I want to share my story with you.
During school, I was a straight A+ student. I did extremely well in school despite my social awkwardness. I was the student who gets very high scores with the least effort. And everybody pushed and encouraged me to go to medical school and that I will do great in it. Eventually, I did, and that was the worst decision I made in my life. I struggled socially in medical school. I didn't have a relationship throughout college, I even rarely talked to girls. I hated college, I avoided presenting cases, public speaking, volunteering and was depressed most of the time and despite that, I actually got As in exams with little study beforehand. The real struggle came afterward, when I started working and residency. The amount of stress in the internal medicine residency was unbearable for me. I couldn't handle it and I dropped out the residency after 2 years and since then I am unemployed for a year and a half now. I got extremely depressed. I lost ties with all my friends. I spent all time eating and sleeping. My weight is up 70 pounds. I look older. I went to a psychiatrist and I am on meds but it doesn't seem to help a lot as I am feeling I reached a dead-end. I am now 31 years old. I don't know what can I do now. Should I switch careers and study another field from the scratch like computer science but then It will take 4 more years at least to finish and moreover, I don't think I still have the passion, mental capacity and dedication I had when I was young. I will be feeling that I am a disabled person.and I think I don't have the stamina for that anymore ( given that outside work my life is miserable, I am still single and lonely at age of 31, I live with my parents, I am doing bad financially, I am overweight). The second option is starting a residency in a more socially tolerant field like pathology. I would be older than my seniors and it also requires a good state of mental health to go through and be able to take decisions but it will be much tolerable than internal medicine and it can give me time to work on my other issues.
During school, I was a straight A+ student. I did extremely well in school despite my social awkwardness. I was the student who gets very high scores with the least effort. And everybody pushed and encouraged me to go to medical school and that I will do great in it. Eventually, I did, and that was the worst decision I made in my life. I struggled socially in medical school. I didn't have a relationship throughout college, I even rarely talked to girls. I hated college, I avoided presenting cases, public speaking, volunteering and was depressed most of the time and despite that, I actually got As in exams with little study beforehand. The real struggle came afterward, when I started working and residency. The amount of stress in the internal medicine residency was unbearable for me. I couldn't handle it and I dropped out the residency after 2 years and since then I am unemployed for a year and a half now. I got extremely depressed. I lost ties with all my friends. I spent all time eating and sleeping. My weight is up 70 pounds. I look older. I went to a psychiatrist and I am on meds but it doesn't seem to help a lot as I am feeling I reached a dead-end. I am now 31 years old. I don't know what can I do now. Should I switch careers and study another field from the scratch like computer science but then It will take 4 more years at least to finish and moreover, I don't think I still have the passion, mental capacity and dedication I had when I was young. I will be feeling that I am a disabled person.and I think I don't have the stamina for that anymore ( given that outside work my life is miserable, I am still single and lonely at age of 31, I live with my parents, I am doing bad financially, I am overweight). The second option is starting a residency in a more socially tolerant field like pathology. I would be older than my seniors and it also requires a good state of mental health to go through and be able to take decisions but it will be much tolerable than internal medicine and it can give me time to work on my other issues.