Prezzies!

Had a rather interesting teaching session earlier this morning about autism and its family (i.e. diseases in the autistic spectrum such as Asperger's). We were talking about typical human behaviour and how we can observe different, subtle traits in the population. Some folks who're thought of as 'geeks' might be suffering from Asperger's. They'd have little or no social skills; might be incredibly bright in academic arenas such as IT, maths etc; might have obsessions with particular subjects e.g. dinosaurs, Star Trek etc; and so on and so forth. Apparently Bill Gates displays certain Asperger’s traits, and Newton (who’s well-known to have led a very reclusive life, whilst occasionally being extremely absorbed in his work that he neglects to feed himself) and Einstein as well. There’s a whole range of conditions that would be worth a discussion, but I won’t delve deeper into the subject for the simple reason that I don’t know much about it just yet.

Another interesting topic of discussion was the differences in clinical presentation with regards to gender. In Asperger’s, there’s a lack of empathy with a decrease in social skills and most of the patients are male. In William’s Syndrome, patients are over-empathic and do very well in social situations, and most of them are female. Which begs the question if there’s something inbuilt in the neurophysiology of men and women that might explain the differences in general gender attitudes (e.g. men being unfeeling bastards who don’t care vs emotional women who care too much). Maybe there’s a biological explanation for why men are from Mars and women are from Venus.

I have realised yet again that I do get rather keen and involved when the topics on discussion revolve around psychiatry or psychology, which makes me wonder yet again if psychiatry is the path that I should take. And yet again, the environment to practise psychiatry back home isn’t exactly ideal. What to do, what to do…

Yesterday's study group session wasn't as rewarding as it should've been, primarily 'cause we ended up being more confused than when we started out. Not a very good sign, I'd say! But we did have an enjoyable afternoon chat over some snacks and OJ. Will be hosting next weekend's session, and since we'll be going over Paeds, theoretically I should be in a position to shed more light on the subject. Which reminds me... I've got a test tomorrow, and observed clerking later on this evening. I really should be burying my nose in my Paeds book...

The highlight of the past 24 hours though, is the fact that I’ve received my not-so-little list of items from Sweetie, which included some Koko Krunch, a large jar of Ladies' Choice chocolate-striped peanut butter, a packet of Oreos with peanut butter filling (yup, I'm a huge peanut butter fan) and a large bright red V-day card. Apparently Sweetie also passed some Hershey's, but that's probably lost in Em's luggage at the moment. For my b’day, I received 2 rather gorgeous Mambo t-shirts, one of which caught my eye last summer when we were window shopping at OU. Needless to say, I'm pretty overjoyed and filled with gratitude and giddiness at the moment. Thanks again, hun!