My LSAT Experience
07/02/09 17:01 Filed in:
Law SchoolThis was an e-mail I sent to coworkers who had wondered how my Law School Admission Test (LSAT) went. Talk about bad timing!
My LSAT Experience of February 7, 2009
Good morning:
Since some of you may ask how my Law School Admission Test (LSAT) went this weekend and it is a bit of tale to tell, I thought I’d share with you the events of the last couple of days. If you don’t care to know, please just delete this message.
First, some background.
I’ve been prepping for the LSAT for about the last month. Going to classes three times a week in the evenings and studying on the days that I wasn’t in class. Things went pretty well in that department (in spite of my dislike of the Kaplan program).
About a week and a half ago, while at work, I had an incredibly sharp pain in my back side. So painful, in fact, that I began to sweat uncontrollably and had a hard time standing. I was about to gather my belongings and go to the hospital immediately when all of the sudden, it simply stopped.
I wondered what it was and had concern, but I figured I could just discuss it with my doctor at our next meeting.
Friday of last week – my normal day off – was spent at home doing my last minute studying and preparation for the test. I went to bed early that evening and felt prepared.
At about 4 in the morning on the day of the test I woke up because of a mild pain in my back. As I sat up it intensified. I knew what it was: it was that pain I’d had at work a week and a half earlier. This time it was excruciating. It felt like someone was taking a stilleto and knifing me in the back over and over again. Truly one of the most intense pains I’ve ever felt in my life. On top of it, my nose felt plugged up and I suspected I was getting a cold.
I was hoping against hope that the pain, at least, would stop as it had that day at work.
I showered. My back continued to throb painfully.
I ate a tiny breakfast. Each swallow, it hurt more. Each drink, more pain.
I took pain pills. But my back continued to throb, white-hot pain.
I drove to the test center at Mt. Hood Community College and hoped each step of the way the pain would subside.
As I stood waiting to get in, all I could think was “Why today? Why me? Please stop.”
As the LSAT began I was in terrible pain. I made it through the first three sections alright. When we took a fifteen minute break I walked around and the pain began to intensify.
We finished the last two sections and I was in utter agony. Finally, I had to complete my writing sample for the test. Which I did with fifteen minutes to spare.
Could I leave? Could I go to the ER right then? No. Had I left at that point, my score would be cancelled and my test discarded. So I had to sit and writhe in pain in my chair for the final, longest fifteen minutes of my life. I went from chills to intense sweating many times in that time on the freeway.
I was one of the first people out of the lecture hall when the proctor released us. Quickly into my car, driving well past the limit to rush to the hospital. My back hurting more and more.
Just as I felt some relief in the knowledge that I was closer to Kaiser Sunnyside, I merged onto I-205 south and found myself in the midst of a traffic jam due to a wreck on I-205 north that had spilled debris into our side of the freeway. What I thought was the longest fifteen minutes of my life in my LSAT’s waning minutes, faded into memory as the next twenty became the worst.
I eventually made it to the ER and was checked in at 2 PM. After two x-rays, four CT scans, and a merciful dose of morphine (thank you Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner) I was finally out of pain and aware of my problem: I had a kidney stone. It’s two millimeters in diameter.
Two millimeters of hell, I say. I could never imagine in a million years how something so small could cause such intense pain.
Is it gone now? No. But strangely, it stopped hurting by the next morning. They say that I should pass it soon, or so the hope goes. They have given my prescriptions to help dialate all of my internal organs to assist with that process.
Don’t be surprised, however, if you find me writhing in pain at my desk in the next week or so, sweating profusely. Try to pay it no mind. J
Once home, I collapsed from exhaustion and slept for twelve hours into Sunday morning. I honestly can’t say that I remember much about my LSAT, other than intense pain and a desire to leave that was palpable. I think that my result could be great, ghastly, or somewhere in between; I truly have no idea. Time will tell.
But if this is a metaphor for how difficult law school can be, well, then I have earned my place for pure stamina. Imagine going to take a test for about five hours with a knife sticking out of your back and you have a pretty good idea of how I felt.
If I don’t get in this year, I will try again next. But just wanted to let you know how things went and to thank you all for the support you’ve shown.
Thank you (& here’s hoping you NEVER get a kidney stone),
Lee
Tags: Law, Lewis & Clark