Tuesday, October 21, 2008

I hate big decisions, and this is quite a predicament

Decisions decisions, should I go to australia and possibly decrease my shots at a great career in cardiology, or should I cancel, stay home, and always wonder what if I had gone.

OK, so I planned a trip to Australia for 6 weeks my first year in vet school. I have been planning it for ages, but things keep making it seem difficult. First of all, I was strung along by an organization at school and led to believe I would easily land this $12,000 scholarship for women, only to later find out that only 1/11 women applying get it. I was planning on that $ to off set the cost to australia, but now that it is not there I need to foot the bill for a $4000 trip. That is doable, but hard, making me more poor then usual and unable to splurge at all from Dec. to Feb.

Then there is the issue with my cat, my car, etc. All of which are annoying hassles, but can be arranged.

Then there is planning the trip itself. My cousin is supposed to go with me for the first 2 weeks of vacation, then I am on my own for 4 weeks at the wildlife sanctuary. Evan asked me to plan all the stuff, from hostels to trains to ferries, etc. which is quite a burden, and I am only about 1/3 of the way done with it, and the trip is less then two months away.

Then there is scheduling everything else I need to do with my limited free time, like seeing family, friends, taking boards exams, which can all be arranged, just another hassle.

There is the stress that my return flight gets delayed and I am late for my last core rotation...something I should not have to worry about but I do cause I have seen it happen to classmates, and your grade is definitely affected if something like that happens.

Arranging with all my credit card companies, etc., for online payments and notifying them that I will be in australia.

Being away from my boyfriend for 6 weeks, doable, but again, not something I look forward to.

Ok, all no big deal, all things I can handle and force myself not to think about and to say "It will all be ok once I am in australia and am enjoying myself there".

Then my email today.

Many of you know I am in the process of applying to internships. I ahve changed my mind since starting vet school. I have realized that as much as I enjoy zoo and wildlife medicine, I have almost no chance of landing a career in it. However, I have also found I LOVE cardiology, and after speaking with Dr. Rush today about it, he thinks while it is very competitive, with the right letters of recommendations and possibly another cardiology related publication (with his help in the spring) I have a decent shot at one of those residencies. Of course, the internships I am applying for I picked ones that have cardio residencies. And today I find out that the normal three week window to either phone interview or in person interview are smack in the middle of my trip to Australia. Basically, by sacrificing them, I still have a chance at an internship, but much less of a chance at the ones I want. I would probably be sacrificing a chance at angell since they want an in person interview from tufts students. And I might be sacrificing other internships since I might not be able to arrange a phone interview easily either.

So the predicament, do I spend $4000 and possibly sacrifice a better shot at a career in cardiology? Or do I say fuck it and go anyways to enjoy the field that I have already realized I don't have a shot at anymore?

I am so not sure...both Heather and my mom had good advice, and I was a little shocked that my mom actually leaned towards not going, but I still need to wait and see. I will wait and see if these internships I just wrote to today get back to me soon and if I can arrange interviews in the week before I leave fir Australia.

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