Dear MS1s,
I am going to be very honest here – my first year of medical school was absolutely brutal. I cried more than I thought possible. I felt lonelier than I ever expected. I was overwhelmed. The worst part of it all? I thought I was the only one who felt this way.
Every upperclassman and faculty mentor I met during those first few days always mentioned that I belonged here, that there is no reason to fall into the trap of imposter syndrome, that it is completely normal to falsely think that I am the only person getting crushed by the very spot I worked so hard to get. I really tried to believe them but how could I? Everyone around me sounded happy and well-adjusted. I was certain that they were thriving while I was barely surviving.
By the time winter break rolled around, I felt more hopeless than ever. I was consumed by anxiety over my grades, felt isolated and friendless, and didn’t take the time to practice self-care. The only thing I had accomplished so far was convincing people that I had it all together. In fact, I promise you that many of my classmates will be surprised to hear that I was hiding behind my smiles and jokes.
Unhappy and dejected, I realized I needed to make an active change instead of succumbing to the pressures of medical school. I decided to let myself be vulnerable and admitted that I was struggling to my loved ones. I looked into options for counselling and practicing self-care. I finally began to embrace the pass-fail mentality and picked a new study strategy that didn’t burn me out. I put my fear aside and reached out to people that I hoped to befriend. I went into the new year with a budding sense of hope – I was going to try.
Now, as I go into my second year of medical school, I can happily say that things got much better for me. Don’t get me wrong – it was hard. I still cried more days than I didn’t, I still believed that I was friendless for the better part of the semester, and I still kept trying to convince myself that I didn’t deserve to be here. Those thoughts never truly went away but slowly started to fade into the background. Becoming well-versed in combating my self-critical thoughts, I built up my self-worth and found joy amidst what I thought was a hopeless situation. At this point, I cry only once in a while, I have a lot of new friendships that I’m excited to take further, and I know deep down that I belong. Here’s how I did it:
- Only learn what you have to – the premed in me was convinced that I had to know absolutely everything. I was deathly scared of going into an exam and not recognizing a certain word or concept. But, the truth is, there’s exams every two weeks and you will always not recognize something no matter how much you study. The goal of pre-clinical isn’t to memorize massive amounts of information that you can impressively regurgitate to attendings during rotations. The goal is to learn how to learn. All of this information is going to be repeated in several different contexts – lectures, small group, patient encounters, clerkship, STEP studying. You don’t need to know all of this now; just trust that it’ll get easier the third, fourth, fifth time you inevitably review this material. By the time you graduate, you’ll be blown away by how much you naturally absorbed over the years. At this point, just learn enough to pass your exams and get that glorious 75%.
- Change your study strategy – I wanted to come up with a study strategy on day 1 that I would stick with for the rest of pre-clinical. I was afraid that if I experimented I would lose precious time and fall behind. Plus, I survived this long – what’s so different about medical school? I learned the answer to that the hard way. Over the course of that first year, I probably tried about five different study methods and I’m constantly tweaking my strategies. As I found more efficient study strategies, exams felt less stressful (compared to the do-or-die mentality I had at first) and I had time to happily watch Netflix with freshly baked cookies the night before.
- Find that one friend – it’s easy to want a big group of friends that goes on Spring Break together and regularly posts on social media. But, it’s important to realize that what you want isn’t as important as what you need. I soon realized that as long as I had one person I could confide in and be totally myself with then I would be very happy. Instead of putting pressure on myself to broaden my friend group, I started to appreciate the people I did have in my life. I relied on my college friends and felt content with the one friend I made during medical school. As soon as I realized what I already had, I felt as if a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders – it’s amazing how much a single friendship can make you feel less alone. Try not to pressure yourself to have the social life you think you need – your person is out there! They don’t necessarily even have to be one of your classmates. They can be your partner, your college friends, your family. What really matters is that you have a support system that you can be yourself around.
- Be vulnerable – for most of my first year, I thought I had to fake it until I made it. I believed I had to hide behind smiles and jokes to make people like me. Packing away my feelings, I convinced myself it was better this way. I quickly realized that it wasn’t. As intimidating as it was, I started to admit my struggles to people around me. I tried to be open about my mental health and what I was experiencing. As I allowed myself to be vulnerable, I began to realize that it was valid to feel the way that I did and that more people than I could ever have realized felt very similarly. So many of the well-adjusted geniuses around me were struggling human beings too. By opening up, I began to live authentically, love all parts of myself, and build truly beautiful connections. Try not to let yourself slip on a mask during this incredible journey – it is so important to stay true to yourself.
If you ever need anything, and I truly mean absolutely anything, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me or any other upperclassmen. We all have learned a lot during our time here and want to do our best to make sure you have as amazing of a first year as possible!
Always,
Layla
Layla Abdulla is an MS2 at the Perelman School of Medicine.
Image by Tracy Du, an MS2 at the Perelman School of Medicine.
