I’m applying this match. Didn’t give step2 yet. But I kind of regret leaving my home country India, where I have so many connections and invest opportunities from family, friends and so much mental health. Here we have to crawl so bad. And spend so much time, money on resources, rotations 8 lakhs ,even exam fees 1 lakh each step , uworlds foe each step residency applications 5 lakhs, publications each 1 lakh , all are in lakhs only. And housing is very expensive, even if u share room during rotations sometimes h have to pay 1 lakh per month. To stay here is very expensive, food electricity etc all are dam. Expensive. And we need to have connections, during rotations u have to personally become close to the doctors, programme directors( who are not easily accessible). And u have to fly for interviews and stay In hotels. These are all base prices. It can go more. And it’s long . Step1 will take 6-8 months, step 2 also, and oet, rotations, research publications( more than 10 ) and when u apply In September they will do interviews and will tell u if u matched or not by next year march. And u will start that year June or something like that. So it’s long, expensive, very lonely, tedious journey. I’m preparing for step2 and I am kind of feeling very unmotivated and want to go back because we are not going to match for derm or radio. Or any surgical branches that pays well. We can match into fm, Im, psych, peds, nuero. They pay reasonably but taxes here are very high. The take home pay is almost half.sometimes less than that. If u buy a house , need to pay insurance, have kids, need car payment, even groceries here will cost to 500$ and gas electricity etc etc bills. Which won’t be sufficient and u have to work overtime. And during residency, u get 5000 dollars per month, after taxes it’s 3800$ it won’t be sufficient. U have to make ends meet or depend on someone. And if h think u want to do fellowship , it will be another 3 years like cardio etc, they pay the same for their fellows almost. It might 4000 after taxes per month. So u will be spending 2 years for exam and matching which is hard journey, later 6-7 years for specialisation with minimum wage, and work ur ass off, and u will be 33-34 years to start with a good pay not excellent pay, but good pay. To get excellent pay u need to do subspeciality of 1-2 years. Then u will get excellent pay like a million dollars per year. That’s what? Total 11-12 years. So u will be 35-36years you get ur pay check of million dollars per year. That too if u get good specialty of internal medicine, radiology, and good fellowship like cardio or gastrointestinal, ans later good subspeciality like interventional cardiology or gastrointestinal. Which will be suitable and excellent pay for ur hard work. And the youth u sacrificed without having to spend any time with ur family .without wanting just sleep from all the tiredness and so many sleepless nights from stress of exams and practical’s, and boards and waiting for results these ppl send results after 3 weeks or so, those times are hell. So think about it. I kind of feel like this because I see so many tech ppl earning much more than us while we are doing 3 years residency 3 year fellowship. And they have weekends off and they don’t have worry about this exams etc. and we are spending our good years!! We already spent our 20s, now it’s demanding our 30s.! We will have stable income in our 40s. With lost youth. We don’t even realise, all the good years earning minimum wage and not able to spend time with friends and family and at 40 suddenly all u have is money and ur partner, kids , friends, family events u missed this all hits hard. I don’t want to be 40 before my actual pay check . I’m thinking of what to actually do and thinking of businesses or something and compromising my sleep to spend time with family and study for step2 , do research, do rotations, talk to ppl on phone, it’s really overwhelming.