How do you know this is for you?

[campperson]

Hey! So the craziest thing has happened & I have ended up off of a waitlist for a school that starts in less than a month. I’m panicking, of course, which is making me question if this is even something I should do.

SO I’m not looking for you to convince me, more so just want to hear about people’s passion for medicine & why you KNOW you want to be a doctor.

I feel confident that I’m just panicking myself into a spiral simply because of the timeline, so I dont

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

You are just panicking yourself. If you didn't want to be a doctor, you wouldn't have jumped through all of those hoops to put a competitive app together. Congrats on the admission!

 

[Goro]

Hey! So the craziest thing has happened & I have ended up off of a waitlist for a school that starts in less than a month. I’m panicking, of course, which is making me question if this is even something I should do.

SO I’m not looking for you to convince me, more so just want to hear about people’s passion for medicine & why you KNOW you want to be a doctor.

I feel confident that I’m just panicking myself into a spiral simply because of the timeline, so I dont

Congrats on the accept!!
😀

Now go read this:

• Goro's Guide to Success in Medical School (2018 edition)

 

[Doc_Ock]

You'll never know until you go through it. I was one of those who never wanted to be anything other than a doctor since I was a kid. Left very late into my med school career because of a terrible experience. Felt insane for a little because I worked so hard for it but I know better than to fall into the sunk cost fallacy.

 

[deleted1099686]

You'll never know until you go through it. I was one of those who never wanted to be anything other than a doctor since I was a kid. Left very late into my med school career because of a terrible experience. Felt insane for a little because I worked so hard for it but I know better than to fall into the sunk cost fallacy.

What happened? And what career path are you going for now?

 

[Doc_Ock]

What happened? And what career path are you going for now?

General awful experience in just about every way. Switching to the financial sector, leaving medicine entirely.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

Awful med school experience or personal? Med schools will test the character of almost every med student. Med school, like football, is not for everyone. Lots of big strong, fast athletes are terrible players or just hate playing. If med school is not the path for you, then you have made a very good decizion. Good luck and best wiahes!

 

[Doc_Ock]

Awful med school experience or personal? Med schools will test the character of almost every med student. Med school, like football, is not for everyone. Lots of big strong, fast athletes are terrible players or just hate playing. If med school is not the path for you, then you have made a very good decizion. Good luck and best wiahes!

People like you who brush aside serious embedded issues with "it's not for everyone" ensure the problems only get worse. God you reminded why I left.

 

[deleted92121]

Hey! So the craziest thing has happened & I have ended up off of a waitlist for a school that starts in less than a month. I’m panicking, of course, which is making me question if this is even something I should do.

SO I’m not looking for you to convince me, more so just want to hear about people’s passion for medicine & why you KNOW you want to be a doctor.

I feel confident that I’m just panicking myself into a spiral simply because of the timeline, so I dont

I think the best you can do is hope you chose wisely and correctly.

For me, having as much HCE as I do, I *may* have a better idea than some applicants. That has nothing to do with my aptitude but rather simply experience. Being a physician is a good choice for me based on that experience; it fits me. At the same time, health care as a whole is brutal. Not just for physicians but RNs, APPs, RRTs, etc. The entire industry is toxic on the the macro level. You don’t know or appreciate it until you’re in the fray and too deep to exit. I wouldn’t choose another field but I suspect I have Stockholm Syndrome.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

People like you who brush aside serious embedded issues with "it's not for everyone" ensure the problems only get worse. God you reminded why I left.

If that is what you take from my comments, you definitely made the right choice. Med school, as I stated is very challenging. There is no shame in saying I would prefer another path. In fact, it shows reflection and character. Sometimes it takes more character to move on than it does to stay. Every year we lose a couple students who are fine academically but decide they want to take a different path. As far as the actual process, it is grueling and imperfect, uncovering mental health issues in some. My school bends over backwards to provide resources to assist struggling students. Occasionally, a few can't handle the academics and are dismissed. Undergrad, grads, and professional schools all have a few academic dismissals. It might take 5 yrs and some remediation, but we get the majority to graduate. We have greater than 90% graduate on time, and greater than 95% who complete their degree. I'm sorry this has been a difficult time for you. I hope you find satisfaction with your new career.

 

[Rogue42]

Going to be really honest with you OP, and I will probably catch a lot of hate for this.

As much as people hype this career up to be a humanistic calling, and that you need to have a purpose for it, a passion, and whatever else people say you need to have to know this is the right career for you, I do not feel that those things are necessarily are true.

At the end of the day, this is a career that people choose for a lot of different reasons. Stability, pride, money, patients, experiences, etc, etc. Now, to be honest, this is very hard. There are a lot of really rough days, a lot of "WTF am I even doing here; all my friends have babies, wives, and houses." So, having passions, drives, "callings," makes it easier. It gives you something to look back on - or look forward to - to remind you why you are here, and what is keeping you going.

For me, it came down to coming from a poor, rural background and my mother having a chronic illness. Having the intelligence to do something no one else in my family could accomplish, the drive from my mother's illness, and the desire to change my family tree forever (aka get out of poverty), I chose medicine. But even now, I do not know if I "KNOW" I want to be a doctor. But I do know that being a doctor gives me all of the things I want out of a career, coupled with the fact that I get to change other peoples' lives for the better which is incredibly humbling.

Only you truly know why you want to do this, but I can tell you this. If you got into medical school, then you can get through medical school. You can do this. Its scary. I got accepted 6 days before school began, and had to move three states away in all of 2 days. Change is scary. Especially when you are looking down the barrel of a gun that very few people understand. But the people that are here, the people that have been through it, and will go through it with you, will always be there to help you. You can bank on that.

