Dissection day 4: Not a safe day to read

Hi all,

Didn't blog last night because I had a really awesome energy work session done last night by a classmate of mine, and I needed to sleep a whole lot. Very, very cool stuff.

Again, this day was pretty intense. Do not read if you are unnerved by anything I've written so far. If you haven't been reading, this is a bad day to start.


Things I learned yesterday:

When dissecting the digestive system, take extreme care not to puncture the intestines. This is very, very important.

Should you puncture the intestines, much cleanup will have to ensue. We definitely had a day of poop going on.

Despite this, we managed to remove the heart and lungs as a unit-- just fabulous. The lungs really are huge, and much heavier than the heart. May had an enlarged heart and a gigantic aorta; even so, the lungs are enormous and weighty!

We also managed to remove (most) of the digestive system at a go. The relationships are fascinating. The esophagus really does run right down the front of the spine, and the inferior vena cava runs right down into the liver. The heart itself is sitting right on top of the liver, with the diaphragm in between them, and the stomach and spleen take up the other lobe of the diaphragm. The kidneys, adrenals, and upper psoas indeed hang out right next to each other in the back of the diaphragm, and the ovaries also hang out on the psoas. I knew all these things intellectually, but seeing them in situ really brings home the interrelatedness of the organs and muscles.

Speaking of psoas, leaving it in place while removing the viscera illustrates quite clearly the 2 separate bowls of the upper and lower pelvis. I had read about this recently, and even looking at a skeleton could only vaguely see the divisions, but the reality of it is that the upper iliac crests form one bowl, then the sacrum dives down and back, forming almost a pelvic cylinder rather than a pelvic floor. It's fascinating, and will definitely inform my teaching in the future.

Today, with any luck, we'll see the rotator cuff, deep rotators of the hip, and possibly even the attachments of the psoas and psoas minor.

Yay.

--Melissa V.

Dissection day 3: Not for the faint of heart. Or lung.

Today was the day of viscera!


We opened up the thoracic and abdominal cavities and spent the day palpating and talking about the digestive system and the "500 functions of the liver."

I learned:

--The intestines are not just hanging out like spaghetti; they're more like coral or very tight ruffles.

--The large intestine does not look all neat and organized like it does in books.

--The lungs really take up most of the sides of the body.

--The greater omentum (never heard of it? It's cool!) is your internal security blanket. It moves (moves!) and wraps itself around any unhappy organ it can reach and tries to make it better.

--The liver really does do about 500 different things.

Time to sleep!

--Melissa V.

Dissection Day 3: Probably don't read this one.

Hi all,

1. Really, I'm fine. Just tired.

2. Formalin stench gets easier to deal with by the third day.

3. Ladies, you have fat investing your musculature. Gentlemen, that's why we're soft. Both of ya, get used to it.

4. It's nice to be done with superficial fascia. The layers really do have their own "vibrations" and emotional content. Yesterday, dissecting superficial fascia (or the adipose layer), the class was getting slow and grouchy. Today, as we got into muscle tissue, the energy was palpably higher in the room.

5. Real cadaver forms look nothing like the pictures in the books. Nothing is neatly differentiated. Skin, superficial fascia, and deep fascia are stuck together like the skin of an orange and the white stuff outside the slices. In fact, if you carefully pull the skin off an orange, you'll find fluff similar the that which binds the layers. My nephrologist friend says that in a live person, it's more slippery and less fluffy, but we agree that's likely a temperature and preservation artifact.

6. I know I said I wasn't going to blog, but hey. No one said it had to be coherent.

Goodnight, all.

--Melissa V.

Dissection Day 2: SAFE TO READ

Hi all,

I've decided I'm not able to blog this dissection as it's happening-- one, because I need this evening time to recharge myself, reset my hands and eyes (when you've been dissecting all day, your eyes and hands REALLY need to do something else), and study anatomy to prep for the next day.

I also feel like it's not fair to make you all read the dissection notes without the experience of getting into the necessary mindset first. (I know all you med students are giggling right now, but your first dissection is on hell of an experience, especially if you aren't prepared by med school.) Gil is very careful to prepare us mentally and psychologically for the encounter, and I don't feel I can do a good job of that, especially in my current state of mind.

So if insights come to me that are coherent enough to share with y'all, I'll definitely let you know. Otherwise, you'll just have to get the benefits of my experience some other way-- like taking classes over the summer! Whee!

Take care-- I'm going to sleep!

--Melissa Voodoo

WARNING! Future graphic posts!

Hi all,

From May 5 to May 10, I will be participating in a Somanautics human dissection workshop. I will be blogging the experience here.

If you are in any way squeamish about this concept, PLEASE DELETE UNREAD THE POSTS FOR MAY 5-10!!!

Let me repeat that: If you are in any way squeamish about this concept, PLEASE DELETE *UNREAD* THE POSTS FOR MAY 5-10!!!

If this concept does not bother you, though, feel free to read on! I expect this to be a thoroughly educational experience, and I am extremely excited about the learning opportunity!

So keep an eye out for the next 5 days' worth of posts-- or not, as the case may be! It will definitely be a unique experience.

--Melissa Voodoo