The lectures start in less than 3 weeks, I am thrilled to enter a new chapter of my life. 

I finished what corresponds to the A Level in the UK at the end of June. It has been a rough path ending in a rough way. The evening before my last written exam I assisted our old cat passing away on her own, few hours later a friend called me and announced me that another friend died, falling from a 9^th floor, not 21 years old yet. I passed my exam with a couple of points more than the minimum and with a heavy heart I left the place where I spent most of my time in the last 6 years, the teachers that have done so hard to try and communicate with me and all these students and some friends with the ones I shared a troubled adolescence.

This summer my dad cheered me up bringing me on a road trip in France and I finally made up my choice to get into Osteopathy. I discovered this discipline less than a year ago at a congress where I went with the school. The symposium presented many universities, all private, expensive, and thereby rather selective. Definitely, not my cup of tea. Until I’ve been given a leaflet worth 3 osteopathic treatments by a student from the university of osteopathy in my city. A couple of months before I broke my 5^th digit, since then I could not extend properly my 5^th and 4^th digits of my dominant hand. So I went and after two treatments I had my full hand function back.

This and the acknowledgement that an osteopath relies mainly on his/her own hands and knowledges led me to make this choice, dreaming a work that I enjoy and that allows me to travel. Only later, during my second of third year I finally understood that it is not that easy to set in a place and have patients straight forward and that insurances, treatment room rent and professional registration are not given for granted and might reach substantial fees. OPS B4

Evaluation criteria and outcomes feedback were missing for oral and practical exams as well, although it would have been highly beneficial for first year students to receive a clear feedback on why they received a mark instead of another. This process might raise consc to questions such as “Is my method of study effective?”, “Have I retained enough reliable information?”, “Have I understood what I was meant to understand?” and “Do I apply reliable reasoning on the information transmitted?”.

A posteriori I recognize I probably did not understand a lot about the connection and importance of all these subjects and the huge amount of information that I was meant to assimilate. 

At that time, unaware of this, I was happy about my choice, established good relationships with old and new friends and ready to dive head first in a continuous new adventure: go and study one year in France. OPS B4

I soon noticed how the lectures were structured differently than in Italy and how the students study method differed as well. Or maybe it was just different from mine?

If my understanding of osteopathy and the importance of the different topics studied was low at the end of my first year in Italy I cannot say it improved while I was concentrated in learning and understanding a new language and integrate information from two different languages and two slightly different way of teaching. So I continued to assimilate notions in an automatic way without make sense of any of them, or at least not much. I also went on spending a huge amount of type re writing my notes until aesthetics approved without getting the meaning of what I was writing. Not many things did make sense to me at that time, not even I knew what was my origin any more, why do we identify ourselves with political bordered Nations instead of areas of the same globe? 

In despite of moving in three houses in the first three months, the inexistent social life and the absolutely oblivion in which all my knowledges resided, I found a reliable coping strategy spending up to 10hrs per week at the gym, discovering pole dance as an amazing complete sport and gaining in flexibility in both a physical and psychological way. I bonded kind relationships with my very original, barely present and very different flatmates and raise love and caring with a stray kitten. I started spending more time outside, studying, revising or following her in her urban adventures around the den of two hedgehogs. She gave birth to an only child and finally both of them ended up living with me, spayed this time. I still wonder about the two hedgehogs. 

No one should be refused love and care, awareness will raise. Wildness is great and rough, city life is only rough. 

With all this thoughts in my head I started counting in French and understood it was the moment the language started to be mine.

Study wise, exams were mainly close questions with multiple choice or open questions with short answers. Far from the some outstanding marks I achieved in Italy, I only had to resit one exam: visceral osteopathic techniques. The teacher did not get fun with me as I did not understand his jokes, which were some sort of bad humour as a friend told me. 

I also got a 20/20 for my handling of the shoulder girdle, this time the teacher appreciated me a lot for the country I come from. Favoritism? In all his magnificence. OPS A2, B1, B3, B4

The things that most impressed me was the elasticity and the thickness of the nerves. OPS B1, B3

I have to confess that I was quite proud of my work. 

I don't find the course of the knee clinical assessment that I received in France, so I hyperlink a site reporting quite precise information. OPS B2, C1, C6

This time I was determined: more quality time spent efficaciously.

Newbie skilful climber, attentive cats’ mama and socially active.

In average a good student: always present at lectures, almost always awake and able to take notes in a tidy and understandable way, at least for who could decode my writing, I also invested 350€ of my season salary in a microscopic, 11 inches, laptop with the feature of disconnecting the screen from the keyboard. Characteristics that I have never used. 

Nevertheless, still tiny was the amount of information I was understanding from my studies. The concept of differential diagnosis and medical testing completely blown out my mind and even if I was living with a final year student who spent the most of his time gaming and partying and still was above average good in clinical and hands on skills, I did not overcome my fear in express questions and doubts. Fear that I reckon I bring with me since I was a child and that prevent me for asking questions even when my head overflown. 

I was also doubting in having done the right choice for my future. Would I have rather preferred get engaged in a circus academy?  OPS B2, B4

- Rheumatology consultations at the hospital

- Rheumatology consultations in a clinic

- Pain management service

- Orthopaedics surgery, pre-surgery consultation and orthopaedics management

- Sport medicine consultations
OPS B1, B2, B3, C6, D10