College Question [Need Serious Advice]

[Sufficient]

For Epi:

I dunno if this is the best idea for me. I've always felt stuck with medicine as my career choice. Going into the 7 year fast track program only further made me feel obligated to finish medicine and become a doctor.

As idealist and simplistic as it sounds ... I went into medicine to help ppl. I feel that health is the great equalizer in life. Everyone needs it regardless of if you're rich or poor, young or old, sick or not sick. To me, it's such a personal and pure way of helping another person. On top of that I feel that it can be extremely interesting combining science with technology with patient interactions. I imagine myself doing something hands on ... surgery perhaps, or maybe something more laid back like opthomology (eye doctor). I actually am not sure what kind of doctor I want to be. That hasn't really helped me since I have no specific goal and feel like I lack drive. I am definitely NOT a prototypical medical student with a type-A personality. The reality of the situation is that medicine is not as opportunistic as one might think. I would say I am not anywhere near the top 25% of my class. I am probably in the lower half academically. That limits your options A LOT. Only top 10% or so can do stuff like surgery, optho, ortho, dermatology etc. The lower half of the class will be limited to family practice, general practice, old ppl stuff, etc, etc. So unless you are super competitive and can beat out other students for the best specialties, you're quite limited in your options.

About the idea of "in the end it'll be worth it". I guess one thing, it's very hard to think of the future in med school. It's all about the here and now ... studying is indeed all-consuming. And to be honest, I am beginning to think that it's not worth it in the end. The more I think about it the more I believe there are other ways besides medicine to help people. When you factor in happiness, I don't want to go through 7 years of unhappiness, come out being a doctor, have those 7 years change me into a depressed grumpy person, and all I have to show for it is having a lot of money. I do believe that if I do ID I would enjoy the whole academic process a lot more than I am currently studying medicine. And believe me, I do realize that even in ID, it won't all be happy stuff.

The commitment needed to get through medicine is HUGE. I do realize that at this point in my life I almost need to just stick to something and do it instead of questioning things. So if I do ID, that's basically my final decision. I can't back out of medicine, do ID, then decide I don't wanna do ID anymore. At this juncture it's basically medicine or ID, no turning back.

Now to the pracical questions. I've always been interested in art and design. I actually went to a high school called High Technology HS ... a vocational school. So I took CAD and drafting classes in HS and have minimal experience in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. I took two art classes in undergrad which I thoroughly enjoyed, but did not continue to pursue. I even started off in bioengineering, so in the engineering department before switching to solely biology in the fine arts department. Do I have the talent? I believe I do. I don't think I'm a genius a drawing. In fact in terms of freehand creative stuff I'm not that great at (although adequete enough I'd imagine). My talent would lie it technical drawings, exploded diagrams, schematic, isometrics, etc. Income-wise, I hear that the job market in ID and product design is getting tougher. Foreign ID schools are still ahead of American ID schools (Sweden, Germany, Italy, etc). Product design in particular is more of a luxury job market. To be honest, I dunno what the estimate entry level salary is for an ID person. I think that it can vary a great deal however. It is very competitive at the levels I would like to get to (working for IDEO for example). I'd like to stress though that continuing to pay for med school is expensive. My parents would be footing most of the heavy billing though. If I do ID, I'm going to be on my own. They realize that 100k would be going down the drain. I'll def look more into the salary of an entry level ID job.

Yes, I realize jobs are boring in general and that there's no way to get past that to some extent. I believe that the academic process will be more interesting and fulfilling than my current status at med school however. I'm simply unhappy studying the material in med school right now. And while I realize I may be unahppy studying ID, I truly believe there will be more days where I wake up looking forward to go to ID class than going to med classes. Just a sidenote ... I'm far from the party/drinking type of person.

I am worried about the fact that I may be labeled a "quitter". But I've worked hard to get to this point in my life. And to be honest I should've questioned my career choice a little sooner, but I'm glad that I've built up this amount of courage to say to myself, my parents, and others around me that I'm unhappy, unsatistfied with life, my studies, my career. While I wish I realized this sooner, I'm determined to make changes to get to a point where I am at least satified with my job, my future, and my own happiness.

