Gross Anatomy

Warning: People who are squeamish about body parts should avoid reading this. Even if you are not, do not read this while eating. Don't blame me if you barf your lunch on your favorite laptop!

Pep talk to self pre-course: "This isn't going to be too bad. After all you have done dissections in the past on rats and despite the initial disgust you felt for the whole process, it turned out pretty interesting, didn't it? You have also been to the 'Bodies' exhibition. I am sure it's not a big deal."

In the classroom: "I am the only girl in this class! I am sure none of these guys are vegetarians! I am doomed! I don't even have scrubs! Arrrrggghhh! Let me out of here..."

In the Lab: Dr. P: " ....most students do not have a problem with this lab. But occasionally there are cases..."
Cases of what? Students swooning, vomitting, having nightmares of cadavers running after them?
Dr. P: "Just make sure when you are not feeling ok, you raise your hand and I will have someone walk you out. Some students just walk out of the room without saying anything and it's only when I hear the crash in the hallway that I realize that they must have had a problem with what they saw."
'Gulp! I am next in line for that.' Dr. P noticed the horror writ all over my face and thought, 'Oh yes you are.'

Dr. P started making an incision from the nape of the neck and I could feel the hair on my neck stand. As he got down to the superficial fascia and layer of fat, I could feel my morning cuppa tea trying to make its way out the wrong way. The nauseating smell of fat subdued the odoriferous formaldehyde and began to overwhelm my olfactory nerve till my head starts to spin and I decided that I've had enough. Steve accompanied me out to the lounge outside.

Pep-talk to self post incision incident: "That lady was dead years ago. She cannot feel pain. Yes it takes just a scalpel to skin a person! She voluntereed to give her body for science so her soul won't wince at what we are doing to her. Go back in there, girl, and validate her sacrifice."

So back I was all pumped up to wrestle with the fat and the muscle and the blood and everything human that could possibly ruin my apetite for the rest of the day. 10 minutes into the dissection and I was right back in the lounge trying to get some air into my lungs.

Pep-talk to self post failed pep talk: "You are not a mouse! It is a human body just like your own. This is a one time opportunity to see how it all fits in together and works. C'mon clench your fist and say you can do it."

For the rest of the class I hovered around the table scalpel in hand just observing the dissections of the back muscles and even that made me rush back home after class and shower till my body became red. My olfactory senses became fully functional only after smelling and drinking coffee. Thankfully my apetite returned too.

Since then it's been less bumpy on the road to understanding human anatomy. I think I am getting the hang of telling the blood vessels and nerves apart and needless to say, it is immensely interesting. I believed it's the initial inhibition both physiological as well as psychological, one needs to overcome. If anything, being a vegetarian in an anatomy class makes it easier for me to handle what I am doing. The food I eat rarely looks like a body part. But every once in a while, there are cases : teammates who will insist on cutting open the gall bladder and insisting it looks like spinach, Dr. P cutting open the caecum with gloves covered in semi-formed faeces, dissection around the anus, turning the cadavers over and the arms almost detaching from the body, fat splaying on people's faces, dissection of the testis with fluid oozing out of it...it never ceases to get grosser and I spend a lot of time in the lounge!