 

[lanzhou_lamian]

Everyone has their own reason for why they chose this. There are some people in my class who are truly passionate about this: they live and breathe medicine, they love basic science, and they could not see themselves doing anything else. The pursuit of medical knowledge and patient care is enough to drive them. If that's you, that's awesome.

If that's not you, that's perfectly fine too. I'm one of the people that believes medicine is a job. I find the day to day of medicine interesting enough, but I also appreciate that its stable, flexible, decently interesting, and can actually make a tangible difference in people's lives. Plus, it aligned well with the subjects in school that come more naturally to me. I'm excited for the job and life it will afford me, and my dreams of that future push me forward. So far, I'm happy with the decision and have enjoyed med school.

Throughout the medical school application process, I'm sure you've distilled down what are the reasons that took you down this path. It can be a rocky path at times, but I'd just remember what those reasons were when things get challenging. Lean on your classmates and realize that your school is generally in your corner and wants you to succeed. You're gonna do great in med school.

 

[MDMechEngr]

You don't really know until you go through it and hope to God that you made the right choice. Med school is my Mount Everest. I have trained for it my whole life and I am ready for the climb. That was the state of my mind when I started med school last year. You cant be wishy washy or else...

 

[Doc_Ock]

You don't really know until you go through it and hope to God that you made the right choice. Med school is my Mount Everest. I have trained for it my whole life and I am ready for the climb. That was the state of my mind when I started med school last year. You cant be wishy washy or else...

Agreed. The only way to really know what it's like is to go through it. I left school, but if I had never attended I'd regret it for the rest of my life.

 

[deleted872555]

Going to be really honest with you OP, and I will probably catch a lot of hate for this.

As much as people hype this career up to be a humanistic calling, and that you need to have a purpose for it, a passion, and whatever else people say you need to have to know this is the right career for you, I do not feel that those things are necessarily are true.

At the end of the day, this is a career that people choose for a lot of different reasons. Stability, pride, money, patients, experiences, etc, etc. Now, to be honest, this is very hard. There are a lot of really rough days, a lot of "WTF am I even doing here; all my friends have babies, wives, and houses." So, having passions, drives, "callings," makes it easier. It gives you something to look back on - or look forward to - to remind you why you are here, and what is keeping you going.

For me, it came down to coming from a poor, rural background and my mother having a chronic illness. Having the intelligence to do something no one else in my family could accomplish, the drive from my mother's illness, and the desire to change my family tree forever (aka get out of poverty), I chose medicine. But even now, I do not know if I "KNOW" I want to be a doctor. But I do know that being a doctor gives me all of the things I want out of a career, coupled with the fact that I get to change other peoples' lives for the better which is incredibly humbling.

Only you truly know why you want to do this, but I can tell you this. If you got into medical school, then you can get through medical school. You can do this. Its scary. I got accepted 6 days before school began, and had to move three states away in all of 2 days. Change is scary. Especially when you are looking down the barrel of a gun that very few people understand. But the people that are here, the people that have been through it, and will go through it with you, will always be there to help you. You can bank on that.

this gave me goosebumps

 

[Tinyhandz]

I don’t really think medical school is for me but honestly I had nothing better to do. It seems like a solid enough career. Will I be happy? Probably not as I know almost no body that is. The advantage to that is medicine is time consuming enough that it’ll distract me. An idle mind is honestly the worst.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

I don’t really think medical school is for me but honestly I had nothing better to do. It seems like a solid enough career. Will I be happy? Probably not as I know almost no body that is. The advantage to that is medicine is time consuming enough that it’ll distract me. An idle mind is honestly the worst.

I think your reasoning is really flawed. Personally, I really don't want my doctor taking care of me since they have nothing better to do. You might be just as happy in banking, finance or tech. Think about it.

 

[FluffyCat1212]

Exposure exposure exposure. Shadow. Work a clinical job. Go to grand rounds if you can. Talk to doctors. Read nonfiction medical books. While you obvs can't do doctor things until you're a doctor, the one thing you can do is try to get a feel for it. Exposure can also show you just how vast medicine is, and how many different ways you can use your DO or MD!

And the second thing is to abandon the expectation that you may have this sudden breakthrough wherein everything suddenly makes sense and you know 100% that this is for you. As a non-trad who came back to medicine, I called this a "say yes to the dress" moment and sought it fervently. Obviously, it never happened, but I fell in love with medicine through repeated exposure to the medical field. The closest thing I had was a small breakdown in my car after shadowing an intensivist because I couldn't wait to learn and start practicing medicine.

I had cold feet all the way up until submitting my primary, and after talking to one of the doctors I worked with, I found out that this isn't at all uncommon. She had doubts too, and knew several others who did. She also encouraged me to reach out to others because chances are that I wasn't alone. She was also a psychiatrist, so I had to listen to her advice on that lol.

I guess the point of this personal anecdote is that it's okay to have doubts and cold feet; many people do. Just make sure that you take time to address it and figure out what exactly what is holding you back. And it's also totally okay to not be one of those kids who knew from age 2 that they wanted to be a doctor. I sure as heck didn't, nor did my mom (who is a practicing physician and genuinely loves what she does so much that she's practicing into her 70s!)

Congrats on the accept, and stop panicking. Getting cold feet at this point is actually pretty normal, but take a deep breath and realize that you wouldn't have gone through premed and application hell if you didn't have a compelling reason to do so. Panic may make it difficult to remember why you did this, but just know that you did this for a reason. Now go rock it, future doctor!