The Deacons: My life lately- Graduation

We are back from vacation! It was fabulous, but I am ready to get back into a routine again! So here is what has been going on with me lately....

Med School Graduation was May 16! I can't believe that day has come and gone already. Time flies when you're having fun!

As a medical school tradition, we have a bunch of activities with our class during the week leading up to graduation. One night we had a semi-formal cocktail party which was fun, but I don't have any pics because I didn't have my new camera that night. Probably the biggest tradition is the burning of our "short" white coats that we wear during medical school. For those that don't know, the length of a white coat designates between student and physician. So a short coat is what I have worn for the past 4 years. All med students grow to hate these coats 1) because everyone automatically thinks you know nothing because they can tell you are a student (which honestly isn't a bad assumption because for the most part we really don't know much!) and 2) they just look plain stupid!! :) So tradition is that we all get together and burn our short white coats! This is been going on for many years and it was kind of liberating to get rid of that thing!

Claire, Lindsey, and me in our short white coats

Me throwing my coat into the fire! See ya short white coat!!

So on the weekend of graduation, we actually have two ceremonies. One is on Friday night and this is just with the College of Medicine class. It is called Honors Convocation. This is when they give out awards, etc. and when we are "hooded," which is when our doctoral "hoods" or sashes are placed on us by other physicians being either members of UAMS faculty, parents, siblings, etc. My hood was placed by my Uncle David who is an Orthopedic Surgeon at the VA/UAMS. He has been a great mentor to me over the years, and we are very close, so it was special to have him there! Funny story....we were in line to go on stage to be hooded and he hadn't come up to meet me yet so I am looking for him in the crowd and finally see him and get him to come up. I asked him what happened, and he said he totally forgot that my last name wasn't Sward anymore! He was waiting on the "S" names to be called! Oops...its only been 3 years! :)

The actual UAMS graduation was on Saturday and everyone graduating from UAMS attends that ceremony! And yes, it was very long, but I actually became Dr. Brita Sward Deacon during that ceremony, so it holds some significance! :)

All of my family and Cam's family were there, and even my best friends from college came to the actual graduation. As I was walking up to the stage, all of my friends were in seats where I could see them and I was so excited to see their faces. It really meant a lot to me for them to come! I have the best friends anyone could ask for!

After graduation, Lindsey and I had a joint graduation celebration over at my house. A ton of our family and friends came over and we had a blast!! My Ophthalmology friend, Lauren, even came all the way from Shreveport, LA for the party. We met last year when we were both doing an Ophthalmology rotation in Memphis, and we have been friends ever since. She will be doing her residency in Memphis! Here are some pics from Graduation Weekend!