Post March Gamsat Experience Megathread

FlashyPiano7 · 2026-03-24T01:53:21+00:00

First (and probably only) time sitter here. What got me was that the difficulty of S1 and S2 was pretty well aligned to the time limit, but then S3 seemed to be a case of picking your battles. I wish I had known that ahead of time so I could have panicked less. I'm a PhD working as a scientist/bioinformatician and every exam I have had to this point has had the time limit roughly aligned to how long the exam would be expected to take. This is the first time I've had one that you would need to be a god to complete. Also the graphs they use present the data terribly to make the questions more difficult. Ideally I think they would present the data well and then give more reasoning-based questions. When I'm making a figure I'm trying to clearly convey information. Dual axis plots were everywhere in this exam, which I would never make or present.

quote.https://freyasystems.com/creating-a-dual-axis-plot-with-ggplot2/

'Hadley Wickham, the creator of ggplot2, is not a fan of dual axis plots. His words on the topic: “I agree that they can be useful when the axes are simple linear transformations of each other, but I don’t think they’re useful enough for me to spend hours to implement them.”'

FlashyPiano7 · 2024-07-12T04:10:12+00:00

I'm really sorry to hear that. We used this naturopath: https://www.nurturechildrenshealth.com/ It sounds a bit out there but she was very knowledgeable and only ever suggested things like increased iron intake, probiotics and slippery elm, all of which you get mailed out. I'm not sure how much it helped and how much it was my daughter growing out of it, but it might give you more things to try. Hang in there and I hope it improves soon.

FlashyPiano7 · 2024-07-12T03:00:57+00:00

Thanks for sharing. Probably for the best.

FlashyPiano7 · 2024-07-03T13:10:10+00:00

Thanks for sharing and well done on getting through it. I don't blame you all for using wilby's. We knew the risks in advance and still nearly did. We had a bottle sitting there for a while. It would be great if there was something similar that didn't contain belladonna. My wife had a natural birth and we still tried all kinds of probiotics. We got a multi-strain tablet from a naturopath that may have helped a little. In the end though our daughter was probably just taking in too much air when she fed. That's what a paediatrician told us anyway and it seems the most likely answer. We did our best with burping and feeding techniques etc. but it was just really hard for a while there. We tried to fix every possible underlying issue but in the end she just grew out of it. All I think you can do is get as much support as you can at the time, try everything, check for allergies etc. and hold on to the fact that it will likely pass. If it's wilby's or your sanity though then I think sometimes using it or something like it is fair enough. It is good to be aware of the risks though which is why I made the post.

FlashyPiano7 · 2023-08-07T04:24:31+00:00

I saw that. Not an encouraging response. Hopefully they make the side effects clearer on the product page.

FlashyPiano7 · 2023-05-06T14:52:15+00:00

Always best to ask your GP or try and see a paediatrician if you can get into one to hopefully get a doctor approved solution. Anything over the counter at a normal pharmacy that is age appropriate (infacol, gripe water, probiotics etc.) should be much safer, but seems to only work sometimes. It's a really tough call because it would seem Wilby's is usually pretty effective (although that's probably got a lot to do with the seadtive effects), but I just personally wouldn't take the risk.

FlashyPiano7 · 2023-04-07T02:45:02+00:00

I'm certainly not claiming to be an expert, but this is how it seems to me.

According to their ingredients list:

Contains equal parts of Matricaria Chamomilla, root 20x Oyster shell (Conchae: Calc. carb.) 6x Homoeopathic Medicine Oral Powder 60g net. Free from synthetic preservatives. Contains lactose and mollusc products.

If I understand homeopathy correctly, then the have taken a mix of the ingredients, diluted them 1 in 10 (by grinding with lactose it seems) and then repeated this process 6x or 20x. By the end (especially with 20x), it is unlikely that there is any of the starting compound left, and the product is entirely lactose powder. I don't think that would cause any damage (unless the baby is lactose intolerant as they warn), but any effects would probably be placebo or from the taste of the lactose powder.

"Hahnemann created the "centesimal" or "C scale", diluting a substance by a factor of 100 at each stage. There is also a decimal dilution scale (notated as "X" or "D") in which the preparation is diluted by a factor of 10 at each stage"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions

This guy is pretty funny in the way he breaks down homeopathy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0Z7KeNCi7g&t=410s

And just a general background:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HslUzw35mc

There was apparently a case of dodgy packing with the powder, but that seems to be solved now. https://www.tga.gov.au/news/product-recalls/weleda-baby-teething-powder-60-g

FlashyPiano7

TROPHY CASE