Explaining the Bad Stuff at Interviews: Truth or Not?

[Cinnameg]

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I suffered from major depression on and off during my first two years of college. I managed to get out of it with only a few C's and two withdrawls, then got great grades my second two years of college and ended up with an overall 3.5. I stopped doing premedical courses after halfway through sophomore year, and ended up going to a postbaccalaureate premedical program right after I graduated from college. When I did my applications -- and yeah, I'm actually done with secondaries -- when schools actually asked me to "please explain any irregularities or weak points in your application" I would say that I suffered from an eating disorder (which is also more or less true, but isn't actually the reason I screwed up some grades). That eating disorder information only ended up on maybe a third of the applications I did, but now reading this thread I worry that saying an eating disorder might not be better than saying that I had major depression. I thought that it was because girls with eating disorders are known to be perfectionists and many recover completely and go on to have great, stellar careers, unlike people with depression, which tend to have recurrences.

Anyway, I wanted to ask, for the sake of any upcoming interviews I might have, WHAT are people saying who are in something akin to my situation? Do you tell them you were sick or do you chalk up any application flaws to "immaturity" and "misplaced priorities"? Do medical school admissions committees accept NOT having an explanation for bad grades?

Anything anyone could say about this would help me. My first interview is December 12th and I'm very nervous about grade-related questions.

Thanks!

 

[MrBurns10]

Check your PM box.

 

[princessd3]

I suffered from major depression on and off during my first two years of college. I managed to get out of it with only a few C's and two withdrawls, then got great grades my second two years of college and ended up with an overall 3.5. I stopped doing premedical courses after halfway through sophomore year, and ended up going to a postbaccalaureate premedical program right after I graduated from college. When I did my applications -- and yeah, I'm actually done with secondaries -- when schools actually asked me to "please explain any irregularities or weak points in your application" I would say that I suffered from an eating disorder (which is also more or less true, but isn't actually the reason I screwed up some grades). That eating disorder information only ended up on maybe a third of the applications I did, but now reading this thread I worry that saying an eating disorder might not be better than saying that I had major depression. I thought that it was because girls with eating disorders are known to be perfectionists and many recover completely and go on to have great, stellar careers, unlike people with depression, which tend to have recurrences.

Anyway, I wanted to ask, for the sake of any upcoming interviews I might have, WHAT are people saying who are in something akin to my situation? Do you tell them you were sick or do you chalk up any application flaws to "immaturity" and "misplaced priorities"? Do medical school admissions committees accept NOT having an explanation for bad grades?

Anything anyone could say about this would help me. My first interview is December 12th and I'm very nervous about grade-related questions.

Thanks!

I think it's ok to admit when you were wrong. Everyone makes mistakes. At one of my interviews I asnwered one of my more difficult questions saying that I used poor judgement. From our conversation she could see that I had indeed learned from past mistakes and that I was a more mature person today because of them.