Ways to Destress as a Pre-Med – Happy National Doctor Day

Happy National Doctor Day!

 

If you haven’t realized by now, the path toward medicine is especially stressful and it leads to a stressful career. However, don’t let that drag you down! It is VERY VERY VEEEEERY important to find a way to destress every day. Even if you are the tiniest medically inclined, it is easy to see that stress leads to bad health and if you’re in bad health you can’t help your future patients. So it is essential to find a way, or two, or three to “destressify” your life every now and again.

With my MCAT 2.0 coming up in 4 days, my own stress level has increased 10 fold. As it should too, I mean it is one of the toughest tests out there. So I reached out to my Facebook friends for support and many people soon texted my words of encouragement and gave me all sorts of warm fuzzies. To my surprise, however, not everyone was so supportive. I was a little taken back when one of the friendliest people I know responded with a reminder of all the future stressful days ahead of me and, in a way, prompted me to find a way to deal with it. At first, I was a little angry, ‘I know what this entails…don’t you think I get it already??’ and after my childish ranting to myself, I realized that my struggle, like everyone else, is there own and I have my own way of coping.

Every spare amount of free time, every invitation turned down, every sunny weekend missed (those 7.5 hr practice tests are no joke!) have been sacrificed so I can give my heart and soul to others. Yea… there is a lot of stress and yea… there is more to come, but when it comes down to it, it’s so worth every late night and early morning.

After reflecting, I decided to make a list of ways I like to destress! (Feel free to add your ways to destress in the comments!)

1. Reaching out to friends and family for support. Everyone may not understand and be supportive, but I have a couple friends I always like to go to.
2. Take a walk. Sometimes 10 minutes of fresh air can do a person a whole lot of good.
3. Get away from it all. Every 2 weeks or so I scheduled in 1 day of fun. Sometimes it was a half day because I’m a workaholic, but a day of no screens, hanging out with friends, and getting away from the desk is just THE BEST!
4. Make some “ME” time. This one I find hardest to make time for, but it’s really just taking a long hot shower, putting on your comfiest pajamas, and taking a deep breath to re-center your world.
5. I’m not very good, but YouTube has a lot to offer for 10 minute yoga sessions!

So with that I wish everyone a Happy National Doctors Day and remember, don’t let the world get ya down!

 

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– Megan 

#lifeinthegap #lifeasapremed