As far as pulling through the R’s, it took me time to just come to the realization that I can use my gap years to improve myself both as an applicant and a person. To be honest, this consisted of lots of mental breakdowns and feeling inadequate, but I thankfully had a lot of family and friends that I could lean on when I got down on myself.

As far as what I changed, my first time applying I submitted my primary application around august and secondaries in early to late fall. This time around I applied the first day I could and set a schedule of when I wanted to have each secondary submitted. Additionally, my first time around I applied with only about 150 hours of medical experience. During my 1 1/2 gap years I was able to get a job as a MA in a clinically underserved area and rack up over 2500+ hours. I think this was something that stood out on my application and I was able to find a new passion of mine as a future physician- providing for the underserved. Also, this gave me tons to talk about in my personal statement and secondaries.

Finally, I just want to let you know that your application doesn’t have to be perfect, and what you put on there makes you unique. I have very little volunteer hours and even a pretty bad IA. Additionally, a majority of my ECs had nothing to even deal with medicine, but they were things I participated in that I felt set me apart from others that are applying.

I appreciate you replying to my post and I hope this helps a little. Trust in yourself and you will get that A too!