M3 Wedding

[ph_wudoc]

I'm a 1st year planning my wedding. I've given myself a long engagement, so I'd have time to plan, but I'd really like to get married in September(3rd year) instead of over the summer between 2nd and 3rd years. Can I do it? Anyone been there? I'd love some advice. Thanks,
Paige

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[fourthyearmed]

I'm not married but I have many classmates who have gotten married during med school so I've seen what they've done. I agree with not getting married in the summer between 2nd and 3rd year. There really isn't a "summer" then because you have to study for Step 1 during this time (at my school we had about 6 weeks). I know of at least 3 people who did get married during this time, right after taking the boards. One of the three failed. I would imagine it would be really hard to concentrate on studying with a wedding coming up! As for getting married in September, it would depend on your schedule for the year. If you had something like FP or Psych then it would be possible to have a weekend wedding and plenty of free time for planning but I don't know how you would get to take a honeymoon at that time. The summer between 1st and 2nd year would be ideal with 3 months off but you said you wanted a long engagement. I would recommend Christmas vacation during 3rd year if your school gives you 3 weeks like we get. Plan easy rotations during the time you need to be doing wedding arrangements. If you really want a long engagement you could take a vacation month at the beginning of your 4th year like one of my friends did to get married and go on her honeymoon. Good Luck.

 

[Amy]

Lots of people in my class got married over winter break of 3rd year. Forget about a honeymoon any other time. Fourth year is a good time, too... you can plan your schedule around wedding festivities.

 

[mudbug]

I'm the fiancee of an M3 and we're getting married this spring. How it worked out for us is last year before we set a wedding date and before my fiance had chosen his clerkship rotation he arranged a meeting with the dean and explained our situation. She gave him a list of dates, told him to set the wedding for one of them and then let her know, and she would make sure he got into the rotation that had a break around that date. He'll have the week before our wedding off and the week after.

I definitely am glad we didn't plan the wedding for anywhere near Step 1. That would have been unbearably stressful for us, although I've heard of other people pulling it off.

Good luck!

 

[gwyn779]

I actually got married in between 2nd and 3rd year and I thought it worked out very well. We were engaged for nearly 2 years, so I had plenty of time to plan everything without it interfering w/ Step 1. I also had a very simple wedding, which is what I wanted anyway. I left 10 days between boards and the wedding, which was plenty to take care of all the last minute details. Of course, we didn't have time for a honeymoon, but we really didn't have the money for it either. Our plan is to take a really nice honeymoon when we have plenty of both.

I have also known people who got married over Thanksgiving or spring break, but for us that's only a week, which was actually less time than I ended up with. Really, pick what you want and it will work out.

 

[Weil-Felix]

I got married during the spring of my third year. During my psych rotation, which was my last rotation, and fortunately my easiest. It was do-able, but I am not sure if I would do it that way again. We had to delay our honeymoon a couple of weeks until I was done with my rotation. If you have a choice, you might want to think about doing it fourth year instead. You will have a lot more time during fourth year.

Planning a wedding during third year is kind of a pain, but you can do it if you are not super high-maintenance, and if you have others in your family helping you.

If you are going to have your wedding during one of your 3rd year rotations, I would highly recommend trying to do it during one of the "minors", like psych or OB.

Don't under any circumstances try to do it during your surgery rotation. (Or internal medicine, for that matter.) Seriously. That would be truly insanity-provoking.

 

[Amy]

A great time to get married is right after graduation, before residency starts. I'm doing it, and so are at least 10 others in my class. 😀

 

[fourthyearmed]

If you are going to have your wedding during one of your 3rd year rotations, I would highly recommend trying to do it during one of the "minors", like psych or OB.

I would talk to some 3rd and 4th years at your school about rotations before making plans. At my school OB was definitely not minor, it was longer hours than surgery and I'd never been more tired in my life.

 

[ph_wudoc]

I would talk to some 3rd and 4th years at your school about rotations before making plans. At my school OB was definitely not minor, it was longer hours than surgery and I'd never been more tired in my life.

Thanks for all your advice, this has really been helpful.

 

[MichiMO]

I am actually planning my wedding for Nov. of my 3rd year. I am just taking one of my shorter 3week rotations (like surg. elective or neuro) and moving it to the beginning of 4th year. My school is really cool about letting you have a life and we have a pretty flexible fourth year, so there is room to play around. There is another girl in my class doing the same thing in Oct. of 3rd year.
The key is letting them know early. Schools can actually be pretty helpful if you give them good advanced warning, but if they have already started to plan schedules, forget about it!

 

[dr. blue]

I'm the fiancee of an M3 and we're getting married this spring. How it worked out for us is last year before we set a wedding date and before my fiance had chosen his clerkship rotation he arranged a meeting with the dean and explained our situation. She gave him a list of dates, told him to set the wedding for one of them and then let her know, and she would make sure he got into the rotation that had a break around that date. He'll have the week before our wedding off and the week after.

I definitely am glad we didn't plan the wedding for anywhere near Step 1. That would have been unbearably stressful for us, although I've heard of other people pulling it off.

Good luck!

i'm a MS2 planning on getting married during 3rd year. thanks for the good advice about talking to the dean about dates and everything, but i have a slight problem--i'm also planning a transfer between MS2 & 3! i don't think it would go over well if i started asking the dean at the school i'm planning on transferring to about prospective dates (even though i'm pretty confident about getting in). we were thinking about a weekend in october (sans honeymoon of course), but how could i possibly know which rotation i'll be in? advice? ridicule?

 

[jennie 21]

My opinion: get married summer between MS1 and MS2. It's the best time, med-school wise, other than fourth year. If you're an MS1 now that would still give you 9 months to plan the wedding, which is plenty of time. It'd be a lot easier than trying to get married during third year, when you have to work around rotations. You really don't need more than a year to plan, anyways. Unless you have some other reason for wanting a long engagement, I wouldn't do it because you think you need two years to plan. You'll just drive yourself crazy obsessing over details if you have too much time, and having a wedding and honeymoon during third year is A LOT harder than before second year (or during second year, for that matter). I got married June of the summer between MS1 and MS2, and planned most of my wedding in the 11 months prior to that (we were engaged for a few months before we did any serious planning). It worked out just fine, I was able to plan the whole wedding as an MS1 while doing fine in my schoolwork. A little crazy at times, but better than trying to do it while studying for the boards or doing rotations, IMO. Just my $0.02!