nerdynamya
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I'm a fifth year medical student in a six year European-style program. We don't have Board exams and essentially matching is done based on your overall class rank, which is 50% the combined average of your annual class rank for the six years and 50% your rank in a final comprehensive board-style exam done at the end of the last year.
Now, I had a fairly ok grades in 2nd and 3rd years, I would rank in the middle (mind you, the grade difference between rank 50 and rank 20 was like 10% and it's, so the grades were super close). However, I suffered a major blow in fourth year, where my rank plummeted into the bottom ten (111/125). I also had to re-mediate my pathology lab exam (it's a stupid 15 min exam, but I somehow managed to flunk it the first time around). Thankfully, the re-mediation doesn't appear in the student file, but nonetheless, that was a major blow to my ego and to my academic standing.
The problem is, none of my peers have ever gone through such a major drawback in their grades. Even our dean said that usually students stabilize their grades and remain in the same rank range throughout the years. So, I found it mind-boggling how I went from being average/slightly above average to being dead last.
And the problem is that I do study and I do put in the effort, albeit it might be misguided. My grades for most subjects in fourth year were 55 - 60%, maybe only a couple of subjects in 75%. And to add insult to injury, fourth year in my uni is one of the more important years, as it includes the entirety of pathology, pharmacology and biostatistics and most internal medicine specialties and a good number of surgical specialties (side note: I was hoping to do well in my urology exam as it is a specialty I was interested in, but I ended up with a 55% and my hopes were shattered. I got a frickin 50% in my hem/onc exam, another specialty I was interested in).
Now, I am in fifth year and things seem to be going better. I've adopted Anki and am trying to use it to be more meticulous with my studying, as I realized that my biggest downfall was that I was preparing myself for board-style exams and focusing on the high-yields and end up forget the low-yield stuff that doctors like to focus on in exams. I was too eager to study board-style and did not accommodate for the regurgitant nature of our in-house exams. So far in fifth year, I feel like I'm doing better and I am in a better headspace (no grades have yet been released, so I still don't know if I'm actually doing better or not). I feel like Anki has helped me tremendously to hammer down the minutiae and sometimes I wish I had started using it earlier on.
However, I just can't get over my failure in fourth year. I can't. I am almost certain that this will be a permanent red flag and will be a point of deficiency in my application. I feel extremely inadequate in front of my peers, as they look up and consider different specialties while I feel like I have to self-select myself out of everything and just settle with whatever comes my way. Things seem to be going fine for the time being, but I just feel that my class rank will eventually bite me in the ass, whether it be by not getting accepted into clerkship or for residency applications.
I know that many say pre-clinical grades and class rank don't really matter, but I feel that's only true if you're average or slightly below average, not when you are dead last.
This is the first time I feel genuine regret at entering medicine. I am afraid of the shame I will bring to myself come residency time and whenever I have to submit my papers and people have to see such horrid grades. I am afraid of all the insecurities and self-hatred that I am having to deal with on a daily basis because of this. Sometimes, I wake up optimistic and hopeful of a brighter future, but then I ground myself in reality and remind myself of my shortcomings and realize that my optimism is just pure delusion and escapism, because I don't want to face the bitter reality of my situation. It's an insanely competitive World out there to the point that it feels like academic excellent has become a given, ie your supposed to be academically excellent, it's not something that only a few are distinguished with. I also think that a lot my hope is coming from survivor bias. I see all these successful doctors out there going abroad and getting all kinds of cool residencies and fellowships at top institutions and I try to imagine myself in their position. But then I come back to reality and remember that, even on their worst days, they were never as bad as I ever was. And then my hopes die and my insecurities creep up.
I never thought I'd see the day where I was genuinely struggling to pass. I had higher expectations of myself, so did my family, friends and everyone who knew me. My imposter syndrome is now very valid and very real. At the same time, I feel like I can't just call it quits.
Now, I had a fairly ok grades in 2nd and 3rd years, I would rank in the middle (mind you, the grade difference between rank 50 and rank 20 was like 10% and it's, so the grades were super close). However, I suffered a major blow in fourth year, where my rank plummeted into the bottom ten (111/125). I also had to re-mediate my pathology lab exam (it's a stupid 15 min exam, but I somehow managed to flunk it the first time around). Thankfully, the re-mediation doesn't appear in the student file, but nonetheless, that was a major blow to my ego and to my academic standing.
The problem is, none of my peers have ever gone through such a major drawback in their grades. Even our dean said that usually students stabilize their grades and remain in the same rank range throughout the years. So, I found it mind-boggling how I went from being average/slightly above average to being dead last.
And the problem is that I do study and I do put in the effort, albeit it might be misguided. My grades for most subjects in fourth year were 55 - 60%, maybe only a couple of subjects in 75%. And to add insult to injury, fourth year in my uni is one of the more important years, as it includes the entirety of pathology, pharmacology and biostatistics and most internal medicine specialties and a good number of surgical specialties (side note: I was hoping to do well in my urology exam as it is a specialty I was interested in, but I ended up with a 55% and my hopes were shattered. I got a frickin 50% in my hem/onc exam, another specialty I was interested in).
Now, I am in fifth year and things seem to be going better. I've adopted Anki and am trying to use it to be more meticulous with my studying, as I realized that my biggest downfall was that I was preparing myself for board-style exams and focusing on the high-yields and end up forget the low-yield stuff that doctors like to focus on in exams. I was too eager to study board-style and did not accommodate for the regurgitant nature of our in-house exams. So far in fifth year, I feel like I'm doing better and I am in a better headspace (no grades have yet been released, so I still don't know if I'm actually doing better or not). I feel like Anki has helped me tremendously to hammer down the minutiae and sometimes I wish I had started using it earlier on.
However, I just can't get over my failure in fourth year. I can't. I am almost certain that this will be a permanent red flag and will be a point of deficiency in my application. I feel extremely inadequate in front of my peers, as they look up and consider different specialties while I feel like I have to self-select myself out of everything and just settle with whatever comes my way. Things seem to be going fine for the time being, but I just feel that my class rank will eventually bite me in the ass, whether it be by not getting accepted into clerkship or for residency applications.
I know that many say pre-clinical grades and class rank don't really matter, but I feel that's only true if you're average or slightly below average, not when you are dead last.
This is the first time I feel genuine regret at entering medicine. I am afraid of the shame I will bring to myself come residency time and whenever I have to submit my papers and people have to see such horrid grades. I am afraid of all the insecurities and self-hatred that I am having to deal with on a daily basis because of this. Sometimes, I wake up optimistic and hopeful of a brighter future, but then I ground myself in reality and remind myself of my shortcomings and realize that my optimism is just pure delusion and escapism, because I don't want to face the bitter reality of my situation. It's an insanely competitive World out there to the point that it feels like academic excellent has become a given, ie your supposed to be academically excellent, it's not something that only a few are distinguished with. I also think that a lot my hope is coming from survivor bias. I see all these successful doctors out there going abroad and getting all kinds of cool residencies and fellowships at top institutions and I try to imagine myself in their position. But then I come back to reality and remember that, even on their worst days, they were never as bad as I ever was. And then my hopes die and my insecurities creep up.
I never thought I'd see the day where I was genuinely struggling to pass. I had higher expectations of myself, so did my family, friends and everyone who knew me. My imposter syndrome is now very valid and very real. At the same time, I feel like I can't just call it quits.
