A realistic journey:will I get into medicine and meet my dreams?

So hi everyone...
I’ve been a bit inactive on here but very active on the student room as a whole with the medicine deadline approaching...
My mocks are next week and the week just gone went alright I guess but I’ve got so much to do...

Biology
We’ve moved onto module 6 of the course which is a really exciting unit on control and homeostasis which looks like it’s going to be fun although undoubtedly there will be a lot to remember so pros and cons I guess. We have our penultimate practical this week which is slightly sobering as we’ve only really just started year 13 but I suppose time goes really fast.

Chemistry
We’ve got halfway through chapter 22 so only a few left . We looked at enthalpy and entropy this week which has been interesting but luckily not too challenging once you’ve gotten your head around the ideas so that looks to be going alright.

Maths
We’ve nearly finished second year differentiation with only implicit and partial fractions left so hopefully by half term we might just get going with integration- although a step up from first year the pure we’ve done so far hasn’t been too horrific although it literally counting down until I can’t do any of my subjects anymore...

Epq
I’ve finally finished research and so my plans for next week will be to finish cross referencing my sources before getting my reflections for the last week up to date so that next week I can get the first section of writing done using my plan so that the whole thing can be done over half term as it is very quickly becoming the bane of my life.


Other things
Excitingly I have received acknowledgement emails from 3 of my 4 choices and I’m now only waiting on uea - I know it isn’t too exciting but considering that UCAT sends results to the unis in November and a large amount of my homework is now due in November due to my half term not being next week but the week after it is all starting to feel quite real.
This week I had a group meeting with my mentor about applying to medicine where we disseminated Atul Gawande’s “Being Mortal” in order to reflect on end of life issues in an articulate manner which was really useful as whilst intended to primarily be for those applying to oxbridge and doing bmat there was a lot that could be taken from it.


Other information
My driving is going well and I may soon progress to main roads which will be a new experience and challenge. I need half term so badly to get everything in order again but hopefully will manage.

Mini announcement- the last appendage to my update I promise
So the deadline for medicine is coming up and I have been looking back at my phone and realised I have spent quite insane amounts of time advising people on their applications and whilst I am really interested to see what happens for everyone and to keep up to date and offer advise I will be reigning it in slightly. Not only will I definitely be willing to offer some advice as we go along and be very happy to share my progress with a levels and applications and also be more than happy to advise properly again next year I will be spending no more than 45 minutes a day in here to focus on my exams more as whilst I’ve still been very focused and kept up with everything I must say I’ve become a bit addicted to the forums - still happy to share things though.
TLDR

Why oh why did I miss this thread before???

There are many things I love about your study techniques...

You know how to apply yourself to your studies. If you drop a few marks you want to know why and are determined to improve. You want to know why your teachers don’t worry about your getting a b in your tests.. that’s because they have faith in you in general.

If you are not proficient in something, instead of avoiding it, you tackle it, eg baking. If you find time to do that whilst at med school, you will suddenly become very popular! If you are worried about cooking at uni, you can always stay in fully catered halls, like I did

I went to uea med school open day, I was very impressed. Loved going on the mock up ward. The tutors and students were very friendly and the med school was very new. Norwich is a lovely city. In the end though my son preferred traditional to problem based learning.

Your Newcastle programme sounds very interesting. I love the fact that you have a mentor.. do you find this encouraging.? I don’t know about the Newcastle programme, but if you are on the Sheffield one you get an automatic interview and a lower offer. Hope this is the case for you, although it seems you don’t need it.

Atul gawande, yes, remember him well. My son really admired him and has read all his books.

The student room is very addictive. That’s okay for someone like me, with time on their hands, but you have a lot to concentrate on, so please keep your usage down if necessary.

It’s lovely that you want to help other aspiring medics. It might be interesting for you to look at l.d.s ‘s journey to medicine. It was fascinating and despite his roller coaster time applying for medicine we all rejoiced when he got in. Once at Ned school he started another thread called lds will see you now. He’s so busy, he’s barely posted on it! But he will probably be very absorbed in his studies.

Good luck with your journey

Firstly, good luck with everything!! Your blog is really interesting to read! I hope your EPQ goes well!

Secondly, what grade 8 piano pieces are you doing? I'm also doing my grade 8 (ABRSM) and I'm doing the Chopin nocturne, the Bach sarabande and gigue and the Beethoven presto alla tedesca.