Where are you at Epi?

[Sufficient]

Cleveland Institute of Art (not to be confused with the TV and email ads for the Institutes of Art) est. in the 1800's has a strong ID dept. Proably one of the best in the nation, as most Auto Designers and ID ppl working for Rubber Made and many other huge companies come from C.I.A.

C.I.A. also has the Med Design program attched to direct work with Case Western Reserve University. If you find schools that work directly with one another, maybe you can apply your med background to ID and channel it into a more personally rewarding career-direction? Just a thought. I had to take med classes while going for Med. Illustration.

Thanks for the info 404. I actually remember you talking about medical illustration, and I asked my art instructor about that specific area of art when I took classes in undergrad.

I def need to gain more knowledge in all the ID schools around, and see if I can perhaps use my medical knowledge as a positive attribute if I apply to ID school.

To the rest of you guys that I haven't replied to: Thanks for your imput. I've read every single one of your posts. And sidenote: I am actively discussing this with friends, family, and ppl who have connections with the ID field/industry.

[Facetious]

I'm not sure my experience is really that related to yours, but whatever. I hate school. I'm not good at it. Rather, once I sit down and do the work, I do excellent work, but I am absolutely terrible at sitting down to do the work. There is nothing I hate more than sitting in one place doing work by myself, and that's most of what school is. Is that all that's out there in the real world? Of course not, and thank God.

Anyway, as a result, I've dropped out of several schools, thinking to myself "switching schools will help fix the problem" or "I need to major in something else." What's happened to me is that now I am still only halfway done (at best) with my undergrad stuff, all my other friends have graduated, and I am more burned out on school than ever before. I wish I had just accepted that I fucking hate school, and plugged away at it, instead of having this false hope that somehow, somewhere, I would find an academic environment that I would enjoy. While many of my friends have chosen jobs that I would hate even more than school, a bunch of them are doing stuff all day that I could really see myself liking, and I really regret that I'm not in that position now. Obviously you like school a lot better than I do, given that not only are you in grad school, but you're considering starting over entirely. Still, I still think that if what you don't like is memorizing shit, changing your major isn't going to solve the problem. That's what school is, man. Memorizing shit.

[Sufficient]

1) Very hard, it looks bad on your resume (professional student who can not decide what he wants to do when he grows up).
2) Get a job
3) Dream jobs? Dream jobs are great as long as you dont mind being poor.

Seriously, in this world people get paid for stress. It's that simple. The closer you are to the money, the greater the stress becomes.

Sounds like you are headed in the wrong direction. You are bailing because of stress. Of course school is the most valuable waste there is, no one can argue that paying for the privilege of being forced to memorize something only to regurgitate it for some test and then forget it forever (here is an idea, perhaps we best remember things that are really important to us) sucks. If you can remember key settings in Subspace, but can't remember stuff that SHOULD be important to you (for making money), spend some introspective time with yourself.

Good stuff. I realize it doesn't look good on my resume/CV. I may be a labeled a "quitter". Ppl will question why I made certain decisions in my life and why I didn't decide sooner. Money will be wasted if I get a 2nd BA. These things are certainly important factors to consider.

Here's a question I have for you guys then: If you are currently working and have at least a BA from some college, are you happy with your job? More specifically, do you have more days where you wake up looking forward to your job, than days where you wake up dreading going to work? Yeah, every job, even a dream job has bad days ... unhappy days. But I would like to have more days where I wake up looking forward to going to work.

Sorta to address the stress issue you raised. I am very stressed out. Do I believe that I can handle several more years of being this stressed out? I dunno. It'll be very difficult if I continue through medicine and try to "just get through it". Many ppl have told me to "just get through it", but I don't think they realize how difficult it is to do this. After becoming a doctors, who's to say I will finally be happy? I think I'll become very much jaded with the profession before I finally start my practice. In some ways I've already been changed into a depressed, grumpy person.

I dunno if ID will be the same. I honestly do not think it will be as intense and as stressful as medical school. I imagine it will be quite stressful during certain parts however. And you know what, that's fine. I can handle small doses of stress. Being in med school though is like being in a constant pressure-cooker. There is no respite, no rest for the weary.

