making sense of match day

“How are you?” seems like too small of a question. Most fourth year medical students are enduring this collective rite of passage in the days leading up to Match Day, each on own arc with our own fears and hopes, odds and probabilities. Our waiting comes at the one year mark of the country’s panniversary, and of course there’s nothing else to do but keep moving forward.

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As a younger med student, I used to wonder how I’d feel in the time leading up to Match Day. We all joked about how the most type A people in the world were just forced to wait to hear how an algorithm sorted out their life's next big decision. It seemed like an absurd process, but everyone made it through right? I figured most people who weren’t applying to some tiny superspeciality would get some sort of hint in the days leading up. I too had been expecting that someone would drop me a wink or a nudge and that I’d be able to breathe easy. Months dwindled into weeks into days before rank lists were due, and I had to accept that the radio silence would stretch on. It turns out that all my programs, emergency medicine as a field at large, follow the Match Day rules closely and stayed quiet about the possibilities.

Friends applying to other fields told me about phone calls and love letters from their top programs. And I loved it! They deserved every bit of the celebration. But I couldn’t help wanting to be recruited too. It was hard not to take the silence personally and fill in the gaps based on my mood. “Everything is fine and I appreciate that they follow the rules” could quickly turn into “Did anyone like me? Did I imagine, entirely invent a narrative, that I was doing well this whole interview trail? How could I have better expressed myself in our twelve minute virtual interview?". When I told a friend that I wish I too had gotten a love letter, he asked if I'd really let myself trust it. And I guess I wouldn't, not really.

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If it was simply the matter of being liked, my skin has thickened over the years. I like me. I know what I bring to the table. I don’t need to prove my worth to anyone, I don’t need to beg anyone to take me on. For a week back in January, I had forgotten that. I felt desperate, like there was nothing I had ever wanted more than being at my #1 program. I would have traded my dignity for a better chance to match there if I could.

But then I realized that I don't want to want anything so badly. Desperation is a terrible look. I wanted security, the promise that my life would be comfortable and my career secure and my values honored, with the people I wanted and in a place that I know could make a home. There was no guarantee I’d get any of those things if I matched at this place. Residency will shake my foundations and push me to my limits and rob me of any false notion of security, wherever I end up.

But in a year marked with so much fear and uncertainty, it would be nice to just know already which coast I’ll end up on. Will I be a California gal for four more years or move back a little closer to my roots? Some days I crave a new adventure and moving to a new city feels like a thrill, a whole new world to explore, some days I just want to be close enough home that I can drive up to my parents’ house for dinner on a weeknight. I’m imagining my life veering off into so many possibilities based on where the match takes me. Some days it’s exciting and some days it all feels hollow.

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Part of me wanted to fast forward to March 19th. Rarely do I wish time away. As each day passes, my tenuous peace shakes and a new wave of emotion to ride out. I’ve been dress rehearsing my reactions for each program on my list – how will I feel if I match here? What would I say if I match here? Who am going to text immediately if I match here? Should I have opened up that SOAP email in case I don’t match at all?

Each of my top five has something special about it, something unique and exciting and incandescent. Each program, each city, will bring out new parts of me. And I actually really like up to my top ten. After ten, the cities get a little cold lol but they’re well known programs and I think I’d find a way to be excited about the work and my new life.  It’s hard to know how I’m going to feel, how my family is going to feel, on the big day. I want to be ready but I’m not sure I will be. 

I'm tired of preparing for the flood of emotions. I realized that I don't want to wish time away. Once Match Day arrives, we're all going to be planning for what's next. Residency will be real and tangible. The end of medical school, hazy and unformed in my mind right now, will start to crystallize. And I'm enjoying life right now, soaking in this last bit of clinical time and making memories with my friends, but I worry that I'll be sad about this adventure coming to an end.

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And yet I am excited about this next step. Residency will be three or four key years in my life that will shape my career forever. I’ll be in the center of the action. I’ll walk in as an intern feeling unsure and walk out at the end of my training able to handle anything that comes through my emergency department doors. Emergency medicine is such a gift. I’ll get to stand beside people on the hardest days of their lives, offer comfort in a moment that they may remember forever. I’ll get a front row seat to everything that unfolds in the world as it makes its way into our hospital. I’ll get to work with some of the most fun, mellow, capable people on every shift. I'll live in a lively city where I know I’ll have a good time outside of work.

