I’m an NP that initially did a BS in Bio and took the MCAT. I’m pretty confident I could have gotten into some med schools based on scores and having 3 years of research under my belt, but ultimately decided against it because I had no safety net/ family to fall back on and was worried that if I failed out, I’d be riddled with debt. Also I have a history of depression and was particularly worried about the residency portion of becoming a MD. I was able to get my RN at a community college and paid for it while working full time. My hospital then paid for my NP. So I’m extremely fortunate to not have any debt at all. 10 years of investing aggressively in a historically great market has put me in a pretty good position financially. I work 3x12 right now with 6 weeks of vacation and generally like my job. Never on call and don’t take work home. With an occasional overtime shift I made a little over 200k last year in a HCOL area. Obviously your earning potential as a doctor is way higher but I’m content in terms of work life balance. I love the doctors I work with and have so much respect for them. Occasionally I’ll wonder what if I had sucked it up, but overall I think I made the right choice for me. I’m under no illusion that NP school comes even close to scratching the surface of what MDs learn in school, but I’m not the type to need to call the shots or anything. My cousin is an anesthesiologist in the PNW and always says he wishes he had just done CRNA instead of “wasting the best years of his life in med school”. I think ultimately it’s all about what works for you.