Surviving the Last Month of Classes

Its already Halloween?! Tomorrow is November?! I turn 25 on Thursday?!

Where has this year gone?

This has been my favorite semester of Pharmacy School so far. We've got fewer classes, less busy work, and more time for fun!  I'm so thankful for the group of friends I have gained through graduate school...who knew that the people I met and befriended at Pharmacy Weekend three years ago would become some of my best friends? We are a big (sometimes dysfunctional) family, but I genuinely love the people who I've spent nearly every day of the last two and a half years with.  We are down to 27 days of classes left together before we split up for rotations...while thrilled on one hand to get out of the classroom and practice what I'll actually be doing in life, I'm also really sad that I won't be seeing my friends day in and day out. I'm even more sad that one of my best friends (also my boyfriend) is moving to Nashville in December to start his rotations there.

Thank goodness Pharmacy School has slowed down some, because my MBA program is good at keeping me occupied! I'm taking two classes this semester (one online and one that I actually attend class for) and while they aren't difficult, they definitely require work.  Its hard to be working on stuff for those classes when all my pharmacy school friends are relishing in the fact that we don't have much to do! I do think this program is going to be worth my time as far as my future career goes.  While I want to practice as a pharmacist for a while, I can't imagine working 14 hour days when I have a family to take care of. Hopefully this MBA will allow me to get into hospital administration work or distract managing a pharmacy chain.

My parents always said that the older you get, the faster time goes. I'm currently experiencing this phenomenon in my life...where has 2011 gone? How can it almost be 2012? How am I turning 25 this week?  Turning 25 seems like a milestone to me, however silly that may seem. I'm a quarter of a century old. I'm in my mid-late 20s. I've been terrified to turn 25 for the longest time, mostly because my life isn't what I always thought it would be by the time I reached this age.  While I'm not married or planning a family (hey, I'm from the south...I'm a rarity here!), I'm truly going to be able to say that I did things for me. I've gone somewhere far from home to get an education (6 hours is a lot for me!), I'm going to graduate from a top 15 graduate school, I'm going to have 2 graduate degrees (a doctorate and an MBA), and I've done it because its the best thing for me. No one else influenced my decision, and I didn't settle for an unfulfilled life to please someone else. I'm convinced that 25 is going to be one of the best years of my life, and I can't wait to see what it has in store for me!

Back to watching lectures, working on a patient presentation, and getting ready for our Halloween Party tonight!