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emf65

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Hello all,

I'm new to these forums and looking for a little guidance, maybe from another who has been in these circumstances. I really appreciate being heard out.

I come from a very financially unstable background and spent the latter half of my childhood caring for my littler siblings at home while my mom worked long hours to provide for us. I didn't get to participate in any extracurricular or social activities outside of normal school hours and got very little exposure to professional careers or subjects other than general ed. Anything that cost money, we couldn't do. Despite all of this, I graduated from high school with honors at the top of my class and was very proud of myself for it.

But during my undergraduate career, it started to feel like everything was falling apart all at once. As things kept popping up, I ended up dealing with a bunch of financial (rising tuition costs, working two jobs, continuing to assist family while covering myself & tuition), personal (severe, cyclical depression, undiagnosed until sophomore year), and family (two deaths, one whom I was very close to) problems that I could have never predicted. I also went to an engineering-focused school & tried to force myself through engineering until Junior year, which has now reflected quite negatively in my cGPA, a 3.06, and in my sGPA, a 2.97.

I'm a rising senior now and declared in Computer Science, which I fell in love with freshman year. I used a lot of my time in undergrad to explore the breadth of career paths that I was curious about. But now I've had my time to explore, I want more than ever to become a pathologist. I've been considering for a while; I actually used my spring break freshman year to shadow a pathologist. But I wanted to explore everything I was interested in before settling on medicine as a final choice, given the huge commitment it would have been.

I know I shouldn't give up, but I feel very far from my goal. I have no volunteer experience in hospitals, though I do have a lot of volunteering hours at a medical museum nearby, as well as hold a Chair position for a very large, on-campus computing group. I worked at a hospital for a school year as an office assistant, but my depression cut that short when it became too much to handle on top of everything else. I have not fulfilled many of the pre-med requirements. I've been recommended post-bacc, but after calculating it out, it would bring me to a 3.4 -- better, but not quite shining.

I'm reluctant to just give up & forget medicine. At the moment, it seems like the best option would be to graduate, focus on becoming financially stable, and then return for post-bacc & med school. But I can't say when that will happen for me, or how long that gap would be, and whether or not that would actually end up working to my detriment when applying.

So, should I wait a year before applying to med school? Should I do post-bacc? Should I just stay the course & continue in my original field? Anyone with advice?

Sorry again for the life story... it feels good having let it out, at least :bear:

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Sorry you went through that stuff. Medical schools will always respect an applicant who worked two jobs during undergrad. I can only recommend bc I don't fully know ur situation. IF AND ONLY IF medicine is your passion I would advise you to finish your requirements and try to get A's in all of em. While you do this try to get as much clinical exposure as you can. Only after you finish your requirements you should set aside 3-5 months of strictly studying for the mcat. However long this process takes so be it.

GL
 
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Thanks, @Kingsmen2018. It's good to hear that med school are understanding of multiple jobs. Do you know if med school typically take into account where you attended undergrad? I am currently attending a rigorous engineering university & hoped that that would work to my credit when applying.
 
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A post bacc where you finish the science prerequisites would help you. If your eventual sGPA and cGPA are 3.3 and you score at least 500 on the MCAT then you would be competitive for at least 15 DO schools that I can think of.
 
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Thanks, @Kingsmen2018. It's good to hear that med school are understanding of multiple jobs. Do you know if med school typically take into account where you attended undergrad? I am currently attending a rigorous engineering university & hoped that that would work to my credit when applying.
From what I have heard it really depends. In your case no it won't make much of a difference bc it is around a 3.0
 
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A post bacc where you finish the science prerequisites would help you. If your eventual sGPA and cGPA are 3.3 and you score at least 500 on the MCAT then you would be competitive for at least 15 DO schools that I can think of.

Thanks, Faha. I have been considering DO programs heavily as well. Do you know if DO would allow me to practice pathological medicine, particularly clinical?
 
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