Things always change. Ironically, change is constant. Not every change is a bad one, and you best believe not everyone is good either. My story is riddled with many such changes. As a “gifted” kid who could easily have found himself in any course of study and thrived, I had a hard time deciding on a path. I had changed my future profession too many times, from Doctor, to Mechanical engineer, to Pastor, to Mathematics Lecturer, to singer. There were just so many options. Growing up in Nigeria in the early 2000s, religion was at the centre of my upbringing, so I did as I had been taught in Sunday school and looked to GOD to choose the best path for me. So, my journey into medicine came by “divine instruction”. And this would anchor the eight years I spent chasing MBBS.
I chose the University of Ilorin because I was told they had a very fast calendar and they do not go on strike. But as we have come to know – things always change. Unilorin’s calendar did change, and the school went on strike – twice. Six years became eight, and dear LORD, I pray it stays eight because that’s not the only thing that changed.
You see, one of the characteristics of living things is adaptability, and nothing would test that as much as studying medicine in a Nigerian public university.
In my second year, we would see a change in how Physiology questions were set, because “what do they know that they are getting distinctions?” Apparently, getting distinctions can pose a problem. In the third year, Anatomy took over the baton, with a change in the head of department a few weeks before our MB. This change meant our MB questions were going to take a different pattern. Well, dear readers, we had quite the casualty from that exam, and unfortunately for me, I was part of the casualties. Have you ever seen a grown man cry?
I remember calling everybody I knew could pray to GOD after the Anatomy exam to actually pray. I called my dad, and I didn’t know when tears rolled out from my eyes. That exam was bloody, and for the first (and hopefully last) time in my life, I had to retake an exam. That changed me. I was no longer invincible. I lost my confidence, and it took quite a while to get it back.
In my fourth year, there was yet another change. But before you conclude, this one was actually a good one. I have tasted life with causal questions and life without causal questions, and I absolutely recommend nursery rhymes. On a more serious note, the elimination of causal questions and then the subsequent elimination of negative marking helped relieve some of the pressure from the dreaded path-pharm class.
I’d skip my fifth year, not because there were no changes, but because not everything can be said in one note. In my sixth and final year, there was the most shocking change of all.
I could never have imagined, even in my wildest dreams, that I would pass an exam and yet not be allowed to proceed. But for the first time ever, a degree that is supposed to be unclassified was ranked, and I was held back. My school would not be allowed to induct the total number of candidates who passed their MB in the first sitting. The results were ranked and the top 150 were inducted as Batch A. Considering how much effort, remontada and sacrifices I put in to pass the exams at first sitting and proceed with Batch A, this “change” has dealt the most severe blow.
But the match isn’t over yet, is it? Let’s see how the protagonist recovers, if he ever does.
As narrated by: Olafisoye-Oragbade Oluwatosin David (Ilorin, Nigeria).
This snippet is published as part of the series, Surviving Medical School.
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