Nothing Worth Having Comes Easy

Goals take effort. Wishing simply just never is and never will be enough. It's not easy, but is not impossible either.

Weekly Report 9/3/18 to 9/9/18

A part of growing up is building an identity, a purpose, and ultimately an end goal that satisfies the effort you have put in to grow a product. ISM has inevitably been that journey to begin to formulate a purpose and build on a person’s existence even if that meant establishing a first impression through maintaining a stature, a poise, and a knowledgeable vernacular.

The challenge of this week was maintaining that standard especially with the commencement of my first interview with Dr. Diana Castro. By far, this was one of the most insightful and “real” interviews with a professional, possibly because her thoughts were highly relatable. As a female, sometimes a balance of work and professional life are people’s first question due to the tenacity required to maintain a healthy lifestyle in addition to a stellar professional life. I was beyond excited for this first interview because it was an exhausting journey to find a female in the field of pediatric neurology/neurosurgery. Females are highly in demand in this field due to the scarcity of female doctors, thus it was thrilling to finally find someone to voluntarily allow me to interview them.

The primary outlook Dr. Castro held was so real that it was much easier to get a basic idea of what life will be like after medical school. People tend to fabricate or “sugar-coat” how easy it is to be in a certain career field, but Dr. Castro gave me the ins and the outs. She was also relatable on a personal level whether that was her personality or her life at home which truly replicated the pathway that I want to pave. The whole experience was enlightening just to see how she balanced her life and was something to take from as an inspiration.

In addition, Dr. Braga informed me that the research paper that we had opened up can progress. There was a bit of disheartening when he informed me that the research and publication process could not continue due to restrictions; however, it looks like we can restart this journey once again. Hopefully, this directs us towards publishing our paper on fusions in Chiari malformation. The progression of this paper looks bright and hopefully we gear towards publication by late fall.

Overall, the next couple of weeks are mostly reserved for interviews, research, and beginning mentor visits again. Soon enough, this journey should be headed in the right direction towards accomplishing the ideas I have in mind!