When do you decide to give up?

[Somethingtosmileabout21]

I have a low gpa and will have my associates next semester. My college is showing 3.0, but I'm thinking with grade replacements its two point something. I'm going to have to use a calculator to figure it out. I mostly just want to know what you would do in my shoes.

I have hundreds of hours working as a CNA.
Extenuating circumstances that explain my GPA. I have a couple unique experiences and definitely a unique and very disadvantaged background. I'm ORM and did give up. Every time I decide that I'm not enough to do this, I can't bring myself to let go. Despite believing it's hopeless. I'm 25 with 2 kids. I was scheduled for 17 hours last semester and received "A's" in every class. I have 2 consecutive semesters of bad grades from my freshman year (2017). I have not taken any of my prerequisites except biology (b in bio 1. A in bio 2). My science gpa is lacking because of math. I had never really been taught any sort of formal math before college. I was not able to attend school as a child. It was like a new language.

I just need to know if I work at this, is there even a chance? Would I be working for nothing? I want this, but I know that I need to be realistic as well. I'll add that my dream school NYIT-Jonesboro.

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[J_Silver]

You never want to give up on something that you truly seek. If one door closes, there's many other that will open, in your case, you might need to build one yourself or find that one key. There's many things you can do to rebuild yourself. We are human, right?

 

[Calizboosted76]

I had a 2.67 and 2.97, cGPA and sGPA. I just finished my first semester of medical school before the holidays. You got this.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

" Never give up...Never surrender" Capt Jason Nesmith. If this is your dream, its not close to being over. Your are going to have to reflect inwardly, utilize the resources at your school's Learning Center to determine why you have not been successful to the degree necessary for medical school admission. Correct any correctable deficiencies. It might take a year of reinvention and a post bac, either formal or DIY. Dust yourself off and get going. Good luck and best wishes!

 

[Zeldaspikes]

I have a low gpa and will have my associates next semester. My college is showing 3.0, but I'm thinking with grade replacements its two point something. I'm going to have to use a calculator to figure it out. I mostly just want to know what you would do in my shoes.

I have hundreds of hours working as a CNA.
Extenuating circumstances that explain my GPA. I have a couple unique experiences and definitely a unique and very disadvantaged background. I'm ORM and did give up. Every time I decide that I'm not enough to do this, I can't bring myself to let go. Despite believing it's hopeless. I'm 25 with 2 kids. I was scheduled for 17 hours last semester and received "A's" in every class. I have 2 consecutive semesters of bad grades from my freshman year (2017). I have not taken any of my prerequisites except biology (b in bio 1. A in bio 2). My science gpa is lacking because of math. I had never really been taught any sort of formal math before college. I was not able to attend school as a child. It was like a new language.

I just need to know if I work at this, is there even a chance? Would I be working for nothing? I want this, but I know that I need to be realistic as well. I'll add that my dream school NYIT-Jonesboro.

Never give up on something you want. First figure out your “real” cgpa, not your schools gpa, by using an online gpa calculator. If it’s lower than you expect, don’t despair just keep working hard getting best grades you can at the 4 year school you transfer too. You’ll probably need to enroll in a post bacc program either (smp or diy) but at the end of it if you ace it your chances are good as anyone’s to make it, if everything else is in line.

 

[AlbinoHawk DO]

There's no right or wrong answer to giving up or continuing. Many of it needs to come from within. However, you need to be realistic with your chances. It sounds like you had a bad first year but have turned things around. It seems you are yet to still transfer to a new school. Personally, I believe that you need to give yourself strong cut-offs. If you finish your BS/BA with <2.6, I think you are better off thinking of an alternative career. If you finish at 2.9-3.2, it is salvageable even if not ideal. In between 2.6-2.89 is where it becomes hard to decide where personally I'd shift into podiatry since you have kids you'll need to feed. You don't have the luxury of waiting and mounting more debt

 

[Riven_1KV]

I have a low gpa and will have my associates next semester. My college is showing 3.0, but I'm thinking with grade replacements its two point something. I'm going to have to use a calculator to figure it out. I mostly just want to know what you would do in my shoes.

I have hundreds of hours working as a CNA.
Extenuating circumstances that explain my GPA. I have a couple unique experiences and definitely a unique and very disadvantaged background. I'm ORM and did give up. Every time I decide that I'm not enough to do this, I can't bring myself to let go. Despite believing it's hopeless. I'm 25 with 2 kids. I was scheduled for 17 hours last semester and received "A's" in every class. I have 2 consecutive semesters of bad grades from my freshman year (2017). I have not taken any of my prerequisites except biology (b in bio 1. A in bio 2). My science gpa is lacking because of math. I had never really been taught any sort of formal math before college. I was not able to attend school as a child. It was like a new language.

I just need to know if I work at this, is there even a chance? Would I be working for nothing? I want this, but I know that I need to be realistic as well. I'll add that my dream school NYIT-Jonesboro.

