Talking to Med Students

Yesterday, I got to speak to an auditorium of second year medical students because my social worker Lisa was giving a presentation on psychosocial resources and breast cancer. It was very fun and I actually enjoy public speaking because I'm a bit of a ham.

We talked for about 30 minutes and the med students had fantastic questions and were so lovely, many of them thanked me and said that they rarely see really positive patients throughout their patient presentations. That made me feel good because doctors should get to see what the spectrum of possible patients may look like and they do have a difficult job.
Below is a recording of the talk we had although the audio sometimes is very quiet because, when I talk, I like to walk around. That must be from when I was teaching junior high school and the vast majority of students were texting and reading comic books secretly :).

 I have to converted my MP3 file to a video. Yay!!

The questions that the future doctors asked were:

• Tell us how you found the lump?
• Were you afraid to tell your boyfriend?
• What support have you received and that you liked from family, friends and medical professionals?
• Are you treated differently by others since getting diagnosed?
• Have you always been positive and what has helped you be positive?
• Have you tried support groups and how did you find them?
• How did your doctors decide that you were metastatic and was it from the core biopsy?
• Are you a religious person and has that played a role in your positivity?
• What about sex post diagnosis?

I thought that they will become a stunning group of doctors and I'm so glad that we'll benefit from them!