A Project Complete

So, after several changes to my topic, weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth, tons and tons of help from my chair and committee members, a very weird dream and surprised enjoyment...my doctoral project is done!!! And the best part?...I passed!

The weird dream I had the night before my project involved my whole family, including my side and Matthew's side, living in the same house all together; me waking up in the middle of the night to find Matthew missing; me going to find Matthew, and then realizing that I don't have any clothes on; me rolling and dodging family in a field because I have realized that I don't have clothes on; finding Matthew with another woman and Matthew excited about me being there; me running away from Matthew because of this discovery and Matthew finally chasing after me, only after he put clothes on. Needless to say I was a little mad at Matthew when I woke up, but once I realized it was a dream I was okay.

As stated above there was a lot of sweat and tears that went into this project. It was a hard project to put together because there is not a lot of research out there on the subject (Isometric Strength Testing in Individuals with Neuromuscular Disorders) and what research is out there is looked at in different ways. I had a lot of information to go over in a short amount of time and it was hard to decide what needed to be said and what could be left for questions. After a lot of work I got it all put together and although nervous, I was surprisingly excited to present. I think I owe this excitement to my recent experiences with teaching in church. Until getting married I never really had much experience where I had to get up and lead discussions and feel comfortable in front of people for a great period of time. My only experiences prior had been giving talks and that was at most once a year. I had a really good time presenting, everything flowed smoothly, I finished on time and although I had a lot of questions asked, I was able to answer all of them. I was even able to use some of the extra slides I created just in case someone asked me a question about material I wasn't able to go over in my allotted presentation time.

After the presentation I spoke with my committee and they said that they were impressed with the way I answered the questions and gave thought to each response. They passed me and asked if I would answer one more question after looking up some information. Afterwards, Matthew and I went to celebrate at our new favorite restaurant, Vinto; a wood fired pizza place. It feels so great to be done! Now I just have to finish this last semester of book work and two internships and then you can just call me Doctor!