I can really only share my own experience as someone who is currently "letting go" so to speak. First of all, lose the hopeless language... you're not. If you took the MCAT and got a decent score, you probably have a decent chance with any adcom worth a damn. You're 25 with two kids and working as a CRNA. You didn't know any math and you're still turning up. Don't let your perceived "chances" be the reason to give up. Statistics is the second most dangerous form of pseudoscience.

It sounds like you are getting good grades, what year of school are you in? You got a 4.0 this semester so that looks good, real good: keep it up.

It seems like you're overwhelmed right now and aren't sure if you can do it with the track you're currently on. You're going to have to your do inventory and reflect on if this is really what you want to do with your life. If you still want to, you can do the math and work it out. You can apply to medical school when you're 30, you can take things slow. I took things way to fast and got burnt hard.

 

[TragicalDrFaust]

Your circumstances, especially not attending school as a child, are unusual. There are places on the medical school application to explain them and how they affected you ability to perform in school. Many schools consider the final 60 credits or so more than the beginning of school so if you can bring your GPA up moving forward, you can make up for a lower GPA in the past.

If you need to take more pre-req math classes, I recommend you figure out how to take remedial math and start from the very beginning. Possibly GED level or even a tutor who can get you started with the basics, whatever level you're at.

Your road will be longer and harder than the average pre-med, and the average road to medical school is already long and hard. But you're still in the running. Nothing you've said so far will prevent you from getting into medical school.

Some questions that might give you a picture of what your lifestyle will be like over the next few years if you pursue this path. Feel free to answer here or not.

How much help do you have with the kids, ie from a partner or family?

How feasible is it to cut back on work hours to ensure high performance in undergrad class from now on?

Are you eligible for grants and loans and do you feel they would be worth it during undergrad?

 

[kelminak]

You are on the brink right now. Clearly you are educationally capable as evidenced by your grades. You would need to maintain that for the next couple years along with studying for the MCAT and juggling your 2 kids in the mix. You won't be admitted until you're 28-29ish? (I'm a little confused on the timeline.) And you won't be a physician until you're 32-33, and add residency training and you'll be 35-36 at the earliest before all of your training is over. Do you see yourself doing schooling/training for the next decade? Only you can make that decision.

PS I'm not sure exactly what you meant by grade replacement, but retaken classes are not replaced but averaged now. Just want to make sure you know.

 

[Osminog]

Become an RN, and after a couple years of working as an RN, enroll in an online part-time NP program while working. This is the most reasonable path toward becoming a healthcare provider based on your work background, academic profile, and family situation. The RN-to-NP path will save you a lot of time and money, and it will allow you to play a bigger role in your children’s lives during their formative years.

The people on this sub-forum are strongly biased in favor of medicine because that’s the path they chose for themselves. Don’t let them convince you that “giving up” on this long, expensive, life-sucking career path is inherently a bad thing. I’ve worked under enough miserable, burnt-out doctors to know that medicine isn’t a worthwhile holy grail for everybody.

 

[Somethingtosmileabout21]

Thank you for all of the responses. They have really helped put things into perspective.

I did a gpa calculator and in 2 years, I will have around a 3.0. That's correcting grade replacements.

In my mind, I know of so many reasons it wouldn't work out. I'm just having trouble with the letting go Part.

Working 80 hours isn't really ideal with my children. I've done that before and I missed a lot of my daughter's second year of life. I showed up to work one day and realized that I forgot to wear shoes. Childcare for my youngest would be rocky at best. I don't have a familial support system to watch my children. . If I got accepted just anywhere, I'd have to take the kids and go alone. My husband has a career here and just finally started to move up. It wouldn't be fair to ask him to move. He's very supportive to a fault.

Sometimes the question isn't can I, but should I. Letting go is so hard though. Thank you again, everyone. I apologize for the time it took me to respond.

 

[kelminak]

@Somethingtosmileabout21 It sounds like it doesn't sound feasible for you in the long run. You might consider PA school instead as it takes significantly less time as long as you're ok being supervised by a physician. I would never recommend becoming an NP.

 

[turtle2019]

NYIT Ar takes people with poor GPA and MCAT scores.

 

[deleted1129181]

Just a quick tip - NYIT has one of the highest attrition and OMS 1/2 year repeat rates of any DO schools I have seen, aside from the newer ones working their kinks out. I feel like you should know this if you have children. I would go to a school that isn't so callous towards their students.

 

[Ho0v-man]

You had a bad year 5 years ago that brought down your gpa. Sounds like a good upward trend since. Also, you haven’t even taken the majority of the pre-reqs. So there’s still essentially nothing to go by here to say you are or aren’t cut out for this.

However, it sounds like your spouse would be zero support because of his career’s geographic limitations. IMO, this is a much bigger limitation. You mention that you didn’t like missing so much of your child’s life when you were working so many hours. You’ll be in a similar situation in med school, only you’ll have zero support from your spouse. My wife did A LOT of the heavy lifting in the parenting department in med school. Between this and no familial support, I strongly recommend against this path.

This isn’t a failure on your part. It’s just reality. Choosing family over medicine isn’t giving up on your dream. It’s choosing what’s most important to you.