Welcome, and thanks for stopping by!
At some point everybody had a secret meeting without me (this happens a lot) and decided to start using the word "non-traditional" instead of "old" to describe students like me. I'm fine with it, because I have mirrors in my house and therefore don't need any other reminders that I'm old.
I'm non-traditional as hell, though. And I'm starting a blog about it.
This blog is more for my use than for anyone else, if I'm being totally honest. It was suggested to me by someone I trust - and of course by "someone I trust" I mean "the Internet" - that I should start a blog devoted to my school experience. I'm doing that because it seems like a good way to decompress. This will be the wall I wail to, a wall I get to decorate with my favorite colors.
It'll be nice to talk to someone, even if that someone is me. If you're a student you probably know that being in school is like being sick - no one gives a shit about the details except you, and maybe your doctor.
Speaking of doctors, that's what I'm trying to be.
Later I'll post something with all the sordid details of my decision to try to go med school as a broke 36-year-old married woman. For now, suffice it to say, I'm 36, broke, and a married woman. That's all you really need to know about me personally. I'm keeping this blog anonymous because I do other stuff in life that makes me somewhat find-able on the Internet, and Egon warned me not to cross the streams. (It could be bad.)
As for the details you need to know to follow my educational journey, they'll come out eventually. Here are the basics:
I'm about to graduate from a 2-year school with an Associate of Science degree I technically started 17 years ago. (You can laugh.) I am stupidly proud of getting this stupid degree. When I get the notice that it actually happened (after finals in a few weeks) I will cry. I promise I will cry.
My GPA since I started back to school is 3.6, but because I was an idiot many years ago and left school without withdrawing and got a bunch of Fs, my cumulative is just over 3.0.
Also because I was an idiot many years ago, I have no "easy" courses left. No filler. Only one more math course (Calculus) and lots and lots of science. So if, going forward, I make a B in Calculus and As in all my sciences (you can laugh) I will be able to top out around 3.4.
So my only hope of getting into medical school is making the rest of my application amazing -- great letters of rec, extracurriculars with leadership, volunteer hours, shadowing, research, publications, and a stellar interview if I get that far. But most importantly - the MCAT. It is my Excalibur.
Actually you know what it is? It's like that scene in The Neverending Story where Atreyu has to walk between those two giant sphinx statues with boobies and he has to believe in himself or they'll shoot him with their eye lasers. I'm Atreyu and the MCAT is the statues with eye lasers.
Tentatively my current plan is to take the MCAT after my junior year, so just about a year from right now. This is a risky step because I will only have taken one semester of orgo, maybe one of physics, and no biochem. But I don't want to wait til my senior year because it takes about a year for the application and admission process, and I'd like to avoid a gap year. Because I'm old. My whole 20s was a gap decade.
If my current tentative schedule works out, it would put me graduating with my B.S. in Neuroscience in May 2018 and starting medical school later that same summer.
Which would put me graduating from medical school in 2022, at age 42. And finishing my residency in 2026, at age 46.
It's all pretty overwhelming, but I've floundered for so long, and this is the first thing that I truly feel deep in my gut is what I need to do. I may fail, but if I do I'm going to fail trying my ass off.
I look at it this way: eventually, God willing, I will be 46. I can either be 46 and a doctor or 46 and not a doctor. I'd much prefer the former.
Everything depends on me acing the MCAT. (Booby sphinx eye lasers.) If I do well on the MCAT, I can probably get into an okay American med school. Which is all I ask.
It's going to be insanely hard. That's what this blog is for. I need someone to talk to, and that someone is me.
Like I said, no one cares about the horrors and foibles of your education except you. So this is my way of chronicling this ridiculous journey for posterity. If along the way I inadvertently offer some advice or encouragement that helps out another rad non-trad, that will be awesome.
Maybe next time I'll talk about why I want to be an OB-Gyn, where I plan to live and practice once I'm out of school (hint: it has a river and a levee and a Mardi Gras), and what awesome free helpful website I'm using to help me pass the MCAT and all that happy horseshit.
Meanwhile I'm gonna go make some flash cards. Most women my age have babies and mortgages and 401Ks, I am broke in my PJs in a rented house with my dog and husband, making flashcards.
Let's hear it for the late bloomers!
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