Identity Crisis and the Brutal Death..of Pre-med.
I dropped premed.
It's been in the works for awhile now....this twilight zone feeling that's come over me is a result of years of resentment and anxiety over a career that had been been forcibly crammed down my throat since I was barely able to walk. And so far, it'd been all introspective ranting and no action... a result of me, let's face it, being deathly afraid of my parents (more specifically my mother) and the fact that dropping pre-med will destroy their carefully constructed universe. If this seems a bit melodramatic, then you people need an education on just how important this is to my parents....
When I had this epiphany after Ochem lab monday night, I thought, "Nina, this is just a random fleeting fantasy....let it out, and then bite the bullet, go back to premed." But there was something so different about that night, its as if once I started thinking about releasing myself from the cast-iron chains of the immigrant burden, I just couldn't stop. And before I knew it I had made a pro/con list for being a doctor. It went something like this:
Pros:Uh... my parents will be thrilled, and...there's some money to be made...after resurfacing from the soul-crushing debt incurred to get through medical school.
Cons: Lose freedom, never be able to find my true purpose in life, sacrifice happiness, be stalked by loan sharks years after graduation, probably become so bitter towards my parents that I'll cut off ties with them, grueling 15 hour shifts, HMO's, 8 ...freaking...years..of school + residency, kiss goodbye any chances to travel abroad, a lifetime of Doogie Howser comparisons from all my friends who do have a backbone, live a "Scrub"-like existence minus the humor and twice the irony,etc.etc.
Bottom line?...the Con list was going on 2 pages...and the pro list was pathetically bare. I can't explain what it's like to have something as solid as the pre-med track that I've been following all my life, to be yanked out from underneath me, by that voice screaming inside "This is FUCKING WRONG...don't do this to yourself!"
I slept on it...I really did, I went to bed hoping and praying that I'd wake up Tuesday with some sort of "Silly girl, that was just cold feet, you really do want this." No, fortunately, or unfortunately...that didn't happen. I woke up with a raging adrenaline-induced headache and wafted through my classes wondering if I were clinically insane to seriously consider ducking out literally months before I apply to medical school. It's slightly sickening to me that I managed to repress all the doubt, the anger, and anxiety for 3 years, and let it culminate in one massive epiphany. Am I that out of tune with myself?
But it all started to make sense. My hostile relationship with Organic Chemistry, my inertial attitude towards the MCATs, the excessive amount of bullshit that would come out of my mouth whenever I was asked why I wanted to become a doctor. It was all a big lie. And today is Day 3 of "Post-Epiphany" where I've finally, slowly come to grips with my decision. I told my brother last night and after convincing him that I wasn't throwing my life away, he pledged his support in breaking the news to my parents.
And this brings me to the "Deathly Afraid" part of my post: I don't want to do this....I'm not sure I have the guts to do this. To, in one phone call, destroy all their dreams, to seemingly dismiss their hopes, to actually tell them that even though I registered for the April MCAT I have no intention of heading out to Bumblefuck PA to take an exam for a career that I've finally had the guts to close the door on. My dad, I think, I can work with...he's rational, logical, so long as I come up with some plausible, respectable career alternatives he won't go into a cardiac arrest.....but my mother. Ho-ly...shit. ...
My brother's advice was to tell my father now, and wait till I get home in May to break it to my mother. I'm not ready to tell her now, in May, or ever. I don't even like THINKING about having this conversation with her. She is an emotional ball of fury when it comes to most everything, and premed is her WORLD. I will be in purgatory those two months before I get to leave for Costa Rica....which, again, is looking doubtful. I can only imagine her response..." Let me get this straight. ...you wait till your junior year to impulsively throw away your future, then decide NOT to tell me, then get home and leave again to some "3rd" world country to find yourself?!" ....whew.
Yeah those are words I don't plan on bringing up...."finding myself" that is...even though it's essentially true. My mom will say "Yeah, you'll find yourself....without a JOB!"
I've never been able to consider other careers b/c in my mind it just seemed so impossible to divorce myself from the idea of being a doctor. Up until this week...it was final, set in stone, a done deal. There were no other alternatives. And now, as incredibly scary as it is to look around and have to do this whole "What the hell am I gonna do now?".....I feel elated. Clear. The albatross of premed was my impediment to success, and the more I think about it, the more I'm sure I made the right decision.
