Writer considering med school - am I crazy?

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copywriter312

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I'm 26 years old, a professional writer and creative (currently working for an ad/marketing agency) and have recently become obsessed (or re-obsessed) with the idea of becoming a doctor.

My current career is lucrative, but it makes me feel pretty relentlessly hollow. Unlike many of my colleagues, I don't find the work mentally stimulating or exciting or important. While I've been fairly risk-averse in the past, I feel like the cost of not making a change might be far greater than the cost of a major career shift -- both financially and in terms of my future happiness and fulfillment.

I work 60-90 hours per week and already feel like I have little time to manage my life affairs, let alone begin my pre-med journey. I've filled out multiple hospital volunteer apps and have researched local post-bacc class schedules but feel paralyzed. I feel like I need to fully commit and start down the path now or seek other avenues for professional/personal fulfillment. I've reached a fork in the road, and need to decide whether or not to take it.

Some stats and a little more about me:
  • Graduated from a top 15 university in 2010 with a B.A. in English (cGPA: 3.9)
  • I have no clinical or research background, and am very thin on the science pre-reqs -- however, scored high in advanced Bio, Chem and Physics before UG and in the few of science/math courses I took for my general ed requirements during UG
  • In my current job I have several healthcare / health insurance / biotech clients, so have some grounding in the healthcare industry and research landscape
  • I'm an extremely committed student and worker -- even for this job I don't even like, I give every project my all. Success is important to me. I'm a little concerned that if I take this leap I will bottom out and be totally hosed by the volume and complexity of all I have to learn.
So my questions are:
  • Am I crazy? Can it be done?
  • Do I have to quit my job (and/or find a new, less time-consuming one) to have a real chance at successfully completing the pre-reqs and scoring high on the MCAT?
  • Finally, are there any others out there who have abandoned a career in a creative field to successfully pursue medicine?
Basically, I don't want to half-ass it, and I'm worried I don't have the stuff to do it well. I'm eager to hear stories from folks in similar scenarios to get a sense of what I'm truly up against — and hear any advice you may have about getting started. Any other writer-turned-doctors out there??

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First you need to get into a hospital and find out if you like the idea or if you actually like being a doctor. I say hospital because a family med doctor practice is worlds different than a hospital setting. Then you need to take pre reqs and do well in them. And so on.
 
I don't think you need to stop working, but 90 hours a week is a lot depending on what pre-med thing you're doing at the same time (mcat studying, class, etc). I agree with above poster that you should follow through on one of your volunteering opportunities in the clinical setting first. But if you have some pre-reqs already that's a great thing. I was working about 70-80 hours a week (2 jobs) when I decided to cut down to just 1 job in order to study for the mcat. 45 hours a week was way more doable. That is just me, though.
 
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Are you the second coming of Michael Crichton?
 
I think it's great that you might want to become a doctor. I would suggest doing some MD shadowing and clinical volunteering before you decide to apply. You can't be sure this is the path you want without significant exposure (and the application basically requires it anyway--you'll be deficient compared to other applicants without it). Research helps a lot on applications (its become a staple) but I would argue that it's not necessary for all schools. If you decide not to do research, avoid schools that put a lot of emphasis on it.

Good luck with the pre-reqs. If you have a good undergraduate record (and it seems like you do), you'll probably get accepted into a great post-bacc program which is always a good option. Bryn Mawr, Goucher, UPenn, and Hopkins all have great programs. Bryn Mawr has linkage with a lot of med schools which is highly appealing for a lot of post-baccs.

PS Success in HS science generally has no bearing on college science success. I know a lot of people who were super science students in HS who bombed the preliminary courses in UG. Stay focused, work hard, and you'll get what you need.
 
I'm an English major-turned-pre-med in the Bay Area, so feel free to shoot me a message if you have any questions about the specific opportunities around here!
 
I was a Japanese lit major and am now an MSI. So yes, it is possible.
 
It's possible, but as mentioned you really need to do a lot of shadowing to see if this is something you'd actually enjoy. Make sure you aren't glamorizing the field -- it's dirty, messy and tiring. In medicine you'd accumulate a ton of good book material but really not have much time to write for about a decade, so if you see this as a nice add on to your writing career I'd get a better handle on the kind of hours this career steals. In most cases you will be putting the writing career on hold to a very large extent once you started med school.
 
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