Yesterday Matt and I were at Target and I saw the school supplies section. For the first time EVER my instantaneous reaction, instead of a thrill of joy at the thought of school inching closer, was a sinking sense of dread. Oh no, school is creeping back up again. I really have to go back to that. I am so thankful that I don't have to be a first-year ever again, but I still have to go through the meat grinder a second time, just on a different setting. Like, really. I have to do that again. Except without Matt there for half of it. People are already asking me about whether or not I'm going to get the jump on Pathology, and school is still almost a month away. But that's not the worst thing. The worst thing is that I know they're right, and I should start studying for Path before the semester begins because in 2nd year your return is directly related to your investment, and so I probably will. Which means buying the textbook before I go visit my family and taking it with me so I have a good two weeks to get myself familiarised with the basics.
Now. I will probably love the material - I'll finally be learning the real doctor stuff - and so studying will probably go well. But I'm not even worried about that. I know I can study; that's not my problem. The problem is that I don't really want to do this again now that I know what I'm heading into. Like every other naive premed, med school was The Big Shiny, the most attractive thing we'd ever pursued. It pulled us through all kinds of juvenile sacrifices and even through the semi-wringer that is medical school admissions. And when I got that phone call I gave heartfelt thanks, because at last I had arrived. So I conveniently forgot that med school is a process, not a destination. And the process sucks. It beats as much out of you as it can: irresponsibility, yes, but also enthusiasm, compassion, empathy, human connection, drive, physical health, integrity, self-preservation, honesty, sanity... I refuse to let that stuff go, but I still feel the pull, and I know I can't retain my full capacity for everything while school is going.
I warned myself when I started this. 'Welcome to your new life,' I told myself when I began first year. 'This is the new normal.' And I repeated that a lot, in anger, in despair, with resolve and at times also with deep bitterness. But summer has been such an amazing reprieve that I forgot that I don't get to be this complete a person all the time. I've gotten to read books, sleep as much as I want, lose weight, shadow at two excellent medical missions, reconnect with my husband, move to a new apartment, play lots of video games, see all my friends... I have truly shed all of the awfulness of the last year; half the time it seems like a vivid nightmare because it has nothing to do with how awesome summer has been and will continue to be. But the trade-off is that I feel emotionally unprepared for the coming semester. I watched the class above me burst into their second year, certain that it would be fantastic - and then abruptly get crushed by the workload and the stress. To be sure, they handled it better than we firsties did our trials because they'd already been through it, but the demands on them were also correspondingly greater. Last year watching what they went through terrified me, and I think I'm afraid that I didn't learn enough, didn't toughen up enough, didn't ________ enough to be ready for this coming year.
Which ultimately brings me back to the other thing I repeated to myself constantly last year: it's a damn good thing none of this is in my hands.
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