So this last week I was in Andalucía for a class trip. It's a 4 day trip and you get credit for it - pretty awesome and a great way to see cool things. The trip went great, except for the part where we went to Sevilla (the city where I wanted to study but couldn't because my school didn't have a program there) and absolutely fell in love. I literally cried during our tour because I was so upset I didn't get to go there. I think mainly it was a population thing - Madrid has around 3,000,000 people and Sevilla has just over 700,000 people. That's a huge difference. (Says the girl with a hometown of 30,000 people...)
I had a great time and didn't want to leave. It just sucks knowing that all this time I've been here I haven't truly enjoyed it as much as I know I could have there. There's just something different about the people - they were all nicer and life was slower. There were real trees and water and parks. The streets were busy yet quiet and secluded at the same time.
One day, I'll go back and spend some time there.
So anyways, then I got back - and life went absolutely crazy. I had a missed call from my med school advisor - apparently they'd been trying to find me all week (no wifi at our stupid hotel). My advisor told me they were concerned about my GPA (thanks stupid bio class freshman year that I got completely screwed over on) (Note- if you ever want to drop a class and your advisor won't let you, don't settle. You're paying for your education, you call the shots, not him) Yeah, anyway... I have to keep a minimum of a 3.5 GPA and right now I'm sitting at 3.477. The problem is I have to decide if I'm going to try and matriculate into the med school in fall of 2014 or 2015 - and with whatever I choose there is no going back. That's to say, if I choose 2014 and if after spring semester next year my GPA is not at least 3.5, that's it, I'm done, no med school spot for me. However, I could also choose to take an extra year of undergrad classes and raise my GPA to ensure it will be high enough to enter in 2015.
Sounds like an easy decision right? Well, yes - except for the fact that I only one more year of credits to graduate. So should I do that 4th year and take easy classes just to get the GPA, or should I challenge myself and work towards a 3rd degree and help better prepare myself for medical school, but at the same time still risking that something could go wrong and I might not get the best GPA (putting me right back in the same place I am now). Not to mention my friends will all be going on to the med school.
It's just a hard thing to choose :/ I feel like I can do it, and like I can get the good grades to keep the GPA I need, but at the same time if something goes wrong and I get dropped from the med school program I will die. Because let's be honest, I've got a Spanish and Chemistry degree - I'm not prepared to take the MCAT, I probably wouldn't get in. That would kill me.
So, I've spent all weekend making different plans and thinking about ideas of what I could do. I've got a meeting with my advisor tomorrow at 8pm to discuss my options. My goal is to ask to postpone my decision until the end of summer - when I will know both my grades from this semester here in Spain and my grades from my summer classes - and hopefully I'll have a better idea on where I stand instead of guessing.
In the end, if there's any doubt in my mind, I will take the 4th year - I just don't know when to draw the line between "this is doable" and "play it safe".
My plan is to talk to my program director here in Spain tomorrow and find out if I can take my final exams early and fly home 4 days early so I can take the summer classes I really need to take. My problem right now is if I miss the first week I'm pretty screwed for passing the class, so I'd have to take some different classes online and take the harder classes during the actual school year.
There's just a lot of unknown right now, and it's driving me nuts. I'm stressed and can't focus. There's a lot of pressure to do well this semester, even though I feel like I'm putting forward all the energy I possibly can already. I have to try harder. I have to do this.
This is the problem with being a perfectionist type-A personality person.
So for now, I'm stuck waiting - at least for the next 24 hours. I'll know better tomorrow night and I'll be able to think through things a little better when I know where I stand. For now, my family has all lit their prayer candles. For now I have to trust that everything will work out and that I will make the right decision.
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