Personality Change ...

[Paws]

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I am wondering how to get through residency. So far, I feel like I am getting kicked all over heck and back and I am just in third year. I feel like I do pretty well with most people most of the time, using my normal personality. But! something about medicine and I feel like I need to undergo some sort of personality change just so I can survive.

I see my friends with their stone faces on rounds, and I have one too. I seem to do better when I erase any essence of my personality and just become this blank, neutral slate. I also observe residents and interns and they seem to do the same thing. Very self protective and careful in what they say. Sort of scary, really.

That seems incredibly exhausting, but I am starting think that I have to do that. Some classmates are excellent at the false persona, but I struggle with this. Residency seems like a political mine field to be gotten through, and I am sort of worried. Anyone have thoughts about this?

 

[TheWowEffect]

I am wondering how to get through residency. So far, I feel like I am getting kicked all over heck and back and I am just in third year. I feel like I do pretty well with most people most of the time, using my normal personality. But! something about medicine and I feel like I need to undergo some sort of personality change just so I can survive.

I see my friends with their stone faces on rounds, and I have one too. I seem to do better when I erase any essence of my personality and just become this blank, neutral slate. I also observe residents and interns and they seem to do the same thing. Very self protective and careful in what they say. Sort of scary, really.

That seems incredibly exhausting, but I am starting think that I have to do that. Some classmates are excellent at the false persona, but I struggle with this. Residency seems like a political mine field to be gotten through, and I am sort of worried. Anyone have thoughts about this?

You hit the nail on the head. However, its not that scary. It helps that you have realized it now. Just get your best armor ready in order to prepare for the battles ahead and when in Rome, do as the Romans do.

 

[Samoa]

There are a lot of places where you can practice medicine and still be yourself. In fact, the kind of behavior you're describing is one of the hallmarks of a malignant program.

So when it comes time to interview, remember what you're seeing now, and look for a program where you feel comfortable being yourself.

 

[Caffeine Free]

Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.

 

[Soup]

I feel like I do pretty well with most people most of the time, using my normal personality.

I haven't been through yet myself, but it seems to me that if you doing pretty well w/most people, most of the time then that's what you should keep doing. What better way to stand out from peers than to be successful (I'd define pretty well with most people, most of the time as successful given your position) while adopting more than a stone faced, stoic, defensive attitude? As long as your responsible and respectful, I think that most people respect those whom display their "real" selves more than those who are putting up a front. Who would you trust more?

 

[rice]

Sounds like the culture you're in is dominated by fear and conformity. It's much harder in med school to be yourself since you're begging for grades and evals. I went through the same thing in my med school. I was always analyzing what I would say before I'd say it, in the fear that someone would take what I said the wrong way. Being yourself in such a situation might make you stand out in a bad way. You know, the nail that sticks out gets hammered back in... That's ridiculous...My residency on the other hand is much more laid back which is my style. Remember this is only medical school; go to a residency with more like-minded people as yourself as your sanity will thank you later.

 

[mdh4569]

I am wondering how to get through residency. So far, I feel like I am getting kicked all over heck and back and I am just in third year. I feel like I do pretty well with most people most of the time, using my normal personality. But! something about medicine and I feel like I need to undergo some sort of personality change just so I can survive.

I see my friends with their stone faces on rounds, and I have one too. I seem to do better when I erase any essence of my personality and just become this blank, neutral slate. I also observe residents and interns and they seem to do the same thing. Very self protective and careful in what they say. Sort of scary, really.

That seems incredibly exhausting, but I am starting think that I have to do that. Some classmates are excellent at the false persona, but I struggle with this. Residency seems like a political mine field to be gotten through, and I am sort of worried. Anyone have thoughts about this?

i think at one point or another in ones education twordsmedicine, this happens. i almost think it happens naturally, and as some sort of defense mec. after all medicine is unlike any other profession

 

[gutonc]

I will keep watching those that I admire, and see how they do it, how they protect themselves. I hope reidency is better than this but I am not thinking it will be any differerent. Only, that I will have learned how to deal with all this better and my skills will be improved. Thanks for giving me the straight dope on this, better to really know and prepare yourself for what's to come.

Protect yourself now because, at this stage, that's all you can do. You're not going to change programs at this point unless you get kicked out. Nobody ever picks a med school to attend based on how things look in the 3rd and 4th years so it's not uncommon to find yourself in an uncomfortable position come that time.

Having said that, use this as a learning experience to determine what to look for in a residency program when the time comes. Also keep in mind that different programs within a particular institution have different cultures and attitudes. So don't judge the Peds program at institution X b/c their Surgery residents are miserable bastards (or vice versa as was the case at a place I rotated as a 3rd year).

 

[Paws]

You know, the nail that sticks out gets hammered back in... That's ridiculous...

Thanks guys for your feedback. I am glad to know that what I am perceiving is pretty real. I sort of feel like Rice's nail here, and that I am being hammered for being "different." I don't exactly know what 'different' is, but I am not a cookie cutter person and I find it hard to be a phony, say-anything-to-please you sort of person. Some of my classmates seem to be way better at the game of pleasing their residents, but when I see that it sort of makes me feel ill. Unfortunately, alot of residents seem to like that.

I think it is the culture because I see some residents and interns also struggling under some of the same dynamics, only maybe worse, I don't know. It seems to me that the decent social skills that have brought me this far, and which seem to work for most of the rest of the hospital - well, they don't seem to serve me with alot of residents and docs. What seems to work with them is to become almost invisible, and yet somehow be friendly. To know everything, and yet never ask them for help.

I will keep watching those that I admire, and see how they do it, how they protect themselves. I hope residency is better than this but I am not thinking it will be any differerent. Only, that I will have learned how to deal with all this better and my skills will be improved. Thanks for giving me the straight dope on this, better to really know and prepare yourself for what's to come.

 

[Disciple]

Graduated residency this past June and am just now starting to feel like my old self again (i.e. the guy I was in undergrad).

That's one of the problems with academic medicine. In residency you're still getting evals and that's when you start toting the party line of your dept/chairman and your specialty academy.

It's such a relief to finally be away from all that.

 

[swpm]

I was always analyzing what I would say before I'd say it, in the fear that someone would take what I said the wrong way.

For me the worst part of being a student rotating through a malignant department was having to pretend to be afraid of those ****bags.

They're like that librarian monster in that Stephen King short story that scares the hell out of children and then drinks their frightened tears with some kind of disgusting proboscis.

They're sick subhuman freaks, but not all programs have them. When shopping for a residency, look for the signs ... they're always there.