So, here's the story: I was a high school academic phenom, not nationally or statewide mind you, but I went to all the camps, Governor's school, etc., and was voted most intellectual in my high school. People thought I would go to Duke, my favorite basketball team, and when I got in early admission, I threw away all my other applications. High school was mostly a joke for me--I would arrive most days with no homework done, and would get everything done before the class it was due, while doing homework under my books during lectures and classes. My senior year was especially bad as I got the "-itis" something terrible, and I graduated 6th after starting the year 3rd in my class behind two gunners (out of around 160 people).
When I got to Duke, I studied a lot that first semester, having been told by one high school teacher that she didn't know if I'd make it past the first semester (she knew how I didn't work). I got a 3.85 that semester, virtually guaranteeing me a spot on the Dean's List by the end of the year, and putting me in Phi Eta Sigma, the freshman honor society. The second semester, basketball season hit hard, and buoyed by that, camping out for four weeks to see us beat Carolina, and my kick-ass first semester, I forgot about studying. I got a few C's that semester, the first since 7th grade, and finished with a 2.75. However, I still was able to make Dean's List for the year, so I didn't feel too bad. The next fall, I was back up, around a 3.3. Then again in the spring, basketball and winter, and I thought I was "back," and I got around a 2.3 again. This same sort of cycle kept happening to me throughout college, except that I started getting used to C grades, thinking that "average at Duke is pretty good," and then I started skipping class more and more, eventually getting D's and an F in one class because I never attended again after the second week. I was miserable, and I didn't want to admit it, and I had no idea how to bring myself back. I didn't want to go to classes, I didn't want to study, and I didn't want to fail, yet I was invariably going to do all three if I didn't change, but I was stuck in a downward spiral.
Eventually, the
[email protected]# hit the fan, and I was expelled from school after too many bad grades. This was the middle of my SENIOR year. I went home, saw a counselor weekly (strongly recommended by my dean, and not really optional), and worked bagging groceries and stocking shelves at a local grocery store. I eventually moved into working in the grocery chain's main office, heading up some projects. I reapplied for admission to Duke and started again the following fall for my fifth year. The time off had partially worked--I wasn't afraid to talk to professors when I wasn't doing well, and I attended my classes, but I still had a real problem when it came to studying--I just didn't want to do it, and did anything else rather than study.
I barely graduated (got two more F's, and I had to change from two majors to one at the last minute to get my degree--flunked two of the courses I needed for chemistry) and worked the next summer at the grocery chain during the day and waiting tables at night. I remember the eureka moment that I was out in the driveway playing basketball and I had the revelation that I didn't deserve to graduate and that my diploma was a gift from above, especially since I had done so little work. I made a pact then and there never to let myself down so much again. I could go on and on about this, but the upshot was that I was determined never to be lazy again with my education.
Anyway, after making about $5k that summer, I started taking courses at Duke again that fall to try and get the equivalent of the chemistry major I hadn't before. It was really expensive, $3k per course, but I didn't want to take classes at a state school and have people say that I was taking them there because they were easier. I worked temp jobs, used up all the savings I had, and got deep in debt. Eventually I got a job working as an organic chemistry technician for a small start up company (took about a year and a half of looking), and my boss was a former Nobel Prize nominee who had left Duke because of a sexual harassment claim. I guess we all have our cross to bear. I traveled to see the Deans of Admission at ECU, UNC, and Wake, and ask them what I needed to do to make myself competitive. They basically said that I should take 10+ hours of coursework, get A's, and rock the MCAT. Well, check, check, check. Credit Kaplan with my 37Q MCAT in Aug. 2000. I took my two years of organic chemistry experience and got a job at Duke Hospital making radiopharmaceuticals for a P.E.T. facility, which got me clinical exposure. With that, my MCAT, recent good grades, and a strong MCAT, I applied to med school.
I was rejected by 20 schools, two of which interviewed me (UNC and SLU), and SLU waitlisted me (never got off the waitlist). I was determined to get in, so in the fall of 2002 (after sitting on the waitlist all summer), I found out about the BU MAMS program, which boasted an 85% success rate at getting people into med school.
The rest is history. 3.77 in the program, took the MCAT after it expired and got a 39R. Been accepted to UNC and waitlisted at Pitt.
In the meantime, I've spent the last several years becoming a classically-trained vocalist, singing in operas, rock operas, and solos in front of as many as 1,400 people. I've also done a ton of research and am now working on my thesis in neuropharm.
It's been a long and difficult road... I'm 30 years old now, and I'm motivated, something I couldn't say about myself 10 years ago. Anyway, I hope my story gives some of you hope about resurrection. It's a real thing. It is never too late to fix what went wrong, and it's never time to give up.
Good luck everyone!!!!!
Good luck in med school.
(and, yes, I was in Dr. Ray's class, Fusion--what a joke, huh?)
