“Stop it. Stop saying that.”

“What? What did I say wrong?”

“‘In my next life, when I’m a doctor.’ ‘If I’d have been an obstetrician.’ You’ve been saying it since we met ten years ago, and I can’t take it anymore. You have to either become a doctor or stop saying it.”

“Russell, you can’t just become a doctor!”

“No, but you can quit your job, go back to school, and then become a doctor.”

The Plan

That’s the day my husband and I started figuring out how to make it possible for me to go back to school for pre-med. After a summer of research and number-crunching, we decided that I would apply to every post-bacc pre-med program in a 300 mile radius. We would move wherever I was accepted, then suck it up and live on one income for a year. We figured we’d have to do it during medical school anyway. 

Then I discovered I was pregnant – with a due date right around the time most programs on my list began. We decided I would take my prerequisites at the local community college over the course of two years. I would stay home with the baby to avoid the astronomical costs of daycare. This way, we could pay my tuition out of pocket and avoid accruing extra debt.  I would start with calculus while I was pregnant; this had my previous stumbling block to STEM courses, so we’d make sure I could handle the rigor of this course material first.

My daughter, The OG, came into the world three weeks early via emergency C section. She was born with an extra chromosome, an AV canal defect, and the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen. I dropped the summer classes I’d enrolled in, to get her to every pediatric, cardiology, neurology, surgical and physical therapy appointment on her busy little calendar. We watched our daughter hit every single milestone on time. She changed the mind of every friend who’d thought that Down syndrome was something to apologize for. I took my calculus final two weeks after she was born, four days after we brought her home from the NICU. I got a 96.

Then, The OG died from complications after her open heart surgery, ten days before the start of the fall semester. She was almost four months old. Her laugh was as beautiful as her chubby little face. 

Grief therapists tell you that you shouldn’t make any major life decisions within a year of your loss, that you should stick to your previous plans. So I started classes, drowning in grief, two days after my daughter’s funeral. I cried every time my biology professor taught about reproductive fitness or my physics professor used rockets or blood pressure in his word problems. I attended Orgo labs via Zoom while we adopted our son from eastern Europe. And I studied for the MCAT on the pediatric oncology unit while my younger son went through 43 weeks of chemotherapy. But I stuck to the plan, because my daughter’s birth, life and death cemented my commitment to this path.

The Path

It’s been a long and disappointing road. Last year, I applied to just eight schools; my son’s cancer diagnosis forced me to postpone my MCAT, and I didn’t want to apply broadly without knowing what my score was. I got just one interview, and after the school waitlisted me for five months, I ended up with a rejection.

This year, I applied to 18 schools. I’ve heard absolutely nothing from 12 of them. The school that previously waitlisted me outright rejected me this time, without even an interview. One school tossed my application because my master’s degree in history didn’t meet their social science requirement. Only two schools have offered me interviews. On decision day, the South Carolina school informed me I was in their “Continue to Evaluate” category: not wait listed, not rejected, just… more waiting. I wept bitterly, realizing this dream might not come true, and began to make other plans.

On Thursday, I got a phone call from an unknown number. My hands started shaking when the caller identified herself as an admissions director, and I burst into tears when she told me the news. 

Accepted.

Western Michigan University decided to take a chance on a 38 year old high school teacher with four kids and a theatre degree. I’m going to be a doctor. I will have the indescribable honor of saving children’s lives, the way I wish I could have saved my own daughter.

Most of my thoughts, however, haven’t been about her. I keep thinking about my husband. The man who told me my “next life” could be this life. He believed in me so much that he went back to work, mired in his own grief, to financially support us while I took classes full-time. He bought me books to prepare for medical school interviews and the MCAT, and told me when my prep was slack. My husband never thought this was a crazy plan. When I walked into our apartment and told him about my acceptance, he texted everyone we know to tell them the good news. He conspired with our best friends to plan a small outside surprise party (masked and distanced). The best part? when our daughters’ godfathers accidentally sprayed Two with champagne (whoops!). He’s already applying for a Michigan teaching license so he can support us during four years of medical school. My husband is my rock, and he’s all in.

So this new chapter in my life is dedicated to our daughter; to all the students I’ve lost along the way; and to every family I’ll have the honor of serving as a pediatrician. But it’s also dedicated to my remarkable husband. Lifey, I would not and could not have done this without you. I love you, and I can’t wait to make you the proudest stay-at-home husband in town.

TL;DR: I’MA BE A DOCTOR, Y’ALL!

Tierra

A malcontent with a heart of gold, Tierra is a first-year medical student, former high school teacher and history PhD candidate, plus mom to four of Bebe’s baddest kids. She curses a lot. Tierra is a DC native but lives in southwest Michigan and will happily exchange writing (hers) for cash (yours).