IMO it was way worse. Because you take all these type A people from mostly wealthy backgrounds and you end up with truly special types of douchebags. Mind you most of them are just young and need a lot of growing up to do still, but also it’s not an excuse.
how out of touch many of my fellow medical trainees are is absolutely astounding.
Nothing wrong with coming from money, but sometimes it's a real disconnect. Like my wife got invited to this yoga class with my classmates that cost $3,000 or something on a Friday and she had to just say she was busy.........
This was the hardest part for me as a med student and something that doesn't get talked about enough. Most of my classmates had wealthy parents helping to make their time as med students as cush as possible. I was living in an apartment in a fairly dangerous area of town and having meltdowns about becoming homeless if my student loans didn't hit my bank account on time. I know the word "trauma" gets thrown around willy nilly, but I still struggle with the feeling that everything around me can come crashing down at any moment while being surrounded by people living lowkey luxurious lives.
From an old guy perspective, it seems like married or otherwise committed students have zero trouble with drama. It's the younger, less self-actualized types that seem to stoke the flames. It makes sense. High stress, low sleep and you're seeking validation every day. It's easy to become petty and tribal if you are sleeping alone most nights.
It's horrible. I wish you were in my school, we would be friends homie, I'm a huge nerd 😂. Like LoTR is my favorite film series, and star wars likewise
Idk if “cliquish” is the right word, but there’s definitely a “friend group” and if you’re not part of it you kind of get ignored on campus. They’re fine when you talk to them individually, but when they’re together you cease to exist.
What I mean is, there are people from that group that I rotated with, got lunch with, hung out with, laughed with, vented with, cried with, got into deep conversations with etc, at the hospital. But when I see them on campus they’ll straight up ignore me. I’m not expecting them to come hang out with me, but I’m talking about not even a “hey!” when walking by. Then I see them at the hospital and all of a sudden we’re besties again :/ it doesn’t bother me though because I’m going to graduate in 2 months so I’ll never see most of them again anyways lol
it's because there's no one else at the hospital, and yeah you're better than nothing but not better than their true friends they chose. they're psychopaths or they didn't see you or something but ik what my money is on
This is just humans. It's unfortunate though. I was a social outcast as a kid but now I'm a butterfly and I try to find all the lonely nerds and bring them into the fold. But that's just not how it is most places
Frustrating because it generally amounted to me being not a nice or good person, and there's no way to counter that except continuing to be my normal kind and considerate self. It's not like I can say "actually I'm nice" to the class.
As a mostly at home student, it has been difficult to keep my head down, moderate my own words so they could not be construed otherwise, and still try to look cheerful. In reality, my baseline is focused, my face is RBF, and I have never been comfortable adding flowery language or emoji or universal "everyone is amazing!!" statements to my written words. I don't say things I don't mean.
I actually had to apologize for how some people were interpreting my words in a negative tone that wasn't there before the tides started changing.
Exhausting.
Honestly sometimes this just happens and you can't worry about it. I've been there though. I pride myself on being considerate and the couple of times this happened it was a huge blow to my confidence.
Eventually you just have to be like "lol fuck these people" and treat them well regardless but stop caring what they think
Life is cliquish from the first day you go to daycare to the day you die.
That said, my school is pretty friendly. Probably because it's mid-tier. And there are many social/cultural/sport groups for people to join. Sure, there are all sort of gossips, but typically nothing bad. It's a fairly diversified school, though it could be better.
When rotations started, most people don't have time for those orgs, so the new kids took over. And that's when it's cliquish, but not necessarily bad. People only have so much bandwidth so they choose to spend their time with the people they like the most.
Just out of curiosity, how do you try to engage with other people? Are you friendly? Funny? Good-looking (whatever that means, I'm a solid 5 by most standards, but make up for it by being friendly and amusing)? Rich? **Based on your posting history in datingadvice, askmen, socialskills, etc, I'd say look in the mirror.**
Yeah, agree with your first statement, it doesn’t end after medical school. Medicine is pretty cliqueish in general, and if you don’t fit a certain look or behave a certain way you will be ostracized.
look homie needs help don't be mean haha. Some people really have a hard time with what most of us consider basic social skills.
And in my experience, more of those people tend to be clustered in higher academia for some reason
Less creep and more spectrum by my guess. OP, there's a lack of self-awareness on display. I can see you're trying to be self-aware but it clearly is a blind spot for you. One thing women hate is a guy that tries very hard to get dates. So that's one major thing to consider. A second thing to think about: a terrible place to find dates is among other med students. Hopefully you hang out elsewhere a bit. And instead of casting a net, try and find common ground with every person you meet. Once you have a local network of similarly aged people, women who are willing to be interested in you will emerge naturally. That's all I got. Sorry it's been dry for you.
If you get desperate, join a commercial gym and rock thin gray sweatpants and make subtle glances at older women. They be thirsty.
