Skip to content
  • About
  • Contact
  • Contribute
  • Book
  • Careers
  • Podcast
  • Recommended
  • Speaking
  • All
  • Physician
  • Practice
  • Policy
  • Finance
  • Conditions
  • .edu
  • Patient
  • Meds
  • Tech
  • Social
  • Video
    • All
    • Physician
    • Practice
    • Policy
    • Finance
    • Conditions
    • .edu
    • Patient
    • Meds
    • Tech
    • Social
    • Video
    • About
    • Contact
    • Contribute
    • Book
    • Careers
    • Podcast
    • Recommended
    • Speaking

Match Day: Leaving behind my polished applicant identity and becoming a physician trainee

Simone Phillips
Education
March 17, 2021
Share
Tweet
Share

On Friday morning, I will receive an email that tells me where I will go for residency. I have spent most of the last year preparing for this email. Over the summer, I completed my sub-internships where I hoped to impress members of my chosen field (psychiatry) and secure letters of recommendation. On my consult-liaison psychiatry sub-internship, I was genuinely interested in my patients’ lives, but I also felt my internal coach urging me to perform daily. When things went well, it was difficult to disentangle whether the reward came from witnessing a patient get better or receiving positive feedback from an attending physician. By the end of the month, I was exhausted from learning to care for patients but also from the effort I had invested in showing that I was learning.

In September, I began revisiting old resumes, deciding which past experiences to include in my formal residency application. Mentors had told me about the importance of creating a “narrative”—a story that strategically integrates prior life experiences to justify my choice of specialty. After writing the first draft, I was told that I needed to insert myself more prominently. I took this feedback seriously and crafted an essay weaving together fragments from my life, specifically selected to illustrate the ways I cared for others. This sentiment was genuine — I do care deeply about family, friends, patients, and members of my community. But it left me feeling confused: I was spending vastly more time and mental energy promoting myself through my anecdotes of compassion and empathy, than actually taking care of those people.

During interviews, when I was asked about mistakes I had made, I was sure to answer the question in a way that conveyed I would never make that mistake again. Throughout the process, I took note of which stories were greeted with enthusiasm and discarded the answers that were received with confusion or apathy.  When an interviewer complimented me on a letter of recommendation or a past experience, I silently wondered whether I would be able to live up to the expectations that I had created for myself. During interviews, I enjoyed sharing excerpts of professional and personal growth, but at times I felt distanced from the kind of physician I actually want to be: one that is sufficiently comfortable with herself to be able to care for others without continually broadcasting her own worth.

The characteristics that make a successful residency applicant may actually be at odds with the habits of a well-rounded physician trainee. The application process incentivizes medical students to curate an idealized version of themselves: one that accentuates strengths and minimizes areas of weakness. The identity encouraged by the application process leaves little space for vulnerability or ambiguity. But it is that ability to identify and share what we don’t know that allows us to learn. In my experience, the best trainees are individuals who seek out feedback, initiate conversations to learn what they don’t already know, and interact with patients out of genuine care, not because they are performing for an evaluation. This creates a culture where others can ask questions and dare to be wrong.

As I move past the residency application process, I am eager to shift focus away from my polished applicant identity to embrace the messy reality of being an earnest, caring, unapologetically fledgling first-year resident. I feel grateful that I have had the opportunity to attend medical school, and I look forward to cultivating my own identity as a resident clinician treating patients with mental illness. As we approach Match Day, I hope to be accepted to a program that encourages residents to ask tough questions, make mistakes, and not feel ashamed when something doesn’t go well.

Simone Phillips is a medical student.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com

Prev

PCPs could counter virtual plans by increasing telehealth visits

March 17, 2021 Kevin 1
…
Next

When the teen with depression and anxiety is yours

March 17, 2021 Kevin 2
…

Tagged as: Medical school, Residency

Post navigation

< Previous Post
PCPs could counter virtual plans by increasing telehealth visits
Next Post >
When the teen with depression and anxiety is yours

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

More by Simone Phillips

  • A medical student learns to listen with her hands

    Simone Phillips
  • Can I belong to the medical profession without having to give up everything else?

    Simone Phillips

Related Posts

  • 7 ideas for an alternative Match Day

    Melanie Sulistio, MD
  • A physician’s addiction to social media

    Amanda Xi, MD
  • The sigh of relief on Match Day quickly changed into a sobering reality

    Steven Zhang, MD
  • Physician Suicide Awareness Day: Where are the patients? 

    Jennifer M. Sweeney
  • Match Day: the perfect ending to the medical school experience

    Valerie A. Jones, MD
  • How a physician keynote can highlight your conference

    Kevin Pho, MD

More in Education

  • How dismantling DEI endangers the future of medical care

    Shashank Madhu and Christian Tallo
  • What’s driving medical students away from primary care?

    ​​Vineeth Amba, MPH, Archita Goyal, and Wayne Altman, MD
  • In the absence of physician mentorship, who will train the next generation of primary care clinicians?

