I can finally understand and relate to my senior's frustrations at failing her final FRCPath exams last year. The first time she failed, she said she was "gutted". The second time she failed, she said "I can't go on living like this. If I fail again I'm going to quit this and leave for good." At that time, we were naive, wide-eyed wonder new trainees with little responsibility. Our primary concern was that we grossed the appendixes and gallbladders well, and that nobody came back to us to ask "WTH is this??? with regards to some organ/tumour/whatever we chopped up. So of course we didn't have a clue as to what she meant when she said "I can't go on living like this" and why she wanted to leave if she failed again. I mean, after 5 years of training, you're just gonna give it up like that? This place is heaven on earth man! Thankfully, she passed on her 3rd try. She's our tai ka che in the department, someone we look to when we lose hope :)

Well, as I'm preparing for my FRCPath part I, I have gotten a glimpse into this "I can't go on living like this" thing. It's ok for now, bearable and masochistically enjoyable at times, since you know, it's just theory and does not yet involve actual slides, but I can see where it'll go from here.