My Educational Desires

It's amazing what I can do at 3:42 in the morning! Now that I work third shift my brain works well in the wee hours of the morning. Of course, my penmanship is absolutely horrid, so it will be extremely interesting when I try to decipher this during normal business hours!

Since I was a sophomore in high school I wanted to work in a hospital laboratory. At that time I was taking major history and English/literature classes as I was certain I would either be a teacher or go to law school. I wasn't taking the advanced biology as knowing weird things about your digestive tract wouldn't help you pass your bar exam. One day during biology class we had to go down to the library to hear a shindig on hospital and medical professions that were seeing a decrease in employment and needed people to major on these professions in college. We heard from a doctor, nurse, respiratory tech and an X-ray tech. Then we heard from the Senior Laboratory Technician from Franklin Memorial Hospital.

She spoke of what a laboratorian does; performing analytical testing on blood, working up microbiology cultures, reading cell blood count slides and typing and cross-matching blood. What started racing through my mind was "Geez, these would be the people that test my blood when I have it drawn every six months." Because of the anti-seizure medication that I was on for the epilepsy I had to have my CBC, hemoglobin and liver panel checked regularly. I wondered how this was all done?

I spoke to the Senior Tech after class and explained how interested I was. With it being just before February vacation, she invited me to come and spend a day with her in each department and see what it all entailed. I was ecstatic! My parents okayed that, so I spent school vacation in a lab coat. I spent a day in hematology, chemistry, microbiology and blood bank. Everything about it was interesting to me and made me want to learn more. I knew that I wanted to learn how to run the analyzers, how to read cultures and identify bacteria and perform susceptibilities. I wanted to learn how to look at a slide and tell the difference between white blood cells and what the morphology of red blood cells could help diagnose. I wanted to learn how to type and screen a patient and cross match a unit of blood for transfusion. I wanted to learn more and more. I had found my calling!

The Monday after vacation I went into my guidance counselor and told him that I needed to change my courses for my junior year. I knew that I needed to step up on my math and science courses. I plowed through chemistry and pre-analytical statistics. My senior year I took physics and anatomy and physiology. I knew where I wanted to go to college. My primary choice was Springfield College. I was accepted there but for some reason I couldn't get enough monetary help to go. So I got into Springfield Technical Community College and was a part of the two year Medical Laboratory Technician program. I did my seven month internship at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Massachusetts and thoroughly enjoyed the time I spent in microbiology and blood bank. I took my American Society of Clinical Pathology boards in August and passed. I was also lucky enough to get a part-time second shift position at Baystate that October. That position turned into a full-time position about a year later.

When I started at Baystate in October 1993 I worked in microbiology. It's going to sound crazy, but I love bacteria. Those cute little microscopic wonders that have the capability of having a massive party somewhere in your body and causing you massive displeasure. On second shift we did most of the processing; getting those little guys on a plate of nutrients that make bacteria happy so they set up shop there. We also did many other tests and procedures that would mean Greek to many people if I listed them all off.

I seemed to be in my own little happy place. I got my own apartment which I shared with my bestest friend ever! I had a wonderful group of friends and enjoyed playing by my "Two Week Rule." I went and did things and met people, including the man that I would marry a few years later. Everything seemed to be going perfectly well and normal...until May 1997.