Stressed tf out with anatomy. Is this normal?

[chillingpanda]

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[Spectreman]

I just finished my 2nd week of med school and I’m pretty overwhelmed. I’m about 1.5 lectures behind but we’re going to have 2 more tomorrow and the ppts are dense. During undergrad I was always on top of the material so feeling this behind is giving me anxiety. My school does hardcore anatomy (gross anatomy, microanatomy, histology...etc) first then we moved onto the other sciences (20 weeks condensed into about 11 weeks). I never retain anything if I just read over the ppts & always relied on making Anki Cards which worked well for me in undergrad and still does but the ppts so go in-depth sometimes Idk what they’re talking about and it’s difficult to make a good card, plus the reviews always take 2-3 hours since I’ll have so many cards since our tests are straight from the ppts & past students tell us to know every single world. Am I just suppose to grind it out? Is anatomy this time consuming? I feel like I’m putting in 7-8 hours a day but it still seems like it’s not enough. I’ve also never taken anatomy before so this is all new to me.

If your school holds review sessions go to some of those and you’ll hear from upper classmates what to focus on for your specific professors.

 

[austintr]

My school was big on netter's and I hate flashcards. But there are netter's flashcards that are kind of nice for things like skull anatomy and such, and your learning resources dept may have a set you can flip through.

I never used Anki, but I hear image occlusion is pretty much a must-have for anatomy and histo and the like.

You can't memorize hundreds to thousands of slides, so don't worry about that. Start with stuff that has clinical correlations and find out what each prof likes outside that and you'll be ok. This is just an adjustment period and everyone goes through it.

90% of med school is learning what's important and parsing through the rest.

 

[Medic741]

Get the netter coloring book. I would not have passed without it. Try to figure out the patters and relationships, everything else will fall into place

 

[DO2015CA]

1.5 lectures behind ain’t ****. Wait until you are 22 lectures behind and boards up coming. You will be fine

 

[Ho0v-man]

1.5 lectures behind ain’t ****. Wait until you are 22 lectures behind and boards up coming. You will be fine

1st semester: oh man. I’m a lecture behind! I’m doomed!

2nd semester: man I’m like 4 days behind! Gonna be one helluva weekend!

3rd semester: guess I just won’t get to all of this last week before the test. Not my fault the school is stupid!

Walking into 4th semester finals: I haven’t watched a lecture since before spring break. Wonder what this is even gonna be about.


OP, it would be weird if you weren’t stressed AF right now. Just keep making multiple passes to the best of your ability.

 

[BorntobeDO?]

I already know it. Every single sentence in the PowerPoint is fair game, even the ones that seem irrelevant which is why I’m stressing. Idk if I should try and change my study strategy but I’ve always used flashcards and nothing else has worked for me....I would start doing zanki and stuff after anatomy but for rn I’m having to make my own cards

You need to just cover the material a minimum of three times and cut out making your own cards if its slowing you down that much. I would suggest using ANKI occlussion add on also if you havent before. A partner who makes some of the sets would be helpful also. I remember clearly feeling how you feel, honestly I went back to just going over the powerpoints and trying to connect one thing to another from slide to slide, rather than making cards. Then I did practice questions to supplement. This is enough to pass if you have to.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Am I just suppose to grind it out?

Yep. Welcome to the suck fest that is pre-clinicals. You can do it.

I feel like I’m putting in 7-8 hours a day but it still seems like it’s not enough.

That will be the norm for the rest of the first 2 years honestly.

1.5 lectures behind ain’t ****. Wait until you are 22 lectures behind and boards up coming. You will be fine

Exactly this lol. 1.5 lectures is cake.

 

[JarethGK]

I guess I’m worried since I see some of my classmates going out and still doing things besides studying. Idk how/if they’re caught up but I thought med school would be manageable if I just put in like 4-5 hours a day, but I couldn’t be more wrong. I think I just need to stop comparing myself to others and just focus on myself....

Everyone falls into this trap. It’s part of the environment, but focus on not overwhelming yourself and you may actually see scores and stuff come up as a result.

 

[fldoctorgirl]

I guess I’m worried since I see some of my classmates going out and still doing things besides studying. Idk how/if they’re caught up but I thought med school would be manageable if I just put in like 4-5 hours a day, but I couldn’t be more wrong. I think I just need to stop comparing myself to others and just focus on myself....

Stop looking at what others are doing. That is the biggest pitfall in med school and will make you miserable, because a lot of people like to act like they have everything together all the time and walk around talking about how they did x, y, and z this weekend to study and you'll be sitting there like "huh, I didn't do any of that, I must be a terrible student". So, cut this habit out now.

For anatomy, Anki cloze deletions were my saving grace. I made my own, but I know there are some pre-made decks out there. I also had some classmates that would form a group and split up decks to make amongst themselves so it wouldn't take as long.

Push through. You got this.

 

[DO2015CA]

I guess I’m worried since I see some of my classmates going out and still doing things besides studying. Idk how/if they’re caught up but I thought med school would be manageable if I just put in like 4-5 hours a day, but I couldn’t be more wrong. I think I just need to stop comparing myself to others and just focus on myself....

4-5 hours per day isn’t going to happen unless you are brilliant. It’s definitely doable. You will adapt and get through it. It’s more like a 40 hrs/wk studying. As you get more efficient with a learning style you will scale back on daily studying hours for classes, but by then you will begin to study for boards so you will still be putting more than 4-5 hours per day in.

