Day 4: Wise Advice

"By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail." - Benjamin Franklin

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When attempting to enter a competitive and complicated field such as medicine it is difficult to know what are the right and wrong turns to take to successfully achieve this goal.

In MedEx, however, we certainly have the opportunity to gain first-hand experience in order to make these decisions easier. Not only that but, from what I have learned so far, my own path to medicine is not going to be a carbon copy of anyone else's. Over the past few years this has been one of the most difficult things for me to swallow as the undergraduate pre-med environment makes it seem as if it is necessary to matriculate into medical school the semester right after graduation. It would be nice if there was a straight and narrow list of things that you had to do that would lead me to become the doctor of my dreams.

But then again if this was true everyone could do it.

Today was especially helpful as we were able to chat with a group of M2 students during a Q&A session in the morning as well as small-group activities in the afternoon. Im always so surprised at the varying ages and paths that people have taken to get into medical school. Some went straight in, others took time off to work or get an extra degree. Ages can also range from 22 to in the 40's. As helpful as this is to see it also makes it more difficult, for me at least, to choose which way might be right for me.

When I entered my small group Misha, one of the M2s, was very helpful especially when I bombarded her with plenty of questions. Receiving input from her and the interns proved very helpful, not just for my personal statement but also on my questions about the application in general. Only this past year did I think about taking a gap year but for some reason I thought that it was a taboo topic to consider; getting in and out of medical school while Im young should be my top priority as I've been lead to believe. When I told them my reasons for considering a gap year they were all very supportive, especially since many of them had taken time off before applying, and hindsight is always 20/20 so knowing what they have learned from their experiences has been very insightful. I am still conflicted though on what choice I should make in the end: apply this summer or wait a year or two and get my masters in global health.

No matter what decision I end up making medical school will still be there waiting for me and it will still be my lifelong dream to become a doctor. Hopefully throughout these next few weeks I will be able to come to a decision on what will help mold me into the best physician that I can be.