As a waitlist alum I wanted to share some thoughts. Now that I have graduated medical school I can confidently say that the agonizing waitlist game was the worst part of the entire process. It was worse than studying for Step 1, the hardest clinical rotations, residency interviews, waiting for Black Monday/Match Day, worse than all of it. The point being, if you can get through this, you can get through anything.
At this point exactly four years ago, I was discouraged beyond discouragement. I don't even like to think about that time. I remember there was one day, maybe in late April or early May? I was convinced that one school where I was waitlisted was going to be releasing acceptances. I don't remember why but I had good reasons. Anyway, my roommate and I went back to our original college dorm to say goodbye to college and I thought that if I was going to open an acceptance email it would be a neat "full circle" moment to do it there. Of course, I didn't get in - but I did open my Facebook to see that one of my pre-med acquaintances did. So that was a hit to my confidence, to say the least. At that point, I gave up hope. I made a new school list, confirmed new letters of recommendation, and wrote a new personal statement. I had a gap year job lined up and I reached the point of acceptance. And lo and behold, after working that job for a few weeks and getting everything lined up for a new cycle, one school finally took a chance on me.
I don't want to disparage the people who got acceptances in November or December and act like mine meant more than theirs. But at the same time...well, I think it instills a different kind of drive in you. I went through so many cycles of hopelessness only to be given the tiniest glimmer of hope, only to go back to hopelessness, only to repeat again and again and again. And when I got to medical school, I was desperate to prove that admitting me was not a mistake. It wasn't always smooth sailing, but at the end of the day I graduated in the top 20% of my class, got an award for academic excellence, published a first author research paper, and I couples matched into a competitive specialty at an institution that's probably the most "prestigious" of all the medical schools I applied to (where I had been swiftly rejected without an interview).
I truly hope from the bottom of my heart that all of you hear good news in the next month or so. It gets better. I am pulling for all of you! Remember what Teddy Roosevelt said: “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
