Overwhelming desire with bad grades

[Dustee]

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Hi all. I need help from you guys... Ever since I graduated from nursing school in 2000, my desire to go to med school never ceased. I graduated HS in 1993 and went to SDSU, undecided major- completed 2 years with GPA of 1.7 (Got all F's in last semester). Then I transferred out to private college and majored in nursing. Got my BSN in 2000 with GPA of 2.9. I decided to do post-bac program while I was working as a full time nurse. Got C's in general chem and physics. Have 2 withdraws, and one D in physiology. 😡
At that point, I was disqualified to continue. That was in 2002.

I continued to work as a RN for awhile and decided to go to grad school for MSN Nurse practitioner. I did not think I would get in with my poor grades, but luckly I did get into the program and completed with GPA of 3.8 last year. Currently practicing as a family nurse practitioner, but my desire to go to med school still has not died off. Not because I want to earn big money nor pride of being called 'doctor', but to learn about human body and able to understand disease processes. NP school somewhat covered it but very brief.
I am 32, going on 33. Once again, I am going to try to go to med school. I am plainning to take some classes at Cal-State as an extension student, retake all of the science classes (Probably take about 1-1.5year).
Is this a good idea?? At this point, this is the only option I can think of. I thought about applying to other post bac programs but most of them are only open to whom never took science classes.
I am kind of limited when it comes to location of the school because my husband has been working for this company for long time.. and don't think it's fair for him to relocate. Currently I live in LA/Orange county area.

Does anyone have a similar situation and successfully got into med school??
I wish I had a clear vision earlier of my life so I could have done good job. I guess it's too late to look back though. 😳

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[DrMidlife]

First, I think you'll get more attention in the nontraditional forum.

Second, can you move to Texas and wait a few years? I just found out that there is an actual grade forgiveness program there, where you can write off any grade that's 10 years old and start over. If you're a TX resident.

Third, I strongly recommend that you hold off on doing premed prereqs and GPA repair until you can go at it full time, with everything you've got. I don't think taking one class at a time, even if you do well, is a recovery from your GPA. Med school is a double-full-time-all-hard-science academic load, and adcoms need to see that you can handle it. So I'd say be a great NP for a few years, and try to have some extraordinary experiences (overseas? with the homeless? start a free clinic?) to blow away med school adcoms. My primary physician is an NP who spends a couple months a year in Ghana working with prostitutes - this is the kind of EC tastiness you'll need to compete with perfect flawless 21 year olds. See if you can participate in some meaty clinical research as well. Learn Spanish or Arabic or Somali or something equally useful while you're at it. And make sure you can write well, REALLY well, while you have the time to work on it.

THEN cut back to locums and dive back in to school and kick some serious a** at retaking the prereqs, AND take upper div science, a heavy load every quarter, for at least two years. I strongly recommend a structured program, like Scripps (that's in LA), or whoever will let you in, so that you have support. Start talking to them now (and anybody else who will listen) about who you are and what you want to do, and collect guidance on what's possible. If you DIY at a CSU, that's okay, but do it in a way that makes you a bonafide premed with advising support. Being an NP makes you interesting: play that card. You have a lot to prove with improving your GPA, and (see my other posts) your undergrad GPA is more permanent than a tattoo. I'm 40 and working to get back above 3.0, which is why I'm being all loud about all this.

Braluk will probably pipe in here and say "plan on taking an SMP as well" and he's right. I believe you have work to do before you can get into an SMP. Somebody else will probably pipe in and say "aim for osteopathic" and they're right too.

Lastly, your one clean slate is the MCAT. This can be your ace in the hole. If you can kill the MCAT, some schools will be okay with a 3.0ish GPA.

Best of luck to you, and keep us posted.

 

[Dustee]

Thank you for your advice. Sometimes I wish I were single so that I can go anywhere I need to go to achieve the goal. Too bad I'm married and my life is somewhat limited. Does not mean I regret.. 😛
But I will seriously consider your advice and start working my way up to there. I was in a 'rush-mode' because of my age...(I'll be 33 this year).
But like you said, even the preparation takes great deal of time and effort. I need to be patient and do well in pre-req's and MCAT.
I'll keep you posted.
Thanks again.👍