    Kenneth Botelho, DMSc, PA-C
  • The moment I knew medicine needed more than science

    Vaishali Jha
  • A faster path to becoming a doctor is possible—here’s how

    Ankit Jain
  • Medical students in Korea face expulsion for speaking out

    Anonymous
  • Most Popular

  • Past Week

    • What’s driving medical students away from primary care?

      ​​Vineeth Amba, MPH, Archita Goyal, and Wayne Altman, MD | Education
    • Make cognitive testing as routine as a blood pressure check

      Joshua Baker and James Jackson, PsyD | Conditions
    • The hidden cost of delaying back surgery

      Gbolahan Okubadejo, MD | Conditions
    • The dreaded question: Do you have boys or girls?

      Pamela Adelstein, MD | Physician
    • Rethinking patient payments: Why billing is the new frontline of patient care [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • The broken health care system doesn’t have to break you

      Jessie Mahoney, MD | Physician
  • Past 6 Months

    • What’s driving medical students away from primary care?

      ​​Vineeth Amba, MPH, Archita Goyal, and Wayne Altman, MD | Education
    • What happened to real care in health care?

      Christopher H. Foster, PhD, MPA | Policy
    • Internal Medicine 2025: inspiration at the annual meeting

      American College of Physicians | Physician
    • The hidden bias in how we treat chronic pain

      Richard A. Lawhern, PhD | Meds
    • A faster path to becoming a doctor is possible—here’s how

      Ankit Jain | Education
    • Residency as rehearsal: the new pediatric hospitalist fellowship requirement scam

      Anonymous | Physician
  • Recent Posts

    • An introduction to occupational and environmental medicine [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • Does silence as a faculty retention strategy in academic medicine and health sciences work?

      Sylk Sotto, EdD, MPS, MBA | Conditions
    • Why personal responsibility is not enough in the fight against nicotine addiction

      Travis Douglass, MD | Conditions
    • How dismantling DEI endangers the future of medical care

      Shashank Madhu and Christian Tallo | Education
    • Alzheimer’s and the family: Opening the conversation with children [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • AI in mental health: a new frontier for therapy and support

      Tim Rubin, PsyD | Conditions

Subscribe to KevinMD and never miss a story!

Get free updates delivered free to your inbox.


Find jobs at
Careers by KevinMD.com

Search thousands of physician, PA, NP, and CRNA jobs now.

Learn more

Leave a Comment

Founded in 2004 by Kevin Pho, MD, KevinMD.com is the web’s leading platform where physicians, advanced practitioners, nurses, medical students, and patients share their insight and tell their stories.

Social

  • Like on Facebook
  • Follow on Twitter
  • Connect on Linkedin
  • Subscribe on Youtube
  • Instagram

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

  • Most Popular

  • Past Week

    • What’s driving medical students away from primary care?

      ​​Vineeth Amba, MPH, Archita Goyal, and Wayne Altman, MD | Education
    • Make cognitive testing as routine as a blood pressure check

      Joshua Baker and James Jackson, PsyD | Conditions
    • The hidden cost of delaying back surgery

      Gbolahan Okubadejo, MD | Conditions
    • The dreaded question: Do you have boys or girls?

      Pamela Adelstein, MD | Physician
    • Rethinking patient payments: Why billing is the new frontline of patient care [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • The broken health care system doesn’t have to break you

      Jessie Mahoney, MD | Physician
  • Past 6 Months

    • What’s driving medical students away from primary care?

      ​​Vineeth Amba, MPH, Archita Goyal, and Wayne Altman, MD | Education
    • What happened to real care in health care?

      Christopher H. Foster, PhD, MPA | Policy
    • Internal Medicine 2025: inspiration at the annual meeting

      American College of Physicians | Physician
    • The hidden bias in how we treat chronic pain

      Richard A. Lawhern, PhD | Meds
    • A faster path to becoming a doctor is possible—here’s how

      Ankit Jain | Education
    • Residency as rehearsal: the new pediatric hospitalist fellowship requirement scam

      Anonymous | Physician
  • Recent Posts

    • An introduction to occupational and environmental medicine [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • Does silence as a faculty retention strategy in academic medicine and health sciences work?

      Sylk Sotto, EdD, MPS, MBA | Conditions
    • Why personal responsibility is not enough in the fight against nicotine addiction

      Travis Douglass, MD | Conditions
    • How dismantling DEI endangers the future of medical care

      Shashank Madhu and Christian Tallo | Education
    • Alzheimer’s and the family: Opening the conversation with children [PODCAST]

      The Podcast by KevinMD | Podcast
    • AI in mental health: a new frontier for therapy and support

      Tim Rubin, PsyD | Conditions

MedPage Today Professional

An Everyday Health Property Medpage Today
  • Terms of Use | Disclaimer
  • Privacy Policy
  • DMCA Policy
All Content © KevinMD, LLC
Site by Outthink Group

Leave a Comment

Comments are moderated before they are published. Please read the comment policy.

Loading Comments...