Match Day

For someone who has absolutely nothing to do, I have no idea where my time has been going. I thought I'd end up writing about Match Day a few days after my last post, but those few days were busy since I was getting ready to go on my awesome end-of-med-school/grad-gift-from-my-parents vacation to Puerto Rico (which was amazing btw). Then after I got back, I needed a few days to have a vacation from my vacation since I was so tired. But, those stories are for a different day.

So Match Day. Where do I start?

Match Day is probably the most important day of a student's medical education. I think the white coat ceremony and graduation come close after it. Everything a student has worked towards for four years comes down to that one day. To those two emails. To that one piece of paper. It tells us where we will be for the next three to seven years of our lives. It tells us that we really will be doctors in that field. For some of us, especially the ones going into super competitive fields, Match week is a nightmare. I don't know how these guys were able to deal with all that anxiety. I applied to categorical pediatric programs, which is relatively non-competitive, so I wasn't nearly as worried as some of my other classmates who applied to competitive programs (i.e. Hopkins) and specialties (i.e. ortho or plastics). From the day I submitted my rank list of residency programs online at the end of January, I was fairly confident that I would match somewhere, and I was fairly confident about the order of how I ranked everything. I had other stuff going on in my personal life with *someone* since December that was causing me significantly more anxiety and stress than the match was... I guess the stress over him and over match was intertwined. I was worried about what would happen with us if I didn't end up in my #1 ranked place, and I reallyyy didn't want to be in a long distance relationship through residency... But, that stress was taken away at the beginning of February when things abruptly ended between us, so I stopped caring where I wanted to match. It didn't really matter to me anymore. Some part of that may have been  due to my broken heart, or maybe some of that may have been my practicality, who knows? I just know I had stopped worrying about where I'd end up.

However, even with that said, I was a raging ball of nerves the weekend before Match week. Sunday night was rough. I could not sleep because I was just tossing and turning, and I couldn't help but to wonder if my confidence was borderlining on the side of cockiness. All I could think about were the what-ifs the whole night.
What if I don't match? I didn't pay any attention on how to do SOAP!! [SOAP is the matching program for the people who didn't match. Basically they'd see what positions were still open and apply to them during match week. Super stressful.]
What if I match to the bottom of my list?
What if I match into Program #3 and I'm unhappy there?
What if its not my number 1 program? Then those thoughts began to clear and I realized it would be okay if I matched to Program #3 or the bottom of my list because all that mattered at this point was if I matched! On Monday March 12th, we all found out if we matched somewhere. All we got was an email at 11am saying, "Congratulations. You have matched." That's it. But that's all I needed. So with a big sigh of relief, I knew I'd be a pediatrician after three years somewhere, but I had to wait until Friday to find out where.

The wait between Monday morning to Friday morning was the longest wait I have ever encountered. I'm so glad that our school had a bunch of festivities lined up the entire week starting with Monday night and ending Saturday night. If I didn't have those events to distract me, the wait would have been even longer! Those events were fun and it was really awesome seeing everyone from my class again. I saw people that I haven't seen in two years after they moved to the other two cities for clinical rotations! I think other than graduation, that was the only time everyone was finally back in the same city. There were dinners, bar tabs, a boat party, and even a formal dinner the whole week... Lots of fun!

Match day itself was on Friday, and was... anticlimactic unfortunately :(
My family came into town the night before so they'd be at the ceremony on time and without rushing. I had to be on campus earlier for class pictures and a class meeting that was completely useless but still a lot of fun since we had some silly awards to give out. During the actual ceremony, they called us one by one in random order to the stage to get our envelopes containing a printed out match letter telling us which program we matched into. Now, I had an issue with the way things were done here. They had three people calling out names at any given time, one of the microphones was not working properly, and they kept trying to encourage us to be loud and energetic. They rotated the announcers and some were fine and able to shout over the microphone and over the noise, and some were not able to. Can you tell where my story is going? I was on the edge of my seat the whole time waiting for my name. I was completely wired, shaky, and nervous, and I was definitely paying attention to whose names they were calling. It was hard to hear what was going on with all the noise and the non-functioning microphone. So I heard all of my friends' named be called except one and they were down to the last two envelopes so we thought it was all for the two of us................. except that the second to last name called was another girl's and the last one to be called was my friend's............

So then I had a small freak out moment. Where the heck was my envelope??? Was that email a glitch??? Did I really not match??? Then my head cleared and I headed to the stage.

My envelope was still on the stupid stage. Apparently, the microphone had stopped working, and the guy with the microphone was unable to shout over the noise of the students, so I didn't hear my name be called. The lady holding my envelope was really really rude to me and said "we called your name three times" in a condescending tone as if it were my fault the announcer couldn't speak over the noise. Umm I'm pretty sure I would have heard my name especially with how intently I was listening, and even if I didn't hear it, my friends would have. This was my career that I would be finding out about, so of course I was listening! But most importantly, no one heard my name being called!! Maybe she just didn't want to admit it was their fault for not checking the microphones ahead of time.

My envelope!

So I didn't get the rush of going up to the stage after hearing my name and getting my envelope while my classmates were watching... Oh well. That was so disappointing, and it put me in a slightly bad mood. It stuck with me the whole afternoon. Anyways, as I returned to my seat, my hands were shaking as I opened it to see... *drumroll*... that I had matched to my #1 program!! I was happy and upset at the same time. Part of me was was ecstatic and dancing in my head singing, "yes, I got my number one!!" but another part of me was much more solemn saying, "wow, I really did end up with my number one which I had decided on because it seemed like a good fit in addition to being in the same city as *someone*..." That second part of me was sad because I was just thinking about him, and how I had put high priority on this program so we'd be able to be together through all of it... I'm not saying I didn't like the program. I did and I do, and I'm glad I will be there. Its just after I realized I liked the program, I thought everything would fall into place with *someone* but that was my mistake, and I was reminded of it after matching.

My Match Day Letter

So I was happy and sad, and I wasn't able to have my time on stage. I ended up getting the same message in my email two hours later, which was kinda cool. I guess that's how non-US med students applying to residency in the US would find out where they matched. I was actually pretty disappointed with Match Day especially since I was so excited for it back before *someone* and I broke up. Sigh.

More stories coming soon! I have lots :)

Until the next one then.