[Ephemeral]

I would add that maturity can be considered the ability to endure uncertainty. I also think that the best work men do is usually done under stress and at great personal cost.

Worse thing I ever did was turn my hobby into a business, found out it is a sure way to ruin your hobby.

[Epinephrine]

Suff,

I am currently in my last year of medical school. Another 12 weeks of instruction and the board exams and I'll get my MD. As to where I am going in the future, residency applications were just submitted so as not to jinx myself, I'll just say I'm not sure just yet.

I can honestly say that I do not enjoy the rote memorization that medical school entails. A lot of my classmates also found the stupidity of having to memorize treatments and pathophysiologies for diseases that we'd likely never see in our professional lives unless we specialized in that particular field. But the fact is, once clerkship arrives, you'll realize that perhaps all that reading you do is trivial compared to the real world.

I can honestly say that while I had lots of trouble remembering all the stuff from books and horrible useless lectures (I skipped 1/2 my classes, and I played a lot of Subspace and went out a lot in my first 2 years of medical school), after only a year of clerkship, I can look back at all my notes and realize that I actually know much MORE than what's in there.

The fact is, once you start doing it for real, it starts coming to you. Of course there's still studying. Of course my friends are all out there working right now, partying on weekends, going on trips to Mexico in the summer and so on while I'm studying and going to work at the hospital every day. But the fact is, in the end it really will be worth it.

After 4 years of medical school and only 2 years of residency, I can be a family doctor. I can literally work 40 hours a week for 6 months of the year and make $125,000. Or I can work 20 hours a week for the entire year. How amazing is that? Will ANY of my friends have jobs that pay even nearly that much? Aside from the ones also in professional programs, I'd say no (and even then doctors do much better than lawyers on the whole).

Even without the money, you're doing a job that really impacts on people's lives. It's true that clerkship is a lot of pointless bitch-work, doing stuff no one else wants to do, but it's also the first time where you will be seeing patients on your own. I just finished a one-month rotation on the wards where I was in charge of 4-8 people/day over the course of the month (maybe total I looked after 15-20 people cause a lot stayed for a long time). Because of my personal efforts they managed to get through from their original problem in the emergency room (I admitted them) to getting all their tests done, to having me set up things for them so that they could go home sure that everything was taken care of. To be able to make such an impact on someone's life is a very special thing.

Medical school sometimes has a problem where family doctors get a bad name. Everyone wants to be the bigtime surgeon or cardiologist. But the truth is, no matter what kind of doctor you are, you are helping people. People will depend their LIVES on you. At the same time, you have absolute power over your entire career, you will make a very comfortable living, and you are also in a job that will forever be in demand (unless those robots get smarter...). How many professions can you have something like that?

You say you want to get into industrial design. Well think about it. It's another 4 years of school (in 4 years you could be a family doctor). And then you have to apply to jobs, suck up to people, and also do really well in your classes if you want to get hired somewhere decent. You will start at an entry level position and make very little money, while interest on your debt is accuring. It will take many more years of STRUGGLE and STRESS if you ever want to be more than just the lowest person on the totem pole. Also keep in mind that forces beyond your control can get you fired. Forces beyond your control can have your company go bankrupt. Forces beyond your control can have other people get promoted ahead of you and you miss out.

Are you ready to deal with all this reality?

Medical school is tough, no doubt about it. The hours are long, and residency is even harder. But then once it's all said and done, you have one of the very best jobs with the most freedom you can possibly find anywhere in the world. And hey you're also doing something good for people.

Finally, I just want to say that everytime I look around I see med students complaining and residents so sleep deprived you wonder if it's safe. But then I look at all the attending doctors and you know what? They're all mostly happy! For some reason, working reasonable hours, doing only what you want and are comfortable with, never having to worry about advancement and getting promoted again, and getting paid well is actually indicative to having a happy life. Go figure...

[PUNK rock]

1) Very hard, it looks bad on your resume (professional student who can not decide what he wants to do when he grows up).

