Stephanie Johnston

Atlanta

My Birthday Weekend in Charlotte!

Charlotte, Atlanta, and the Yankees!

The past month has been filled with great weekends and hard work in the clinic. October 5th was my birthday, and I was lucky enough to spend a wonderful birthday weekend in Charlotte and then two weeks later a weekend in Atlanta with my boyfriend Josh. We had a great time going to museums, the worlds largest aquarium, going to a Gaslight Anthem concert (check them out, they are awesome), and watching the Yankees play and advance to the World Series!! I am a jersey girl so I grew up going to Yankee games in the Bronx so naturally I am excited for the Yankees to be in the world series and I hope they kick some Philly butt. As always I am rooting for my Devils as well!!! I will post some pictures from my adventures in the south.

I Passed Boards!!!

After a very nerve wracking six weeks I finally found out I passed part two of boards! There is no greater weight to be lifted off ones shoulders than to check your nbce scores and to not see any asterisks. The light at the end of the tunnel is finally starting to illuminate and it is truly an exciting time. I feel very blessed to be in a situation where I can spend my days actually improving the quality of people's lives. I spent years in a job that I detested crunching numbers and watching rich greedy men get richer, and I always felt this internal need to do something greater and more rewarding. There were many days in which I questioned going back to school (while screaming out Serenity Now!) and if all this work and debt would be worth it, but I can honestly say it is. Everything is coming up Milhouse!

Taking a Stand on The Health Care Reform

As many of you know, I am rarely on the fence about many issues. I usually know rather quickly which side to defend and do so with conviction and passion. Health Care Reform is one of the rare cases in which I simply found myself indecisive.  There seemed to be too many unknowns festering around this debate. In order to make a decision I could whole-heartedly defend a lot of research had to be done. So with a great deal of research and some trepidation, I arrived at the stance of being for the health care reform, hence the title. Before the pros can even be discussed, one must understand why there is such an upheaval against the health care reform so I looked into the three biggest arguments against it and tried to find truths amidst the sea of mass hysteria and this is what I came up with:

The top three arguments against the health care reform that I found to have very little validity (actually they are blatant lies) are as follows:

1.    Myth: You will have no choice in the health care you receive.  This is just untrue. The myth that a “health choices commissioner” will decide what benefits you get seems to have first stemmed from a July 19 post on an online blog in which the homepage features a picture of Obama looking like the Joker from Batman. The truth is, the House bill sets up a heath care exchange. This exchange is essentially a list of private insurers and one government plan where people who do not have health insurance through their employer or some other source can shop for  a plan. The requirements will be floors, not ceilings, however, in that the feds will have no say in how generous the private insurance can be.  That is hardly socialized medicine.

2.    Myth: Illegal Immigrants will get Free Health Insurance. The House bill does not give anyone free health care, period. Under a 1986 law illegal’s who can’t pay do get free emergency care now. They will not be eligible for subsidies to buy health insurance.  This was another case of mass hysteria that stemmed from a defeated amendment in July when Dean Heller of Nevada tried to pass an amendment that would require those enrolling in a public plan to have citizenship verified.  So just because the amendment was defeated a viral media smear campaign started and escalated into the rumor that all illegal immigrants will get free health insurance, and it’s simply not founded in any fact.

3.    Myth: The Government will set Doctor’s Wages. This too seems to have sparked from the very same website that has Obama starring in the lead role of The Dark Knight. The House Bill says that physicians who choose to accept patients in the public insurance plan would receive 5 percent more than Medicare pays for a given service, doctors can refuse to accept such patients even in they participate in a public plan. Doctors will not be employees of the government and this is not socialized medicine.

 

Some oppose a requirement that everyone have health insurance as a sheer violation of individual liberty. It seems to me that equality is vastly compromised when people fall terminally ill and instead of trying to put all their efforts into fighting the cancer that is turning their body into a war zone, they have to worry about not having health insurance and how much said treatment will cost their family. There is something inherently wrong when doctors are driven more by insurance companies rather than what is best for their patients.  Opposition endlessly complains about the cost of the health care reform. The total cost is what is spent in one year in Iraq. The current state of health care in the United States is unacceptable. Whether the health care reform will be the answer to all our problems remains to be seen, but at least an attempt is being made to improve the state of things. The giant question that is left is where will Chiropractic fit into this mosaic of reform?

 

 

 

Life Moves Pretty Fast . . .

The further along you get in school the more you come to savor and enjoy the few breaks you get along the way. After a whirlwind quarter of outpatient clinic, part two of boards, clocking hours, and classes I am thrilled to have  a little break. I actually have two patients today, during the Monday of break, but after today I get to enjoy a week off!

On Wednesday, I am going home to New Jersey for one of my best friends wedding on Friday! I am so excited, we have been best friends since the 3rd grade and I am Maid of Honor in her wedding. New Jersey isn't always the best place to go an unwind after a period of stress, but there is nothing like going home and NJ has more character than any other state for the good and the bad! The food is unparalleled as well, and even though I probably will be practicing in another state when I graduate, NJ will always be home. They are also home to the best hockey team ever, the NJ Devils!!!!!!

I will post pictures of my NJ trip and my friends wedding when I get back. Happy Break to everyone!

