I have a few questions

[Curious19]

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Hey guys, I have always been very interested in psychiatry and am looking to pursue that but I am kind of In a tough situation. I am a student athlete and just like most I thought I would play for ever, I will earn my bachelors in psychology this year and have a few questions I was hoping some of you could maybe help me with. First, I know that I haven't taken the science courses that would be required for entrance into med schools, but is there any other way to get into a med school? I have thought about working while also taking the classes necessary in order to possibly get accepted, only problem would be the time spent. I guess what I am asking is if there's any good advice anyone can offer on what would possibly be a good decision to make? I realize its getting late in my education but any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you!!

 

[Nasrudin]

Hey guys, I have always been very interested in psychiatry and am looking to pursue that but I am kind of In a tough situation. I am a student athlete and just like most I thought I would play for ever, I will earn my bachelors in psychology this year and have a few questions I was hoping some of you could maybe help me with. First, I know that I haven't taken the science courses that would be required for entrance into med schools, but is there any other way to get into a med school? I have thought about working while also taking the classes necessary in order to possibly get accepted, only problem would be the time spent. I guess what I am asking is if there's any good advice anyone can offer on what would possibly be a good decision to make? I realize its getting late in my education but any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you!!

Welcome. It's not late. The average age for matriculating med students is mid 20's or something like that.

No, there's no way around the requirements just like there's no way around being good enough of an athlete to play at your level. If there was I would've played. Just for giggles. I spent 10 years crawling through a degree and prerequisite while working multiple jobs count of monte Cristo style.

What you really mean is your going to have work insanely hard and start over at something some people your age have already moved on from. Don't worry about it. You just move steadily and you'll get there.

The biggest mistake you can make is not doing well in your classes or the MCAT. However you can put together the pieces of the puzzle to accomplish this along with having enough clinical experience to validate your decision doesn't matter, as long as you get it done right. Psychology oriented students do have a nice background advantage as psychiatry trainees but the distance between you and that is spanned by general sciences, anatomy, biochemistry, and the like for a long time. And then for even longer after that all the medical fields OB, peds, surgery, medicine, etc.

I'd make sure you really want to do it. Whatever that means to you, I couldn't say. I had all the information a person could have and consider myself accidentally lucky that psychiatry is actually a branch of medicine. So....good luck with that.