New Post and a Note From The Author

During the time that I've written this blog, I've never really been all that involved in the comments on my posts. I read every comment written on this blog, usually I stay neutral or like to make a funny comment if I say anything at all. I do this because I really don't mind if people express their opinions, whatever they may be, about my writing or the blog. That being said, I do not appreciate being called a liar, especially by people who know nothing about my life.

I do not share much about my personal life on this blog. For one, the blog is about a fake person, not me. For two, a lot of people read this blog and I don't particularly feel like sharing things about my life for a bunch of people I do not know to read. That being said, I'm going to break this rule of mine this one time to put to rest any idea that I'm lying about who I am or what I'm doing with my life.

I have applied to medical school twice. Once in 2013 and once this time. I submitted a primary application in 2012 but withdrew it shortly after for reasons I won't be detailing here. The medical school application process can take about 9 months (or even longer than a year, if you are wait-listed). The primary application portal opens the first weekday in May and you an submit it the first weekday in June. Then it is processed which means someone goes through your official transcripts to verify all of your grades and stuff. This can take up to 8 weeks. Once your primary application is processed, you can start receiving secondary applications the first of July. These secondary applications are specific to each school you apply to and cost an additional fee (anywhere from $50 to $225). These applications vary in length and what they ask. One of the secondary applications I submitted had 11 required essays as part of it, another required me to submit a scan of my birth certificate and ACT score (which I took, like ten years ago). About half required me to put in all of my coursework over again even though it was listed on my primary application and took HOURS to fill out (because I have two bachelor's degrees and graduate coursework so it's A LOT of classes and grades to retype and a lot of opportunities for typos). Once you submit your secondaries, you wait to be offered an interview. The interview season is usually from September to April for most schools. If you are wait-listed the school does not have to inform you of admittance until the day before orientation starts at the latest. One guy in my graduate program actually had this happen to him this year. He was told he got into medical school three days before orientation started, he didn't even get to attend his white coat ceremony because his acceptance letter arrive the day after the ceremony.

Getting into medical school is the hardest part of becoming a doctor. Once you're in you are pretty much guaranteed to be a doctor unless you are one of the 2-3% of students who drop out.

So, anyway, if it seems like I've been talking about applying to medical school or preparing my application for a long time, it's because I HAVE been talking about medical school and preparing for my application for a long time. When you're taking your pre-med classes, your application is always looming ahead of you and you are constantly preparing for it, so yes, it probably sounds like I've been talking about this forever. So those of you who brought that up: I'm not really sure what you wanted to add to the conversation by bringing that up but if it was to make me feel bad about how long it has taken me to get into medical school...well Congratulations, you succeeded. 

You should all hang out with my mother and bond over coffee as you discuss all the ways I have failed you.

I started taking the pre-reqs for medical school in January of 2011, a little over six months after graduating from undergrad in May of 2010 with a degree in a completely unrelated field. I completed my pre-med classes in 2013 and took the MCAT (for the second time) that summer. I graduated in May of 2014 with a second degree in biology and didn't get accepted to medical school. So I applied to a graduate program and started that in August which is what I've been doing this year. The graduate program I'm enrolled in is specifically designed to make its students more competitive for medical school. It is a very demanding program and ate up a lot more time than I could have ever anticipated but I won't apologize for not prioritizing the blog over my education.

I had an exit interview after my first failed application at my top choice school (which I received an interview at) and the woman I spoke with told me that she could see no reason why my application was not accepted other than timing. When I asked her for suggestions on how to improve my application, she had none. I did not get into medical school because the pre-medical committee at my school submitted my committee letter three months late, effectively ruining my chances at every school I applied to (and wasting $2000 of my money in application fees) because of rolling admissions. This is not an excuse, I'm simply explaining the situation since several of you feel entitled to comment on it being a giant lie.

But school has not been the only thing I've been doing since I went back in 2011 and if it WAS just my pre-med classes, I'm sure things would've been so much easier than they've turned out to be. I've mentioned how much volunteering I do on this blog before, but this past year I added even more volunteering commitments because my graduate advisor recommended it. To put it into perspective, most of the medical students I know (because I take classes with them) and my peers who are also applying this cycle volunteer at maybe two different places. Most volunteered at the hospital associated with my school for less than six months and have done no research. I have volunteered at two hospitals in my area for nearly four years, I started volunteering at a third hospital 6 months ago. I've been a community mentor for three years to a teenage girl in my area, I did research in an Alzheimer's lab for two years, and I started volunteering at my local rape crisis center as a facilitator for a sexual assault support group and on their crisis hotline. In addition to all of that, I work part-time.

On top of all of that, I currently live in an abusive environment and have since I moved back home in 2010. Faith's mother is not even close to being fictional. I wish she was. I bring this up not because I want sympathy or because I want to be lectured on what I "should" do or what I "need" to do about my situation. I'm well aware of what I need to do, thanks, and there are a lot of issues within my current living situation that are not as simple as me leaving, but I won't share those on this blog and I ask that you don't speculate about this part of my life because it has never affected this blog in any way (the rest of my life is another story), I use this blog as an escape from it and I want it to stay that way. I bring it up because while a lot of medical students breeze through their medical school applications and have the time and money to do medical mission trips to make them attractive to medical schools while their doctor parents help them achieve clinical shadowing, I have not had any family support during this endeavor, financially, emotionally, or otherwise. So, if it seems like I'm making the past five years sound harder than they should be, maybe that's because they have been incredibly hard and I've had only myself to rely on through all of it.

I also want to point out that writing for and maintaining a fictional blog is extremely time consuming. The amount of material you have to produce on a regular basis is honestly difficult for me to explain to all of you because even I can't wrap my head around it sometimes. I think, though, that the fact that my blog is one of the longest running fictional blogs I know of, should say something. Almost every new fictional blog I've seen pop up since I started Modern Day Faith has died within a year. Usually with no explanation, the writer simply stops writing. Probably because it is hard as fuck to write so much and so often (especially if it's not putting money in your bank account). I appreciate the patience so many of my readers have shown me during all of my hiatuses. And, for what it's worth, if I didn't feel like writing and didn't have a post, I'd just say so. I've done that before, as many of you will remember. I'd never make a post up saying I lost all of my medical school essays unless it were true, particularly because I wouldn't want to challenge fate to make it true (sort of like that feeling you get when you want to say your grandmother died to get out of something but she's still alive and you don't want to tempt fate into killing her).

Thank you for bearing with me while I salvaged my essays. I tried several of the programs you all suggested in the comments but had no luck, unfortunately. For anyone who cares, I completed all of my application essays today and submitted all but one application because I'm considering applying to that school's dual degree program for an MD/PhD program, I'm waiting to speak with my advisor about it before I submit. Regular posting will resume every Sunday, including tonight. A new post is up entitled "Guess Who's Back, Back Again". You can find it below or you can click here.

See you all next week.

-del