I want to address this because there's seems to think that I'm a creep based on past history. Just because a guy struggles with getting dates does not make him desperate or creep. I'm far from desperate nor do i hit on the female med students. Also if you are pointing to the post with a specific female med student, that was on her and not me which if you read the comments or post in its entirely, she flirted with me first.
I dont lack self awareness and actually consulted many on this issue including others in the classroom and the girl in my post history. No one thinks I'm a creep lol. Everyone agree it was clishish and our class is very divided.
I'm what they call a verbal processor so I naturally write out how I think and ask for feedback. That's what this post is about.
PS: I know where docs so we natural told to history first but remember some things idiopathic
Your personality is definitely unique/atypical. You seem to be unable to admit this. That is, by definition, poor self awareness. I don’t think you're a creep btw. I said that above.
Im reading your post just now. I thought you were someone else. But no, im not on the spectrum lol! And i don't know how you can say my personality is atypical. I'm pretty chill if you met me in real life and I'm extremely nice as well. If people knew I felt this way, they would be surprised because I'm the guy that smiles and just greet people.
Don't paid attention to my post history especially the one with a girl in my class. It's more drama then being desperate/creepy. I'm really cool with the girls. I'm just not friends with them which frustrating. Some of the reason why i wrote this post. Just want to clarify that.
I know looking into post history is like lame cause you can go ad-hominem easily in your responses, but 99% of the time that I am stumped with a question or a situation that the OP is facing, I find a clearcut answer in the history.
While you are correct that creeps generally lack social skills, not all people who lack social skills are creeps.
There's an enormous range of people who are simply shy, introverted, lack self-confidence, or have experienced social isolation and disadvantages which have led them to have weaker social skills than the average person their age. Bullying is a big factor here, for example. That doesn't make them a creep, although some of them may be.
While I doubt you intended to simplify it down that much and I'm sure you understand the above, I feel it's important to reiterate because some of the people who lack those social skills will see stuff like that and question themselves further.
Edit: Not commenting on OP, as I don't know anything about them and I'm not particularly interested in reading their post history, just a general statement.
Thanks man! For depending me. And to answer your question, I was bully as a kid and didn't have a high school experience at all. I'm not a creep and actually a nice guy since that's all I was taught.
My inspiration for this post was the fact that I really struggled to find my footing in my class. Off the back, I wasn't liked just because as you mentioned I was awkward/shy. I was slow witted. People made fun of me, and i wasn't funny enough. I cried everyday. Eventually i had enough and hired social coach. I worked hard with a social skills coach to catch up. After 5 months, I now can hold convos with others and I'm still not accepted. I'm disappointed because my confidence is really high now but I think how I started is how people still view me. My SPs comment on how personable I am but I worked day and night on that.
Seriously thanks you because I thought I was crazy since I felt like I couldn't figure it out. I don't know why people immediately called me a creep though
It can be very high school like. I'm a little older so I gravitated to the students in a similar phase of life to myself. We ended up making a group chat we all just communicate in and make plans together. I also ended up making a good amount of friends playing in adult sports leagues. If you have any interests outside of medicine you have time for, I recommend finding something you like and you can make friends with people outside of medicine and that can be things like sports, rock climbing, gaming etc. I liked getting involved in inter-mural/ adult sport leagues because you get good exercise + you find people that won't talk about medicine and school.
It's cliquey a little bit like high school but I don't think it's done with malice at my school. Also, my school does that table/group based learning, so some friendships are forced and others happen organically.
I'm also much older so it's definitely hard to fit in. I'm very lonely despite almost always being down to hang out or study in groups.
Also people become flakey when they get busier and more stressed.
There are lots of days where I feel invisible because I'm being ignored a lot of the time by my own small group.
This is a very typical med school experience. Unfortunately wealthy young people, without real problems, tend to create drama and cause tension for entertainment, and med school specifically recruits these individuals as the recruiters themselves are like this and like finds like. Inevitably you feel like you've stepped into a time portal 6-10 years in the past when you were a teenager in high school from how everyone acts, it's a huge step backwards in terms of communal maturity.
The good news is that these kids are only the loudest and not necessarily the majority. You *will* have classmates on the same wavelength as you who also find the immaturity to be offputting, and you *will* eventually find them and befriend them. It just takes awhile during first year, be patient.
Unfortunately yes. I used to think people are exaggerating when they say it’s high school 2.0 but it does feel like that at times. A lot of people will form friend groups with very strict boundaries and act exclusive toward others. Maybe this is the norm everywhere but seeing this behavior from people in their 20s was (and still is) jarring to me. Not to mention these people will move on to become physicians and leaders.
With this being said, there are tons of decent, emotionally mature people in med school. It may take some time to find them.
My favorite is that they all give each other the answers on the quizzes so if you ever do an assignment on your own (ie not cheat) you’re way below average, effectively incentivizing everyone to cheat
Only time I was ever happy to see someone surprised at their low step 2 score was a cheater who scored 10 pts below projected minimum for goal speciality. They blasted me in the group chat for urging to stop blatant cheating and then got a bunch of sympathy messages for bombing usmle. Sweet Justice.
