Looking back

After one week of my Easter holidays I’ve drank a year’s supply of tea and got a reasonable amount of work done. However when you realise that the only time you’ve left the house in 3 days is to put the bins out you know you’re working too hard! One of the reasons why I choose to return to university to study medicine was that I wanted a job where I wanted to work hard, I wanted to be so interested, and care so much that it wouldn’t matter how much effort it required. Now that I’m here I think maybe you can have too much of a good thing but I’m also glad that even after all the hard work that I’ve put in this year and the hard work still to come I can still enjoy learning and all the other experiences that come with medicine.

Over the holidays a lot of the medical school will be closed for the selection centres, and while I’ve been working from home in my pyjamas I’ve been thinking about my own experience at the selection centre last year. I was lucky to actually turn up on time to my selection centre, having stayed in a B&B in Kenilworth I laid out my clothes and had everything ready only to wake up in a blind panic realising I had forgot to set my alarm! Fortunately my nerves woke me up at 6am and I was actually an hour early, and had plenty of time to nervously chat with my fellow candidates. Interviews are always nerve wracking but having only had experience of panel interviews I definitely felt like the Warwick selection centre at Warwick was a leap into the unknown. The selection centre has changed since last year but I’m sure the candidates are just as nervous as I was.

Applying to medicine is like no other experience. For many applicants going through their 2nd, 3rd or 4th round of applications there are a lot of hopes and dreams on the line. Many have left successful careers to get work experience, or missed out on an offer first time round and undertook a tough science degree in order to meet the entry requirements. Myself I spent most of the application process wondering if I had made the right choice. Having studied hard for my PhD, secured a postdoctoral role in a different country deciding to apply to medicine meant that here wasn’t really any going back. Using my holidays to do work experience, volunteering on a hospital ward after an already long day at work and revising for the UKCAT on a weekend and all for at best a 1 in 10 chance of actually being accepted felt like a big gamble. After the assessment centre as I analysed everything I had said and done I realised for the first time just how much I wanted to get in and that it didn’t matter what I was giving up or the risk I was taking.

Now that I’m revising for my first summative exam of my medicine degree I can honestly say I made the right choice. I’ve doubted it many times but if I can actually say that I’m still enjoying learning new things while cooped up revising for exams then I must have made the right choice! Despite this realisation I think I should still make the effort to go outside for things that don’t involve waste disposal!

Megan Earle : 25 Mar 2015 11:24 |  Tags: Exams Joanne Mbchb Selectioncentres Warwick |  Comments (2) |  Report a problem