Limbo

So I have been really bad about blogging….what can I say. I am busy/lazy.

I want to update about how I am feeling. As my defense draws near and I am inching closer and closer to third year of medical school, I can’t help but feeling anxious. I keep having dreams about things going wrong…not getting my shit together in time for the defense, missing my defense, sucking at third year etc. Amongst the most stressful parts of my thoughts is a sinking fear that I won’t find a specialty in medicine where I below. Sure I get core rotations so I’ll see family medicine, internal medicine, surgery, pediatrics, neurology, psychiatry, etc during third year but what about all the specialties your don’t get to see before you have to decide? (like PMNR, derm, anesthesiology, radiology, ophthalmology, etc). Up to this point, I have been pretty sure about what I wanted to do and honestly, the thought of choosing a specialty seems years away especially since I was doing a PhD but boom….I am here and I don’t know what I want.

To try and alleviate some of my fears, I have been shadowing A LOT.  I guess taking 4 years away from medicine has helped me form connections with different doctors in different fields so it wasn’t a problem to shadow them. I have seen cardiology, ophthalmology, pediatrics, ob/gyn, and neonatology. There were some surprises (like I liked OB/GYN more then I thought I would) and some disappointments (like I don’t think I am fit to be a neonatologist) but the truth is I am still unsure what I want to do. Top of my list right now is ophthalmology which will require me to work REALLY hard and do REALLY well third year but I am scared to close the door on other specialties.

Perhaps I am stressed because work has been blah lately. I feel like I am no longer an integral member of the lab. On the one hand, it is probably the natural order of things (afterall I don’t want to start or take on any projects since I’ll be leaving in  5 weeks) but on the other hand, I am use to dong stuff…having experimental goals. With my paper out in revision (after multiple rejections), I am free to sit around and stress about third year, my defense, my wedding, potential reviewer comments on my paper, and a host of other things.

I am trying to be optimistic but I think I like KNOWING what to do.  By far the hardest part of the PhD has been the first year where I didn’t know what I was doing and I feel that same uncertainty creeping up on me. I suppose a sense of limbo is natural with career transitions but god, I just want to fast forward a few month.