So much to know, so little time.

Today I had my first day of an 'observational' practicum. I forget how many patients I saw with the two doctors; it is all a blur now. 20 or 30? I am left with one very distinct feeling: there is much too much to know and I'm not sure I'll ever be able to pack it into my little head. My head hurts.
The doctor I was with in the morning is classy; she looks like she stepped out of an upscale older ladies' fashion magazine. She is gracious, very intelligent and very eloquent. I didn't say much all morning, there seemed to be no point. I learned millions of little tidbits that I scrambled to write in my notebook while peering over her shoulder watching pap smears and breast exams and flu shots and hordes of other things.
Do you know that migraines can be helped by the caffeine in coffee, but chocolate, on the other hand, which contains caffeine, also contains histamine which can worsen migraines? Do you know that the nose produces 2 liters of fluid a day just to warm and humidify the air going into your lungs? Do you know that the antidepressant drug Wellbutrin is useful for helping with Nicotine withdrawal because it has essentially no side effects? And that was just the first patient.
By the afternoon my brain was full, but that was just the beginning. The next doctor walked into the office to see me sitting there and said, "Who's she?"
I stood up with a smile and an outstretched hand and the female doctor explained, "Oh, don't you remember Heather, she's here with us every thursday for the next 9 weeks."
He shook my hand and then turned and walked away without saying anything. I thought, oh brother, what have i got myself into. The female doctor gave me a signal to go after him and I ran down the hall to catch up with him and squeezed into the examining room with him. Look confident, Heather, I told myself.
"This is Heather, she's a medical student tagging along today." The doctor explained to the patient. I wondered if it would be simpler if I just wore a shirt that said "I'm really dumb, so don't ask me any questions."
Actually, the patients were awesome. Something about having a student there, but they loved to tell me ALL their complex medical problems as if I was a journalist writing an article about the weirdest health problems in history. In fact, one of the male patients even gave me a pen that said it was stolen from a real estate office. You never know what's going to come your way.
The doctor I was with all afternoon was pretty cool, though. He went over every chart with me and discussed his differential diagnoses and let me help out with a few things. The only super challenging question he asked me was whether or not I could recognize atrial fibrillation (a kind of heart murmur) from the ECG. I said yes, of course, and then was hugely relieved when he said, "You're right, you can see the absence of the p-wave here."
Of course. The absent p-wave. That was exactly what I had been meaning to say, he just beat me to it.
I felt bad for some of the older patients in for physical exams, one lady seemed a little embarrassed to have me in the room. I wanted to say to her, relax, honey, I'm a nurse, and you ain't got nothing I haven't seen before; but coming from someone barely old enough to be her granddaughter, it probably wouldn't have been that comforting. So to all of you who someday might have a medical student in attendance, thank you so much! You are offering a great service to the education of future doctors! Your willingness to be vulnerable and talkative and pleasant is no small thing.
At any rate, I better keep studying. I have about 10 million things to learn this winter, and I've barely started. Hopefully a good night's sleep will clear a little more free space in my brain.