Is this generally accepted as looking bad to potential employers? I'm 2 quarters away from graduating with a BA in history, yet I plan on going back to school to get a second bachelor's to actually get a job.

[Galleleo]

After 4 years of medical school and only 2 years of residency, I can be a family doctor. I can literally work 40 hours a week for 6 months of the year and make $125,000. Or I can work 20 hours a week for the entire year. How amazing is that? Will ANY of my friends have jobs that pay even nearly that much? Aside from the ones also in professional programs, I'd say no (and even then doctors do much better than lawyers on the whole).

Today in the paper I read that this CEO guy of some bank at Wall Street is getting a 40 million (I believe dollar) new years bonus. A frikken BONUS of 40 million.

[Exalt]

So I'm 23 and partially through my second year in med school and I realize that I don't like what I'm doing, I hate cramming useless information in my head, I hate getting tested on the most obscure details of the folate deficiency pathway, the parts that I do enjoy I don't enjoy anymore because I spend all my time studying books and lecture material instead of practicing clinical skills with patients. I basically dread waking up and going to class.

So I decide to take the rest of the year off to think things through (also been struggling academically this year).

I realize that if I could do something besides medicine it would be product design or industrial design (ID). That would mean going back to get my BA in design at somewhere like the DAAP program at the University of Cincinnati (http://www.daap.uc.edu/). So 4 more years of undergrad. To give you an idea of where I'm at ... I have a BA in biology (specialization in physiology) from Northwestern University.

So three BIG questions:
1) How hard is it for me, a 23 year old, to go back to get a 2nd BA?
2) My parents have been taking a heavy load on my tuition. They say they will NOT pay for my education if I decide that medicine is not for me. I'll be totally financially independent. How the heck do I pay tuition? Will I be able to take out loans with no credit? I've literally have had no REAL jobs in my life.
3) Is anyone in the product design or ID industry and/or academic track? Can you tell me a bit about it and the education you need to work for a company like IDEO (www.ideo.com ... used to be my dream job in HS)?

basicly your mommy and daddy pay for everything you do, and now your trying to change your mind on a choice youve made long ago and now are crying that mommy and daddy wont fork out more money for you to waste even more years of your life searching for what you want to do in life, which you will find you really wont like anything at all because every job has its pros and its cons.

heres my advice

1. grow up, your 23 and acting like a 16 year old
2. if you really want to go through college again, get a job and stop using mommy and daddys money
3. grow up again
4. go get a REAL job that you say you havent done, then learn what the real world is actually like

oh yeah, being in the military i guess im biased on my opinions, but honestly you dont know what a real days work is until you go out and do it, and just to let you know if you go through nuclear power school through the navy (which is voted one of the hardest schools in the world) you do at least 40 hours a week of study time, on top of your 40 hours a week fo class. How many 80 hour weeks have you pulled studying in med school????

[Sufficient]

Thanks for taking the time to write out a detailed reply Epi. I'm definitely going to think long and hard about the decision. Thanks to everyone else too.

[genocidal]

I wonder if I'll choose to do the money-making method like Suff (except either law or business school) or do something cool with my life like write or teach. I'll probably end up being a professor.

[Sufficient]

I wonder if I'll choose to do the money-making method like Suff (except either law or business school) or do something cool with my life like write or teach. I'll probably end up being a professor.

There has to be some job that'll allow you to have both. Being a professor sounds like a decent balance between the two.

[Epinephrine]

Well good luck either way dude. Whatever you decide on, just stick with it and be happy with it.

[T3l Ca7]

My advice to you, like my advice will always be on decisions that would greatly impact your life, is: think it over, do not make impulse decisions. Have a cool down period of at least 2 months for yourself.


If you really hate Med school and have been so for the past year or so, my suggestion is to quit it and try something else. But if your decision is based on what happened in the past few weeks, then you should stick around for a bit longer and see what happens in another couple of weeks' time.

[Bioture]

3) Seriously, in this world people get paid for stress. It's that simple. The closer you are to the money, the greater the stress becomes.

That's not true. My boss is rich as fuck and he isn't stressed at all.