Man Seeking Boredom

The other side of medicine is that your doctor constantly worries she is becoming boring. As a medical student, my days outside the hospital are spent clicking through question banks, diagnosing myself with all of the conditions I read about (those dreaded defense mechanisms...). When I am out with non-med friends, I find I have nothing to tell them about besides weird patient cases while they have moved on to promotions, incomes, traveling, and marriage. (I also seem to spend a lot of time reassuring 20-year olds that they do not have cancer, but that is another topic for another day)

Recently (not-so-recently, I started writing this in August) I was at a beach bonfire with two friends from high school. While my friends were talking about various intellectual pursuits they would like to undertake, I offered that my ideal future was lying on a beach somewhere (under a SPF 50 tent, of course). Not even reading, just lying there, taking in the vista for hours on end.

I'm turning 25 soon, and I guess the thing that scares me the most is how I went from a super ambitious 21 year-old (just read the archives of this blog!) to a 25 year-old who no longer reads books for leisure, just absentmindedly touches the images on pages of a magazine. Is this what medical training does to us?