Photo courtesy of Rachel

“It’s just like Grey’s Anatomy!”

This comment came when I was making rounds with my team one morning. If only everything in my real life were that bright and shiny… Call rooms smell way too much like spoiled food to hook up in. The McDreamy attendings are happily married with adorable children. And nobody has the stamina to round in sexy form-fitting skirts and stilettos a la Dr. Addison Shepherd (at least on Medicine, different story in Psychiatry).

Life as a third year med student is, unfortunately, much less awesomely glamorous than the medicine practiced on TV. The similarities pretty much stop at wearing white coats and working at a hospital. I guess the closest med students have ever been represented were in some episodes of Scrubs and on ER. My hospital reality is far more like being in a dysfunctional one-sided relationship, where I am the one in extremely unrequited love. My sleep-depriving “significant other” demands the intangible, is borderline irrationally judgmental, and basically makes me nuts. Yet I cling on to the relationship, desperately willing to do anything to please… Crazy, stupid love…

All that aside… Hello! My name is Rachel. I’m a medical student, currently doing my third year in a hospital, and here to provide glimpses of the churn medical students go through before we even get the privilege of calling ourselves interns (a.k.a. newly graduated MD’s). As I’ve explained to several of my patients: on the totem pole, I’m below the ground.

Outside of the hospital, I like cooking, playing sports (played rugby in college, soccer now occasionally) and traveling with friends. I also have a wonderfully supportive boyfriend, who is not a medical student, but a photojournalist, and helps to keep me mostly sane.

I think it’s important to know that I haven’t always been absolutely sure this was without a doubt where I wanted to take my life. Before transitioning from undergrad to medical school, I got very cold feet and deferred my admission (I have commitment issues, and medicine is a serious commitment). The next year and half I spent wearing the green apron of a Starbucks barista while simultaneously doing animal research, then quitting both for a job in the corporate world, mostly because I really needed health insurance. Unexpectedly, I enjoyed the corporate environment so much I seriously contemplated staying. Almost fatefully I happened upon an older medical student, who had—in his late 30’s—changed careers from business to medicine. When asked if he had regrets, he told me, “The best days I had in business are nothing compared to even my worst days in medicine.” It was enough to convince me to at least try medical school for a little bit.

On the brink, for the second time, of entering med school (but this time with some money!), I went on a "last hurrah" backpacking adventure for two-and-a-half months, bouncing through Europe and all of Egypt. Highlights included running with bulls (yes, actually running) for the San Fermin festival in Pamplona, Spain, and hiking through the Cinque Terre of Italy. On very bad days the pictures remind me I once had a normal life, where I didn’t constantly discuss body fluids over meals with friends.

Complaints aside, third year has, by far, been the best of all my time in medical school. More of a “learn by doing” type, I’m beyond thrilled to be roaming hospital halls instead of sitting in the lecture hall. I have seen some cool shit, like open-heart surgery for an aortic valve replacement and the DaVinci robot in action. I’ve been part of stories that played out tragically with a diagnosis of cancer, even death.

Of course, those parts are expected. Unless you’re dating or parenting someone in medical school, you never hear about the student side: appearing “interested” even though you absolutely hate the field you’re rotating through; the reality that sometimes you’re competing against your friends to look good, that some classmates are perfectly willing to sabotage you; wondering if your significant other will move with you for residency. It’s a weird phase of life, full of too much to think about all at once.

So welcome to my everyday life on the wards… I hope you’ll find it as interesting as I do!

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