My Journey of becoming a TCM Physician Series: Chapter 1 Hopes and Dreams
Chapter 1
Hopes and Dreams
Warning: The following content contains twists, joyful upheavals and emotional drop downs interweaved amongst elements of sweat, tears, laughter and numbed stoning moments.
So where should I start?
Ok, let’s talk about dreams and hopes. There is always one essay or writing in elementary schools with the topic “What will you like to be when you grow up?”
For me, my vocabulary for occupations was super limited when I was young, so I always put either engineer or architect, although I have no idea what they do. Interest in human body developed when science classes came into my life and then followed by Biology. The idea of becoming a doctor became cool thereafter.
Things look more interesting in the world of medicine and healthcare when a new double degree course was offered. And it sounds exciting to be the pioneer batch. It sounds even more exciting to be studying Western medicine and Chinese Medicine at the same time, having the best of both world, I thought.
The journey started when I had both modules of Biomedicine and Chinese Medicine mostly on the same day everyday, so you can imagine my brain needed to switch from CNN to CNTV back and forth a few times in a day. Spirits were always higher when the Chinese Medicine classes were on, the teachers that flew in from the university in Beijing which I was going to head over after 3 years were all experts and cream of the crop in their field. After every TCM lesson, my marvel towards TCM was always being pushed a notch up higher. Chinese language for me and my coursemates (even those jia kandang ones (English speaking Chinese) automatically advanced to expert level after just 1 month into the course. It was amazing to see how fast the body and mind reacted and got used to such intensive daily exposure of language.
The few of my Western Medicine textbooks which we scurry to get just to make sure we can understand things better and faster and pass exams usually in a matter of 2 to 3 months time!
Nevertheless, studying 2 degrees at one go means the days were buried in lectures and tutorials and never ending memorizing missions for tests after tests. Plus sometimes modules were arranged as such that contents needed to be consolidated and delivered and digested and then regurgitated within as short as 2 months. Even some of the Western Medical Doctors who gave us the lectures claimed they were doing something of miracle-level: to let us master 1 year medical course of Anatomy/Physiology/Pathology within less than 3 months. So you can imagine day in day out, the brain was just basking in either C2H2OH molecules, H pylori bacteria, omentum, femur and humerus or Compendium of Chinese Materia Medica.
Still, it was always inspiring to listen to the stories of the TCM lecturers and their clinical experiences. One of them I remembered vividly was my TCM Diagnostic Lecturer who one day revealed her real age to us with the showing of her ID card to us. She was literally a 60 plus year old in a 40 year old body. I think it was from then I became so into anti aging techniques in TCM, maybe subconsciously. But they do work (because the problem I face now is literally looking too young).
Anyways 3 years passed and it was the end of chomping down 1 big degree. We all thought life could finally lighten up by 50% as China awaited! How much harder could it get after going through three years of everything in double-size and double fast forwards? （Or so I thought ）
Further reading:
Everything you need to know about Acupuncture
Men’s Health Series: Which is the Better Way to Treat Prostatitis - TCM or Western Medicine?
How do Acupuncture and Acupressure work and which is the Better One
Everything you need to know about Dampness
It is not normal to have cysts and fibroids
Why Everything Cold is Discouraged during Menstruation
Men’s Health: Low libido equals low testosterone?
