I don't know what I'm going to do with the rest of my life.We're in the midst of planning our fourth year schedules, but inherent in those decisions is knowing what you want to be when you grow up. Want to go into surgery? Gotta start applying for audition rotations. Want to do family medicine? Maybe you should do an elective in rural Montana. Want to do something competitive? Take your Step 2 early.
So now I'm completely lost.
Coming into med school, I was convinced I was going to be a pediatrician. What can I say? I love the kiddies. They're cute and more resilient, and far more likely to get better than say, an 85 year old slightly demented grandma who thus forgets to take her medicine. I was a camp counselor, coordinated the peds interest group, played my violin at the children's hospital, etc. - everything I did was pediatric minded.
Then I did my pediatric rotation.
Maybe it was just (bad) luck of the draw, but I found that I didn't love it as much as I thought I would. The kids in the hospital were super sick, but it seemed like all we were doing was giving them oxygen and physical therapy. It probably didn't help that I did my inpatient rotation during January, in the midst of RSV season. I saw 35 RSV-positive bronchiolitics, 16 RSV-negative bronchiolitics, and 10 asthma kids. And for each and every one of them, the protocol was the same. Start them on oxygen via nasal canula, increase as necessary, and albuterol treatments every 4 hours. By day 3, I was itching for something a little more exciting. But I only got more bronchiolitics and the occasional ear infection.
It also didn't help that my senior resident was not the nicest or cuddliest of residents. She held her arms across her chest, gave me constant stink-eye whenever I gave an oral presentation, and would heave these huge dramatic sighs whenever I gave the wrong answer to one of her "what am I thinking" pimp questions. And it was apparent that she didn't get along with the other residents on the team, which made for a very passive aggressive environment for 2 weeks. It made no sense to me, given that I had thought that niceness and compassion were prerequisites for becoming a pediatrician.
Needless to say, it wasn't a very good experience.
So then I was back at the drawing board. Psych perhaps? I was a psych major in undergrad, and my grandfather - the role model for my life - was a psychiatrist. But while I loved the material because it was so interesting and there was so much patient interaction, I don't know if I could do consult psychiatry for 3 years of residency. Can I really endure 3 years of assessing capacity and delirium so that I can do what I find truly interesting - child psychiatry?
And then, this past week I started my Obstetrics and Gynecology rotation. Now, I deliberately set my schedule so that ob-gyn and surgery were dead last, because I knew I didn't want to do surgery. I can't stand blood, I fainted when I saw a c-section 2 years ago, and given my stage fright, there's no way my trembling hands wouldn't nick an artery or something and cause some massive damage.
Except, I'm one week into ob-gyn, and I'm loving the procedures. My hands are actually quite steady, and I've seen some major bleeding, and haven't freaked out or gotten woozy. I love that it fulfills my love for immediate gratification, because there's really nothing as gratifying as watching a couple turn into a family all within the timespan of 30 minutes, and knowing that you were a part of that. And the patients are all so happy - I don't think I'll ever stop feeling warm and fuzzy inside when I see the expecting parents light up and beam when they hear the fetal heartbeat.
Yes, it's only been one week and from other students' accounts, I've lucked out with the residents I've worked with. I'm sure if you check back in three weeks, I'll be hating ob-gyn and my sleep-deprived days on night float.
All I do know is that my 4th year schedule is due in five days, and I no longer know what I'm supposed to do with the rest of my life. And it's scary. This is where the rest of my life begins, but I don't even know which path I'm supposed to take.
