What If I'm Scared I'm Not Cut Out For This?

I think everyone in medicine has that moment. The one where you look around and think, What if I don’t belong here?

For me, that moment came early. I remember taking my first practice MCAT and doing so poorly that I genuinely thought maybe medicine wasn’t for me. I was crushed. It felt like all the dreams I had as a kid of walking hospital halls with my dad and helping people feel seen and cared for were suddenly out of reach.

I’ve started to think that maybe they have engineered this journey into medicine to make us all ask ourselves that very question. It seems as though this system is designed for us to feel less than. While I don’t agree with their tactics, I can absolutely say that I am a more resilient person than I was when I first ventured on this path. For better or worse, I am stronger because I’ve had to be. 

That failure ended up teaching me more about myself than any success ever could. I studied smarter, worked harder, and built resilience that would carry me through every setback after that. Years later, I ended up going to medical school in my dream city of New York and eventually matching into one of the most competitive specialties as a DO student. That’s not something I take lightly.

The truth is, self-doubt never really goes away. It just changes shape. I felt it taking Step, starting clinical rotations, auditioning for dermatology, and again during residency interviews. But fear doesn’t mean you’re not meant to be here. It means you care deeply about getting it right.

When I start questioning myself, I think back to that girl crying over her first practice test, certain her dream was slipping away. I wish I could tell her it would all work out. That the things meant for her would find her, even if the road there didn’t look like she expected.

This newfound strength has given me the backbone to persevere through Intern Year. A time that surely would have broken a younger and more fragile me. I’ve dealt with angry patients, families who want answers we simply don’t have, and losses that have felt like my own. I am almost certain that the resiliency I have gained, almost like an outfit of armor, have allowed for me to become the doctor who can be stable in this world full of uncertainty. 

You don’t have to be fearless to be great. You just have to keep going, even when you’re scared. Especially when you’re scared.

So yes … sometimes medicine feels impossible. But so did everything else you’ve already accomplished, and you did it anyway. That’s how I know you’re cut out for this.