I'm not running away from premed because I'm scared of the courseload...hell, I've already TAKEN my premed classes. I've already experienced the unique joy of being a human acid depository in ochem lab, the awesomeness of 7:30 am wake-up calls for soul-crushingly boring classes that have no real-world relevance.... I'm WALKING (admittedly, SPEED walking) away from pre-med because I refuse to get trapped, to be forced to choose my life's work at 19, and spend the rest of my life in regrets because I'm such a coward when it comes to my parents. It's not going to happen. Either way I'm a cliche: I'm the rebel Indian girl who ditched premed....or the spineless immigrant child who did what her parents told her to do. I'm fine with being a rebel. I'm going to be the first non-doctor in my family, and that's okay with me...I think. To be quite honest, I don't really give a shit what my relatives think, I only cared so far as their importance in my mother's life. ....my mom...oh yeah, there's that knot of gut-wrenching fear again.
So now, it's do or die time. I actually got my roomate to pretend to be my mom in order to get a refund from those stingy bastards at the MCAT registration office....unsuccessfully. Apparently I'll be getting a "partial" refund, but as my roomate said "hey, that's the price of epiphanies." ....yeah, that and a screaming match in May with my mother. But its worth it. Tomorrow, I'm calling my father and telling him....I don't anticipate that to go well...but I either take a stance now, or it'll never happen. And then I can go on an honest career-search.... my possibilities so far? International human-rights lawyer....
I actually looked at the law school application, and that question "why do you want to be a lawyer?" is dirt easy for me to answer. I can answer without thinking....it wasn't like the doctor question where I was literally making up reasons. Whew. I just need courage, I need to find it and then channel it because if I buckle under my mother's inevitable blitzkrieg of guilt-tripping, I'll never forgive myself. And as cliched as it is to have an identity crisis just as I'm about to turn 20, I'm glad I had it now and not in my 3rd year of medical school, where dropping out would have not only been insane and foolhardy....but very...very expensive.
It's done. Moral? There is life after pre-med.
Quote of the Day:
"My goal is not to wake up at forty with a bitter realization that I wasted my life at a job I hate because I was forced to decide on a career in my teens."
Daria
It's been in the works for awhile now....this twilight zone feeling that's come over me is a result of years of resentment and anxiety over a career that had been been forcibly crammed down my throat since I was barely able to walk. And so far, it'd been all introspective ranting and no action... a result of me, let's face it, being deathly afraid of my parents (more specifically my mother) and the fact that dropping pre-med will destroy their carefully constructed universe. If this seems a bit melodramatic, then you people need an education on just how important this is to my parents....
When I had this epiphany after Ochem lab monday night, I thought, "Nina, this is just a random fleeting fantasy....let it out, and then bite the bullet, go back to premed." But there was something so different about that night, its as if once I started thinking about releasing myself from the cast-iron chains of the immigrant burden, I just couldn't stop. And before I knew it I had made a pro/con list for being a doctor. It went something like this:
Pros:Uh... my parents will be thrilled, and...there's some money to be made...after resurfacing from the soul-crushing debt incurred to get through medical school.
Cons: Lose freedom, never be able to find my true purpose in life, sacrifice happiness, be stalked by loan sharks years after graduation, probably become so bitter towards my parents that I'll cut off ties with them, grueling 15 hour shifts, HMO's, 8 ...freaking...years..of school + residency, kiss goodbye any chances to travel abroad, a lifetime of Doogie Howser comparisons from all my friends who do have a backbone, live a "Scrub"-like existence minus the humor and twice the irony,etc.etc.
Bottom line?...the Con list was going on 2 pages...and the pro list was pathetically bare. I can't explain what it's like to have something as solid as the pre-med track that I've been following all my life, to be yanked out from underneath me, by that voice screaming inside "This is FUCKING WRONG...don't do this to yourself!"
I slept on it...I really did, I went to bed hoping and praying that I'd wake up Tuesday with some sort of "Silly girl, that was just cold feet, you really do want this." No, fortunately, or unfortunately...that didn't happen. I woke up with a raging adrenaline-induced headache and wafted through my classes wondering if I were clinically insane to seriously consider ducking out literally months before I apply to medical school. It's slightly sickening to me that I managed to repress all the doubt, the anger, and anxiety for 3 years, and let it culminate in one massive epiphany. Am I that out of tune with myself?
