Applying to Medical School While a Volunteer

These past few months I have been applying to medical school. I only decided during Peace Corps that I wanted to be an osteopathic physician. My whole life I have wanted to work in the medical field and for the majority of this I wanted to be a doctor, but my sophomore year I was discouraged by my pre-medical advisor and by my shadowing experiences abroad to become a physician. So I explored other options, homeopathic practitioners, nurse, physical therapist etc. By the time I left for Peace Corps, I still did not know what I wanted to do, but I was almost dead set on not becoming a doctor- if anything not to succumb to pleasing my dad.

It was in Peace Corps that I realized I wanted the most options possible to help improve the health of others, specifically in marginalized communities. To do this, I feel that I should become a doctor. I want the ability to do research, have a title that is respected internationally to help me open doors, and to be able to work in the field, with patients, not just in an office administratively. I learned more and more about osteopathic medicine during Peace Corps and I decided this embodied what I was looking for the whole time- a holistic approach to medicine working with the patients with manipulative care and as a partner advocating for their own health.

Deciding was the easy part. Now I was faced in a rural village in the mountains of the Dominican Republic with no Internet, little electricity and I had to apply to medical school. First thing was first, I had to take my MCAT exam, which I had not done yet in fear that it would expire or I would not decide I truly wanted to go to medical school. So, I ordered a Princeton review set online to study from and thank GOODNESS, the books actually arrived (unlike the many letters and packages I’m still to receive, but have not yet). I studied for this exam for many months, laboriously reading through my book after or before my work for the day. I would lock my door and often by candlelight would study for the MCAT. Some days I just became so frustrated with the lack of a quiet place to study I would throw my book on the ground. As I perched on the edge of my chair, book in lab, the donkeys and roosters screaming at the top of their lungs and the music from my neighbors shaking my house’s foundation, it wasn’t the easiest process. Without internet, I couldn’t use online resources to study, I didn’t have a library with countless books, I didn’t have study partners to review with, I didn’t have a prep course. I just had my candle, 5 heavy books, and me.

In the end I went to take the test in the beginning of June, which would be followed by the best treat ever my first trip back to the US since joining Peace Corps two years before. My first time seeing my family in about 6 months. My trip to take the MCAT was not the easiest. The MCAT is not offered in the Dominican Republic, so I had to take the exam in the US or Puerto Rico, due to scheduling difficulties, all of the spots on the date that I wanted to take the exam were filled in Minnesota and Wisconsin 4 months before the exam. So, I decided to take the exam in Puerto Rico. To get a cheaper flight I flew out of Punta Cana, so it was a two-day trek from my site to Punta Cana including 6 guaguas and 3 moto rides later until I finally got to the airport. The night before I took off, I submitted my AACOM common application for osteopathic medical school to 16 colleges. I was submitting them by little Internet that was running out quickly. Finally once I got on the plane and to the airport, I flew in about a half and hour flight to Puerto Rico. I then landed to be greeted by an ex-Peace Corps volunteers and a security guard whose son was taking the exam at the same place I was the next day! I then treated myself to stay at a nice hotel with a grocery store across the way and a starbucks down the road. I went for a run in my chacos, took a hot shower, turned on the depressing news filled with shootings and Trump, and then went to bed at 7:30, setting 4 alarms. I work up early had a full breakfast and some coffee and then took a cab to the testing center where I sat for 7 and a half hours with three small breaks to take the MCAT. By the end of the exam, my brain was so fried I could barely understand Spanish or English. The first time visiting Puerto Rice, I wanted to see at least a little bit of San Juan so I wandered around the city for maybe an hour on foot, dazed from the test, and carrying my luggage with me. I felt like a crazy person and didn’t end up seeing too much. So eventually I went to the airport again and slept the night there, not wanting to pay for another hotel room.

After my MCAT adventure I still had to fill out many secondary applications for med school. I gained a little bit of Internet access and spent so many hours editing and reviewing essays. It was so kind of my dad, Frankie, Megan, Michaela, Adrian, Herel, Claire, and Christine to all help me edit my essays. Getting new sets of eyes on my personal statement and my secondary application essays was awesome and so needed as I had not spoken too much English in the last two years, let only spoken intelligently. It would have been so much easier if I had had unlimited internet service and could search schools, or topics, or email with my peers about my essays more regularly or if I had had free telephone access to the US where I could have called schools if I had questions or called friends if I had questions about a part of my application. The difficulties were immense. Will power outages often my computer would run out of battery or Internet in the pueblos would not work, there was always something. It could never, never be easy, but it worked.

After this whole process I am so solidified in my desire to become an osteopathic physician. Overcoming countless obstacles to apply to medical school and take the MCAT while I was a Peace Corps volunteer was at times extremely difficult and stressful, but after this, I don’t think there is much I can’t do.