I kept saying this to myself, hoping that I could drag the excitement out. And then today, a switch flipped. I realized just how many friends from all over were thinking about me, were cheering me on, were truly so pumped to see where I end up. So many people are sending me love, and I felt a cocoon of protection from all the well wishes surround me. Friday doesn't seem so daunting anymore.

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I'm part of our virtual graduation committee and we're trying to come up with ways to make commencement special despite the changes. It’s been SO great to see the country do better, really it has, but leaves a tiny ache seeing things slowly return to normal-ish knowing that it’s too late to undo our virtual ceremonies. I spent the afternoon last Sunday laying in a patch of daisies in Golden Gate Park, surrounded by mugs and champagne flutes that said Class of 2021. Almost thirty classmates, ranging from people I saw almost every day at one point to people I’d never seen before, stopped by to pick up their Match Day gift basket and under the sunshine, we caught up.

Some classmates told us the specifics of their order, some hinted at where they heart laid, some didn’t talk about Match Day at all. I swapped program details with other EM-bound friends, one of who wondered if we might end up co-residents. And hearing bits and pieces of so many stories, it pulled me outside of myself. I could feel myself getting excited, feeling so hopeful about my classmate’s prospects and wanting nothing more than everyone to end up at their top choice. One classmate said that no matter where she ended up, there would be something to celebrate and something to grieve on Match Day.

And that feels like the essence of this day – there’s so much fanfare, so much build up to this one moment that might unleash a flood of emotions. It’s generally a reason to celebrate but we’re cautious, practical people who don’t want to let ourselves feel too disappointed.

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Ultimately, I want to be somewhere that is excited to mentor me. A place that wants to nurture my special light. The way the match works out, I’ll only end up somewhere that does just that. And I’m loyal to a fault. I’ll pour my heart into serving this community, into representing my new institution, into recruiting the next class of residents. My presence and labor will be a gift. All of ours will. 

I’m reminded to step outside of myself. Match Day is a huge moment for medical students and their families across the country. I’m so excited to see where my best friends go, where my classmates go, who else makes up my new intern class so I can start scoping out a residency bestie. There is a lot to look forward to, even if I feel a little tired right now.

I think back to this time last year. If someone had told me everything that was going to happen in the next twelve months, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine moving forward. But we did. I found ways to keep going, to evolve and shift in response to the world, to keep finding light and beauty and fun, to keep forging a path of my own. Life will continue to be hard, disappointment and suffering are guaranteed even if I can’t predict what form they’ll take. I can’t protect myself from the very stuff of life. But I have to trust that residency me will live out our values, build the foundation for our career, keep our inner light going – and she can do that anywhere she ends up. It’ll look a little different based on the program and the city but I trust that we’ll make the very best of whatever happens, that we’ll look back on it all knowing that there was no better way for it to have happened.  

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Last night was the new moon in pisces which apparently has a strong cleansing energy. The intention I made for this lunar cycle was to receive everything that comes to me with open arms. When I woke up this morning with an urge to clean, it was like welp message received! I swept and scrubbed and decluttered, and immediately I could feel a difference. My space seemed more open and light, and by extension so did I. Spring cleaning is a tradition for a reason. Spring is a new season, with new gifts and blessings, but in order to receive what's in store for us, we need to create space that allows for the new.

What if the best way to prepare for Match Day isn't dress rehearsing every possible reaction? What if it's looking inwards, creating a space that can honor and receive my news, my gift, no matter what form it takes? How can I clear away fears clouding this ability to receive? In this final stretch, I want to lean into the wisdom of spring, when tiny buds turn into blossoms and remind us that change is an agent of enormous beauty, when we clean to welcome the grand new changes coming into our space.

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I keep returning to this: on Friday, I will celebrate regardless, maybe even put on makeup and curl my hair and buy myself flowers and post a cute photo on Instagram. And then Saturday onward, I can sit down and process the logistics of what's next, quietly let myself wonder and feel and plan and honor the way my life has shifted. 

xoxo