Go Ahead, You Can Laugh

The road to becoming a nurse is not without its troubles and concerns. On occasion, the learned nursing student will self-diagnose her/himself with everything that s/he has learned in class.

I am not the exception. I might even be the extreme.

Over the past 3 and a half years, I have self-diagnosed, at one point or another, believing it to be true for any amount of time, the following conditions:

1. Supraclavicular Nodes (feeling one of these is bad news)
2. A Blood Clot (that was not too long ago)
3. Leukemia (I had a total of 1 symptom)
4. Spontaneous Cerebrospinal Fluid Leak (because I had a runny nose)
5. Urinary Retention (turns out I just didn't have to "go")
6. Pre-Ventricular Contractions (actually this wasn't too far-fetched, but I still didn't have it)
7. Atrial Fibrillation (which would cause a blood clot, sooo...)
8. A blood clot, again
9. Ventricular Septal Defect (this is a BIRTH defect, I was 20 when I "acquired it")
10. Anemia (like the serious kind)
11. Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (again, not too "out there", but not entirely accurate)
12. Crohn's Disease (just a little tummy ache)
13. Meningitis (my neck really hurt, okay?)
14. Umbilical Hernia (after a big day of eating...)
15. Melanoma (some people pronounce this as "freckle", as in my diagnostic case)

I won't even go into things I learned in my Psych class.

Lucky for everybody else in the world, I keep these diagnoses to myself, until now.

Also, don't meander onto GOOGLE Search when you have any of the concerns listed above, it's just not helpful... or when you have a runny nose, a full tummy, an ache or pain...