and when I came back inside to get the change, Rashid told me that they don't give out change on Mondays. *blank stare*
The next night, he told me that they don't give out change on Tuesdays, so I said, "I thought that was Mondays." He said, "Monday is Kumail's night. Tuesday is my night." So we started a little rapport about it. Well, I had built up so much change from them, that one night, I took all of the one dollar bills to pre-pay for my gas and he was quite surprised and said something about all the ones. I told him that it was from all the times I worked the pole. I told him that I needed to get a better club where they throw fives and twentys. Yeah, I enjoy picking on my guys there.
Then there's the young lady that works at the Subway. She sees me and knows exactly what I want. Wow! Now that's service!
Anyway, a little long-winded tonight, but I remembered all these things that I wanted to share. Have a great night and a pleasant tomorrow.

Day 42 - Mas Mater

Tonight was the first night of learning the Cranial Sacral modality which helps with headaches, neck and back pain, and other stuff I don't seem to remember that was on the list. I found it quite fascinating to know that the head expands and contracts in a rhythm and actually makes the whole body move due to its rhythm.
Through the lecture, we got to hear more about the central nervous system and the dura mater, arachnoid mater, and pia mater. I'm very glad that we had anatomy and learned about the nervous system before having this class.
We partnered up and all we did was just see if we could feel the cranial expansion rhythm. My partner felt mine, and I believe I felt his.

Day 31 - Thai-ing the Knot

I forgot to add something to last night's entry. One of our TA's for last night's class is currently taking a Continuing Education class in Thai massage. From the little bit I've learned about it, it's like Yoga for lazy people because somebody else is doing the stretching for you, using your body. Our TA was demonstrating a few moves to a few of us using a classmate as the guinea pig. He had her upside down with him on the floor and her glutes on his knees. She was almost in a backbend position with him supporting her. In another move, she was lying on the floor, on her back, and he picked up her legs by the ankles, crossed them around his legs and he did a squat, stretching her quads, hamstrings, hip flexors, and goodness knows what else. It fascinated me, seeing as how she was pretty much a pretzel. I think I'll have to be in better shape to try that. From either end...giving or receiving!
As far as tonight's class goes, we had another quiz on the nervous system. Despite not having the luxury of being able to study like I did over the weekend, between work and school and driving to or from, I managed to earn a 9.5 out of 10.
After the quiz, we learned about the Endocrine System and the basics about all the glands that make up this system. We learned about how the endocrine system uses positive feedback and negative feedback to control its systems and the hormones the glands release. To sum it all up with an example, we went over the system's role in the female menstrual cycle. One of the classmates declared that he was glad he was a guy.
In learning this, I also discovered that I am looking forward to learning pathology in regards to the endocrine system. For those of you like me, who don't (or didn't) know what "pathology" is, it's the study of why certain systems don't work the way they're supposed to. Or at least, that's my understanding of what it is now. Check back with me next week...well, how about tomorrow?

Day 29 - Nervous Progress

This evening's class represented my progress in learning the nervous system, as we had our first QUIZ! I've been graded on written and hands-on final exams and I've been graded on homework, but tonight, we had our first quiz, worth only 10 points, in Anatomy, and more specifically, the Nervous System. More importantly than the points, though, it demonstrated where I may need to study more or if I'm studying enough. To make a long story short, I got a 100%, so I guess I'm stduying well enough.

After the quiz, we learned even MORE about the nervous system, specifically the Central Nervous system, and the different names for connective tissue and spaces within the brain, like dura mater, pia mater, and arachnoid mater.
Even prior to this class, I had a tendancy to break down words when I heard new vocobulary, sometimes taking it back to the Latin roots and such. So, do you know what these names actually translate to?
Dura Mater - Strong Mother
Pia Mater - Delicate Mother
Arachnoid Mater - Spider-like Mother
I like Dura and Pia, but Spider-like? When looking at the anatomical reason for that name, it makes sense, but I think that most mothers out there may be slighty weirded out by that.
We colored some brain pictures to get used to where things are, and I realized that my coloring skills haven't improved that much since I was five. We learned about craniosacral fluid, where it's produced, not in Colorado, but in the Choroid Plexus, and also what it does - protects the brain, giving it cushion to keep from bumping up against the skull everytime it gets jolted.
Speaking of brains, mine is on overload, so good night and watch out for Spider-Mothers.

Day 25 - Getting a Little Nervous

I began my first Anatomy class. I can't remember if I've ever even HAD an anatomy class - even in high school. During this four week class of Anatomy, we'll be studying the Nervous System, the Endocrine System, and something else. I forget what it is without looking at the syllabus. Eh, you'll find out later anyway.
We learned tonight that the nervous system is kinda like a biological computer - it takes input in, processes it, and spits out output. We learned about neurons, synapse, myelin, and a bunch of other words that I'm going to have to write down on flashcards, with descriptions on the back.

Part of me has a nerd-like fascination about this - as talking about synapse reminds me of Star Trek because Dr Beverly Crusher would talk about the double synaptic relays that Klingons like Lt Worf have - and part of me wants to blankly stare into space. And yet another part wants to take everything in because it's the nervous system that is mostly affected by Multiple Sclerosis (MS), a disease that my brother was diagnosed with in 1991. I'm sure I will be learning more about MS when we get to the Pathology section.
Whatever happens from today on, I'm a bit nervous, but I can almost see me going "geek" with this.
I also found out that I have a 4.0 GPA right now. Yay!
Let the fun begin!