There are a lot of emotions running deep today. The past nine years have one hell of a trip. The person I was when I signed my name on the dotted line is vastly different from the one who signed out today. I've had quite a few drinks to celebrate the end so it's a little bit difficult to truly reflect but.. man idk. I'll try and put together a small album together within the next couple days of my favorite moments. The military has allowed me to meet countless interesting people, visit 30+ countries, and develop myself to a level I would have never before thought possible. While I never posted much on hubski I would like to thank y'all for keeping me somewhat grounded-just lurking and reading has been significant. When surrounded by the echo chamber of the army this website has always been a refuge to maintain at least a little intellectual capacity.

If the military finds the need to make a statement like this they see a serious threat. I see the statement calming things down at least a little. With the charges building up against the rioters and now directed military support of the election it won't seem like a game anymore. Actions have consequences.

On an internal level it gives commanders authority to restrict attendance of protests. It should cut down on members of the military attending protests and inevitability getting caught.

My contribution.. It was my first time making bread. Not perfect, but I kind of eyeballed the proportions so I'm pleasantly surprised with how well it turned out.

Smart idea, terrible mentality. I'll try and sum up diabetes as best as possible.. There are two types of diabetes (at least that we care about here); type 1 and type 2. Type 1 is a condition where your pancreas does not produce insulin. Type 2 is an acquired condition where your body has stopped responding to the effects of insulin. This is generally due to continuous levels of extremely high circulating insulin. Insulin is generally created in response to high levels of glucose in the blood, hence why people with poor diets/the obese often develop this condition. 95% of diabetes patients are type 2. He never specifically states it, but it sounds like he has type 1. If he in fact has type 2, this is all kinds of stupid.

Now the potential short-term complications could be easily managed. If the device gives too much insulin that could become quickly deadly-blood sugar drops drastically, causing the brain to not receive enough glucose and kill the patient. Too low of insulin and blood sugar will increase to harmful levels. High blood sugar, while harmful, takes an extremely long amount of time to deal any significant damage. I don't predict either of these problems happening because A. He's using a manufactured insulin pump which release extremely small amounts of insulin over an extended period and tend to be fairly dependable and B. He has CGM (Continuous glucose monitor). CGM's provide instant feedback to blood glucose levels, basically ensuring he would be able to correct the issue before it became a problem.

Basically all this guy did was connect an insulin pump to a glucose monitor and then create an algorithm that changes insulin based off his sugar readings. Oh and he made it bluetooth compatible. Cool.

So the main problem here is insulin resistance and the proper treatment of diabetes. See, the more insulin you give, the more resistant the body will become resistant. His device alters the levels of artificial insulin every 24 hours. He sees this as an easy way to keep his blood sugar consistently low. He's right, it will do that. It is a remarkably good way to maintain his A1C levels (long term sugar marker). However, it will also slowly but surely increase his insulin intake. Insulin resistance is a common problem, most diabetic patients gradually increase their insulin uptake over time. Several problems arise with increased insulin uptake, the main one being increased fat development. This is so common because people see insulin as the cure and not the band-aid that it is. The real cure to type 2 (and management of type 1) is LIFESTYLE MANAGEMENT. General health practices such as exercise, proper diet, and quality sleep can drastically alter your BGL fluctuation. He briefly touches on a low-carbohydrate diet as quackery, which I would almost take as an offense considering how beneficial a ketogenic diet can be for diabetics. That's a whole other topic, this is already going on long enough.

The point I'm trying to make is that he seems to think that this fancy "artificial pancreas" will be the save-all for his diabetes when really he should be using it as a secondary device to lifestyle improvement. He comes so painfully close to self awareness... He states

the problem is not because you're failing to remember to give insulin - but the type of food you eat creates these volatile swings

Given the choice between a) changing my lifestyle to be boring and b) hacking my metabolism, I chose the easier option

If you can't tell this is an extremely frustrating subject for me. I've seen countless patients who will try every damn medication under the sun to manage their diabetes BUT WON'T FUCKING EAT HEALTHY FOOD. The answer to diabetes is not a fancy device, it's your goddamn diet.

The process to become a doctor in the US is terrifying.

You start off with four years of an undergraduate degree. God help you if you get anything below a 3.5 gpa, no chances of becoming a doctor now. If you're applying to med school straight out of college say goodbye to any type of social life. You had better be volunteering and spending countless hours working in a medical clinic of some kind. Medical school entry is so competitive nowadays that you are almost guaranteed rejection without clinical hours. Study your ass off for the MCAT, pray you get something high. Spend your senior year applying to med schools. Still get rejected, because fuck you someone else wrote a more compelling personal statement.

Should you get into med school, that's another four years of intense studying. The last two years are spent being disregarded by doctors just trying to do medicine.

Finish med school and congratulations, you're now a doctor! For the next 3-7 years you'll be treated like shit, work shit hours, and get paid for shit. Apparently the 80-hour work week rule is considered more of a guideline in many hospitals. God help you if at the end of all this you decide to do a fellowship.

Now of course the paycheck at the end of all this is quite substantial. I sure hope you haven't gone into any debt through your 8 years of schooling and 3-7 years of residency.... Oh and by the time you've graduated the shortage of physicians has increased even further. You'll most likely be needed to continue to work an insane amount of hours.

So I've looked at all of this and yet still decided fairly resolutely that this is what I would like to do. Due to the fact that I'm only about 2/3 of the way through an undergrad with zero science pre-requisites. I'll most likely have to do a post-bacc as well. Thankfully I can skip a large amount of the clinical hours and voluntary work. The earliest I can see myself making it to med school is at 30, which puts me finishing residency at 37 should I chose a shorter specialty. How is all of this sane? How is this sustainable? I keep asking myself is it all really worth it? I know it is and I'm going to continue towards this path but that's one hell of a lot of pain to commit to.

Thanks to California's absentee voter laws I have now officially sent my first fax.

Things are moving fast.. Turns out it's a lot of work to move halfway across the world. Who would've thought?

I had my stem cells pulled by forever labs yesterday. None other then thenewgreen himself appeared before the procedure! Unsurprisingly he's an astoundingly awesome guy. I don't think I've ever seen anyone so enthusiastic at 645 in the morning(especially after I mentioned finding FL through hubski). We very briefly talked about FL, hubski, and ethereum. I don't think the conversation could have been any more hubski.

In other news I finished up my skydiving A license. Are there any skydivers around this site? I may start trying to convince people. Seriously, it's amazing.

https://imgur.com/a/3VrX3

I'll be damned, I finally moved to Germany. It's a bit unreal. If anything this is all worth it for the doner. My god is it delicious. I'm headed to a Christmas market this weekend, I'll try and post some pictures