But it all started to make sense. My hostile relationship with Organic Chemistry, my inertial attitude towards the MCATs, the excessive amount of bullshit that would come out of my mouth whenever I was asked why I wanted to become a doctor. It was all a big lie. And today is Day 3 of "Post-Epiphany" where I've finally, slowly come to grips with my decision. I told my brother last night and after convincing him that I wasn't throwing my life away, he pledged his support in breaking the news to my parents.
And this brings me to the "Deathly Afraid" part of my post: I don't want to do this....I'm not sure I have the guts to do this. To, in one phone call, destroy all their dreams, to seemingly dismiss their hopes, to actually tell them that even though I registered for the April MCAT I have no intention of heading out to Bumblefuck PA to take an exam for a career that I've finally had the guts to close the door on. My dad, I think, I can work with...he's rational, logical, so long as I come up with some plausible, respectable career alternatives he won't go into a cardiac arrest.....but my mother. Ho-ly...shit. ...
My brother's advice was to tell my father now, and wait till I get home in May to break it to my mother. I'm not ready to tell her now, in May, or ever. I don't even like THINKING about having this conversation with her. She is an emotional ball of fury when it comes to most everything, and premed is her WORLD. I will be in purgatory those two months before I get to leave for Costa Rica....which, again, is looking doubtful. I can only imagine her response..." Let me get this straight. ...you wait till your junior year to impulsively throw away your future, then decide NOT to tell me, then get home and leave again to some "3rd" world country to find yourself?!" ....whew.
Yeah those are words I don't plan on bringing up...."finding myself" that is...even though it's essentially true. My mom will say "Yeah, you'll find yourself....without a JOB!"
I've never been able to consider other careers b/c in my mind it just seemed so impossible to divorce myself from the idea of being a doctor. Up until this week...it was final, set in stone, a done deal. There were no other alternatives. And now, as incredibly scary as it is to look around and have to do this whole "What the hell am I gonna do now?".....I feel elated. Clear. The albatross of premed was my impediment to success, and the more I think about it, the more I'm sure I made the right decision.
I'm not running away from premed because I'm scared of the courseload...hell, I've already TAKEN my premed classes. I've already experienced the unique joy of being a human acid depository in ochem lab, the awesomeness of 7:30 am wake-up calls for soul-crushingly boring classes that have no real-world relevance.... I'm WALKING (admittedly, SPEED walking) away from pre-med because I refuse to get trapped, to be forced to choose my life's work at 19, and spend the rest of my life in regrets because I'm such a coward when it comes to my parents. It's not going to happen. Either way I'm a cliche: I'm the rebel Indian girl who ditched premed....or the spineless immigrant child who did what her parents told her to do. I'm fine with being a rebel. I'm going to be the first non-doctor in my family, and that's okay with me...I think. To be quite honest, I don't really give a shit what my relatives think, I only cared so far as their importance in my mother's life. ....my mom...oh yeah, there's that knot of gut-wrenching fear again.
So now, it's do or die time. I actually got my roomate to pretend to be my mom in order to get a refund from those stingy bastards at the MCAT registration office....unsuccessfully. Apparently I'll be getting a "partial" refund, but as my roomate said "hey, that's the price of epiphanies." ....yeah, that and a screaming match in May with my mother. But its worth it. Tomorrow, I'm calling my father and telling him....I don't anticipate that to go well...but I either take a stance now, or it'll never happen. And then I can go on an honest career-search.... my possibilities so far? International human-rights lawyer....
I actually looked at the law school application, and that question "why do you want to be a lawyer?" is dirt easy for me to answer. I can answer without thinking....it wasn't like the doctor question where I was literally making up reasons. Whew. I just need courage, I need to find it and then channel it because if I buckle under my mother's inevitable blitzkrieg of guilt-tripping, I'll never forgive myself. And as cliched as it is to have an identity crisis just as I'm about to turn 20, I'm glad I had it now and not in my 3rd year of medical school, where dropping out would have not only been insane and foolhardy....but very...very expensive.
It's done. Moral? There is life after pre-med.
Quote of the Day:
"My goal is not to wake up at forty with a bitter realization that I wasted my life at a job I hate because I was forced to decide on a career in my teens."
Daria