The Elusive Quest for Sanity

Finally a moment to sit and breathe. The last month has been a juggling act that would take a toll on the most skilled member of cirque de solei. My first outpatient clinic was both exciting and stressful. I was thrilled to finally be doing what I came to school for, seeing patients and adjusting! Yet, amidst all that excitement and clocking in hours and trying to see patients we still had classes and tests, and of course part two of boards followed by a week of finals two days after boards. Needless to say, I was yet again one of Dunkin Donuts best customers, they should start giving me shares of stock for the business I give them. So as I concluded my second part of boards (well that is if I passed and don't have to take them again in March, knock on wood) I am left wondering if I have learned any valuable life lessons I can pass on to lower quarter students. Perhaps, I am not the best person to ask because my stress level was unquantifiable for the past 30 days and cats have taken longer naps in the span of a day then I have gotten sleep in the past month. But, perhaps I have escaped unscathed long enough to impart some nuggets of wisdom. Here are ten ways to cope with boards stress, free of charge:

1. If you hate the taste of coffee, get over it and fast.

2. If you feel overwhelmed take a night out to celebrate festivus, get a pole, grab some friends and have an airing of grievances. You will feel like a million bucks.

3. Take deep breaths

4. Listen to classical music while you are studying for boards, it will calm and relax you and stimulates parts of your brain that you will need for a long time!

5. If you feel like you are getting sick, or have a tickle in your throat start downing Airborne like it is the anecdote and you swallowed poison. I swear by that stuff, it is gold baby!

6. If you feel so stressed that you want to punch every person who uses poor grammar or who snorts while laughing just think of something funny like a line from Wedding Crashers and laugh it off. When all else fails, instead of going postal just think WWVVD (What Would Vince Vaughn Do?)

7. Just take it one day at a time, keep a planner and just focus on mini-goals of what you need to do each day to prepare for clinic, boards, classes, and family. If you just focus on one day at a time and cross things off your list and you complete them, you won't feel quite so overwhelmed.

8. Make sure you get enough sleep the nights leading up to boards. Don't pull all nighters right before boards, trust me I have seen people do this and they don't even know their names the day of boards, its a bad move! If you don't know it by 8 or 9 the night before, you will never know it!

9. Do not under any circumstance, talk about the section you just took in between tests. If you start talking to the peanut gallery and the questions you may have missed you will start freaking out and do poorly on the next section. Bring your ipod and listen to music in between and brush up on the next section.

10. Wear your lucky t-shirt the day of the test. I wore my star wars t-shirt, hopefully the force was with me! Good Luck!

Greenville Drive

This past weekend a group of Sherman students went to enjoy America's favorite past-time, baseball. Greenville has a minor league baseball team downtown that is affiliated with the Boston Redsocks (Booo, Go Yankees!) The only plus side of the Redsocks affiliation is that the stadium was modeled after Fenway Park, just a smaller version. For less then ten bucks you can enjoy an entertaining night of baseball with friends. Then after the game you can go to the movies to see such films as Prognosis Negative and Sack Lunch!

Back To School: Tenth Quarter and Outpatients!

    After a wonderful break full of traveling it was time to go back to Sherman College for another quarter. This quarter I entered tenth quarter and can now start seeing outpatients in the Health Center and must start clocking hours. Classes have finally started to dwindle down, but new stresses arise as we enter outpatient clinic. Many students are consumed with the same worries as I, how will I get outpatients? Will I be able to meet requirements? Will I be able to do my best at adjusting?

    All we can do as students is take it one day at a time, and just start with people we know. It is an exciting new chapter and one that I hope will work out and lead to an even greater appreciation for Chiropractic as I start to develop the skills that I have been given thus far. I also have Part two of Boards in September so I am hoping to harness new skills for my eternal quest to find balance. Sometimes I feel like George Castanza playing one giant game of Frogger with my life. Sometimes you have to take steps back or to the side in order to get to where you are going. So here we go.

Summer Series: New Jersey

    Second stop during break was Home, Sweet Home. New Jersey. One of my best friends, whom I have been friends with since the third grade is getting married in September and I am the Maid of Honor, so I went home for she Bridal Shower and to see friends and family! New Jersey will always be considered home for me no matter how far away I am, or whether I actually ever live there again. There is something about being from Jersey that shapes who you are and stays with you as part of your core for your entire life. Trust me, I know a lot of jokes are aimed at NJ but there is something unique about New Jersey that can never be replicated, it is riddled with character. Whether that character is always good can be debated at length, but it stands alone regardless.

    New Jersey isn't exactly a place you go to for relaxation, so unlike Houston there is stress involved especially while driving! There is traffic everywhere and I can't say I missed driving in NJ. As soon as I rented the car in Newark Airport, I could feel my blood pressure elevating! Nonetheless, this is home for me and where most of my best friends live as well as all of my family besides my immediate family who now lives in South Carolina. I was great to see family and friends, and eat the wonderful cuisine that can only be found in the Tri-State area! Italian food, pizza, bagels, bread, Italian pastries, and even the black in white cookie which can be found in every bakery and restaurant in NJ are all unparralled! For we know all of lifes questions can be answered by simply looking to the cookie!