Thanks @Oxford Mum TSR is full of so many supportive and lovely people and your comment genuinely made my day.
The tutors at uea were very nice I think - my dad ended up having a chat about playing rugby with one of them of all things and they were only too happy to show all of the resources they had available and the city is great. I would say that’s a pro about medicine though - there’s so much choice about where you can go based on your own interests and needs.

The Newcastle programme should be interesting- I got provisionally accepted today. Basically you have to go through the same process but it may attract different cutoff scores at all the stages and then if you make it your firm you get a bbb offer subject to passing an academic summer school which would probably be great fun. As Bristol stated a few years ago the contextual offer is something desirable and reassuring but hopefully something I won’t need.

My mentor is great. They are a retired oxford educated doctor so although they are not currently practising they have such a breadth of knowledge and experiences they can share which are genuinely fascinating and it has helped me a bit with discussions and the personal statement.

Thanks for the recommendation to follow LDS - he is so inspiring and I read up on all of his blog last year and I’m so pleased he got in too.

Slightly belated update but here we go...

This last week has been so tiring and so I took a bit of a break from life and got a couple less hours studying than usual but still plenty enough to get everything I needed to done.

Biology
We carried on our new topic on nervous control which is so exciting and a nice break from all the plants we’ve been studying although I’ve been slightly distracted by the fact we have a test today which is a bit terrifying after the last one but fingers crossed it’s better. We also did our penultimate required practical which is quite sobering as there is only one left for the whole course but also nice as they can be really stressful.

Chemistry
We finished our topic on entropy and I did a few past paper questions and caught up my notes as well as going through my materials for the test on Friday 1 my plan is to get through a few sets of questions on physics and maths tutor as it is so useful and will allow me to best focus my revision. We also moved onto redox titrations and today did a practical which went really well actually- chemistry practicals always go better than biology ones.

Maths
We finished off differentiation and I can honestly say it was not as bad as I had worried and I’m hoping the massive integration unit is much the same ...

Epq
I’ve finally finished my planning matrix and caught up with my reflective diary - it’s highly ridiculous to tell someone that wants to go into medicine and have to dedicate their life to reflective practise to reflect on everything to the point that it has completely run away with me and I have reflection overload. Very excitingly, I am able to begin my write up and should get it finished over half term - just one more week left to go.

Life stuff
I had parents evening this week and it went alright . My chemistry teacher was a bit odd and tried to psychoanalyse me but other than that wasn’t concerned about me although did tell me to expect to fail the odd thing. Biology parents evening was ok as was maths where my teachers both told me to have more self belief but I suppose they seemed positive about my progress.

Driving lessons are going well and I should get onto the main road next week if I don’t manage so this week which will be a new experience to say the least.

Really excited for the weekend though where I can just sleep before cracking on with my plans

Keep going, you are doing fine! EPQs are tough but worth it.

Thank you so much

Good luck with your EPQ! I'm sure your Bio test went really well- you seem like an incredibly organised person!

Update time... I just needed some time to reflect on some stuff that’s been happening and on how awfully everything seems to be going right now.

Biology
I did shockingly - don’t know what more to say apart from the fact that my teacher humiliated me in front of my whole class when we were going through the paper ...

Chemistry
We did our test and I screwed it up so badly as it was completely unrepresentative if any of the preparation that the college signposted is to as well as all of the textbook questions and exam packs written by the textbook company even though it was written by them? Also it wasn’t like any of the actual papers either so don’t know what to say - wasn’t like my preparation either

Maths
Silver lining of the week as I somehow got an a and was only a couple of silly mistakes off an a* even though the paper went rubbishly . I nearly sobbed with happiness at this.

Epq
I’ve begun the write up and just have 3000 words to go - as advised it kind of writes itself and it’s got back to being interesting again.

Safe to say my confidence is pretty shredded right now and that I don’t really know what to do as no one around me is too concerned by my performance and keeps saying it will be fine and I can’t really believe them - even though due to contextual factors if I got medicine offers they would all be around the abb mark I’m still a bit of a perfectionist

Other stuff
So I had a driving lesson and have progressed to the main roads and the four way control traffic lights near where I live which is quite fun.
Went on the interview course and got told that my knowledge is more than enough and when directly questioned I can give impressive answers but would probably fail an interview as I am not confident enough so that adds to my confidence! On a serious note, I’ve got a few more practises lined up and know what I need to improve although don’t really see it happening.

Which chapters have you finished for Chemistry Bio and Maths? I am curious to see how behind my school is.