Failure

[scaevitas]

Hello, it’s Scaevitas. 

I am a medical student and I am halfway through my degree. Unfortunately I marginally failed a component of an assessment (by 0.03) which is needed to progress to the next year. I was struggling with depression and I also have around 9 other chronic illnesses. I did not seek help when I needed it most and have not taken responsibility for my own health and academic performance. I am currently repeating the year at medical school, and I have two months until a similar exam. I am an utter failure. 

I am still coming to terms with having to repeat a year of medical school. This is very stressful as I have to make new friends and do everything again. For the first few weeks of semester, I was struggling with active suicidal ideation and recently, I have had passive suicidal ideation. 

I often want to escape from reality and I have spent a lot my time indulging in TV and movie streaming services to distract myself from my situation. This however, is not sustainable. 

Some other context about my life: 

I come from an extremely academic medical family where failure like this is unheard of. Many times throughout my childhood, my parents have said, “how are you my child” in regards to my intelligence, or, “how did I give birth to such a stupid person.” 
I have also never been in a situation like this and I have also lost friends because I am repeating the year. The university has also been very condescending, apathetic and unsupportive during this time. 

I am not sure how I can go on. 

[white knight]

Hi, welcome

Ever since I received therapy in 1987 for anxiety I can immediately identify some things other people go through as needing similar assistance. People now place excess (IMO) emphasis on friendships. Drop a year from uni and you will drift/lose friends from that year but end uni and go into a job and you'll lose contact anyway. Priority is uni not friends. Sorry if I'm being direct there.

However, another more pressing aspect of your life needs addressing. The treatment from your parents will likely stay with you forever unless you get help. Such abuse will result from such comments to you as a child, they are wrong and you have the right to be angry and seek a conversation about it. That combined with expectations so high with being yet another medical professional in the family is a high bar to jump. Those two factors could be why you are struggling and have such suicide ideations. 

We havent even begun to discuss your chronic illnesses including depression. How can you possibly not watch TV and seemingly - give up?

It is also normal to ignore your mental health until it's too late. So, do you feel normal now? 

What to do?  1/ Try to embrace dropping down a year is not a big deal. We cant all pass. 2/ Good friends will stay in touch, they come and go in our lives- friendships are fluid  3/ you are not in this world to live up to others expectations including your parents 4/ You are not what you were tagged as being, even parents get it wrong 5/ Your failure wasnt to a great measure so you are likely to pass next time. 6/ you are not your family members career wise, you are YOU. If that means a career change so be it.

Well done in writing in. repost anytime. 

TonyWK

[scaevitas]

Dear TonyWK, 

Thank you so much for replying to my post! I am in a much better place now. In regards to TV/ streaming platforms - I haven’t used them in over 2 weeks. I decided to designate one of my devices for purely educational purposes. Instead of watching things, I’ve been keeping myself busy by reading medical books and interpreting ECGs using a workbook. I have decided that this year will be a good thing - I am doing some research, which will allow me to publish academic papers, making it easier for me to get into a specialist training program. I will also use this year to expand my knowledge. I’ve organised some placements outside of uni so I can get more clinical exposure as well. 

For my health, I’ve organised appointments to see my GP every month and I am seeing a psychologist fortnightly. I am also running in the morning with a friend and going to gym after class (2-3 nights/week). I stopped eating sugar as well, and I have lost 3kg since February, just 2kg more to go. 

Thank you for reaching out, it really means a lot 🙂

[white knight]

Wow, well done.  I hope you succeed in everything you set out to do. Just remember, every smooth road has a puddle to avoid and we cant avoid them all.

TonyWK

[Aunt Jobiska]

Hey... I don't know if you'll get this post, but I'm also a med student, I withdrew from placement due to discrimination amongst other issues so will come back next year with the subsequent years... It sounds like a crap situation. Are you aware of all the med student help resources? Reach out for help. I'm doing a research project on disability in medical school... Would love another participant! (Don't think the rules say I can't spruik my research project!) There's a Facebook group for drs (and med students) with disabilities... Depression counts. Have you contacted your unis disability office and asked for accommodations?  Depression sucks, I can't imagine doing med school depressed, you're stronger than I am. One of my classmates has BPD and she's managing to survive.... Just keeping her head above water thus far. All the best.