 

[DO2015CA]

You will do great though. I tell new incoming students about my personal story. I Was always the top of my class in undergrad, all that jazz. I started school which had mandatory lectures and by Wednesday of the first week I went into the anatomy professors office hours and told her I think I’ve made a mistake. There was no way I was going to survive. She said that medical school is like eating a huge stack of the driest pancakes possible, no syrup. Each lecture was a pancake. You just eat one at a time. Focus on just that. Don’t look at the entire stack or you will throw up. If you just focus on that pancake and just eat, you will finish

 

[Goro]

I just finished my 2nd week of med school and I’m pretty overwhelmed. I’m about 1.5 lectures behind but we’re going to have 2 more tomorrow and the ppts are dense. During undergrad I was always on top of the material so feeling this behind is giving me anxiety. My school does hardcore anatomy (gross anatomy, microanatomy, histology...etc) first then we moved onto the other sciences (20 weeks condensed into about 11 weeks). I never retain anything if I just read over the ppts & always relied on making Anki Cards which worked well for me in undergrad and still does but the ppts so go in-depth sometimes Idk what they’re talking about and it’s difficult to make a good card, plus the reviews always take 2-3 hours since I’ll have so many cards since our tests are straight from the ppts & past students tell us to know every single world. Am I just suppose to grind it out? Is anatomy this time consuming? I feel like I’m putting in 7-8 hours a day but it still seems like it’s not enough. I’ve also never taken anatomy before so this is all new to me.

You're right on schedule.

Try these:

Human Anatomy Quiz

TeachMeAnatomy - Learn Anatomy Online - Question Bank

TeachMeAnatomy is a platform full of human anatomy learning resources, allowing you to learn anatomy online using in-depth guides and interactive tools.

teachmeanatomy.info

 

[jets46]

I’m in my 3rd year and I got pimped randomly today and was told to draw out the anatomy of the ducts from the gallbladder, pancreas, liver, and their attachment to the duodenum. My attending gave me until the patient was done being seen (took Maybe 2 min) to have it completely drawn out. Needless to say, I forgot a lot of it (now I have it nailed in my head). Point of the story is, don’t expect to memorize everything. Except for the sphincter of Oddi. Remember that!! Or else the juices will be flowing out of your eyes!

 

[rg2o3]

Sounds like the first few weeks of first year. It will get better.

 

[hungrydoc710]

Welcome to med school - get comfortable being uncomfortable.

In all seriousness, do you have a block system?
Do the best you can... use boards material now and go thru lecs for minute details for exams day before.

 

[Ho0v-man]

Welcome to med school - get comfortable being uncomfortable.

In all seriousness, do you have a block system?
Do the best you can... use boards material now and go thru lecs for minute details for exams day before.

This is literally the best advice for any class...

Except anatomy. Anatomy you just have to live through your schools material.

 

[Blanky]

My class has a GroupMe for Anki and split the workload. This has been my saving grace.

 

[Blanky]

I’m more frustrated with the required OMM and ethics lectures... 8am listening to how vaping is a gateway drug is a waste of my time.

 

[jurassicpark]

This is a perfectly normal feeling for a lot of people in their first few weeks of medical school. I'm sure someone's told you the expression before, "like trying to drink from a fire hose."

Anatomy is your first real big taste of medicine, and therefore can be the most nerve wracking for the newly initiated. There's a vast amount of knowledge that you have to use blunt force memorization to nail down. Part of it is learning to cope with it. Each layer of medical school and residency is about turning up the heat enough that you don't boil to death but sometimes wish you did, so what comes next won't be inhumanely overwhelming. In a few years you'll look back and realize anatomy wasn't even a thing.

 

[anthony78001]

we were all stressed and behind. it gets better. one day youll realize you didnt need most of the stuff that you had to learn in medschool either it wasnt taught clinically or you focused so much on minutia that they missed the big picture.

its all a game get through it and pass and do well on boards most importanly
dont sacrifice your mental health and make sure you make time for yourself

 

[hallowmann]

I already know it. Every single sentence in the PowerPoint is fair game, even the ones that seem irrelevant which is why I’m stressing. Idk if I should try and change my study strategy but I’ve always used flashcards and nothing else has worked for me....I would start doing zanki and stuff after anatomy but for rn I’m having to make my own cards

You're spending too much time making cards. The gold is in the clinically relevant anatomy, but realistically, its all fair game. You're not going to memorize it all. It won't happen. The goal is to make enough passes through the material that you remember enough of it to do "OK". The definition of OK is different for different people and will change as time goes forward.

It doesn’t seem that much but i don’t feel like I’ve mastered all the material in the lecture. And I’ve been slacking on going to the cadaver lab & practicing histology from the umich because I’m still tryin to catch up on these PowerPoints. Idk maybe this is normal? I’ve just never had to play catch up so much till I started med school

This is part of the problem, you were one of those undergrad students that was always "on top" of everything. You need to realize that's not going to happen in med school. You will never be that way. There will always be more that you could study. You need to become comfortable with studying the most important things and expanding from there if you have time.

I guess I’m worried since I see some of my classmates going out and still doing things besides studying. Idk how/if they’re caught up but I thought med school would be manageable if I just put in like 4-5 hours a day, but I couldn’t be more wrong. I think I just need to stop comparing myself to others and just focus on myself....

No. No. No. Your expectations were way off. 4-5 hrs a day worked for me to pass when I knew what I was doing, had lower expectations for grades, and had stuff to do with family. In the beginning 8-10 hrs a day is normal. Just wait until dedicated when 10-12 hrs a day will be normal.

Others are either more behind then you, and they'll either have a rude awakening after the first quizzes/exams, or they're lying to you.