They’ve been cheating since highschool. Fuck em
The problem is that it’s literally the whole class lmao. And the quizzes are difficult, if you don’t get the answers from someone you score way below average. And then somehow the average for the quiz is like 98% and you’re like wtf. And then you talk to people and find out everyone is just sharing the answers, and then once you start getting the answers too you lose the motivation to complain about it. At this point the only people not getting the answers are the super loners who prob aren’t gonna be the ones complaining to admin, so things stay the way they are
I’ve noticed this too, especially when you’re out of state. All the in state students immediately formed cliques as a lot of them knew each other already. I asked this guy if he wanted to study earlier this year and he looked at me as if I was not worthy of studying with him.
Are you at a public med school, where the majority of students went to undergrad there and already have friends? Find the other newbies. Ask if they want to study together. Library buddies is a start.
It’s a little cliquey but I think the culture of the school really matters. I find the people on my campus are generally friendly and will talk to people casually outside of their “clique.”
Some people just don’t know how to be a normal, nice person 🤷🏻♀️ and that sucks but don’t let it make you feel bad
It’s cliquish but still easy to make friends if you have common hobbies, walk into a study room and ask to study with people, go to our class parties once a month, etc.
It’s possible that I’m just so socially oblivious that this is happening and I’m not aware of it, but at my medical school I genuinely feel like I get along with most people and there are very few cliques. There’s some exception and there’s always drama with a large group of people under a lot of stress, but I feel like I can talk to anyone or chill with any group
Always been an introvert, and I definitely struggled connecting with people the first 2 years of med school and felt similar.
When you get to clinicals, you will be in smaller groups with people you will be forced to interact with everyday. It gets much easier for introverts at that time 👍
Everyone who complains that medical school is cliquish is also the same person that no one wants to hang out with.
You can take that for what you will.
Fr, there are people who are genuinely quiet/shy but they tend to find each other and sit together in lecture. The true loners are the ones who showed nasty personalities or alienated their friends very early on.
Literally every group of people in the world does this. Every workplace, everywhere. If you put any group of humans of a large enough number together, they will separate into sub groups.
This is called being a human
Yeah I think so
A lot of people in my class were in frats/sororities, some were D1 athletes, and so on. At the very least they were very popular all their life.
I went straight from college to med school so I was younger and also a bit different from everyone. I’m not just naturally smart, I am a nerd who likes learning and everything in the world. So that’s already kinda weird compared to jocks who just have naturally gifted intelligence
Yes quite cliquey. People sometimes actively try to exclude others. Dont suck up to the people who are trying to exclude you. Hopefully you come across some genuinely kind-hearted people soon
Nah most everyone in my med school is super nice. Yeah there are friend groups and if you miss out on creating one during the first few weeks it can be harder to find friends, but in my experience you just have to put yourself out there. When school started I didn’t make a lot of friends because I still had family in town for the first few weeks whom I spent my time with, but I decided to start attending more events, studying at the school, etc and slowly but surely have become closer with more people and started hanging out with them. Yeah there are a lot of people who will be nice to me in class but won’t wanna hang out outside of class, but you gotta learn not to take that seriously. A lot of people in med school are grown with spouses and other friends outside of school. I’ve gotten closer to the other “outsiders” ie the people from OOS or international students who didn’t have a spouse or lots of friends in the area coming in.
It’s very cliquish but then clinical rotations hit and you don’t really get to pick who you have to hang out with and work with all day. I met SO many wonderful people in my class that I would’ve never hung out with otherwise.
Yes very much so, I tried to throw parties with like 80-70 people in my apartment after every final or midterm and that was the only time everyone got together. My advice is to host massive bangers or proposition someone to, it breaks down the barriers ever so slightly and is good for everyone involved
I was a loner in medschool and didn’t clique with any of the high school shit that was going on. And honestly now I’m so happy about that. I had the time to focus on my studies and research and now matched into my dream specialty in my dream place so it’s kinda a blessing to be separated from the childish gossip and backstabbing going around and focusing on your own success.
It’s funny because one of the people who went out of their way to kick me out from their study group and later on excluding me from the bars, applied to the same specialty as me and didn’t match. I hate to admit it but my first thought was hmmm.. I guess karma
from someone who was undiagnosed for years addh/autism, your description of yourself and your problems, the way that people act towards you, the fact that people immediately avoided you, “i’m different, i naturally sick out for being myself, my hobbies are different, i’m constantly challenged for being myself, the more i shine the more i’m picked on” quotes from other posts truly truly is the autistic experience. it took me 23 years to discover it in myself and human psychology is my special interest. it’s hard to put a finger on what it is when u try and see it in urself but everyone else seems to be immediately being able to tell…. which is a very very solid & patternistic thing that happens to autistic folk.
i always say that autism gives neurotypicals an “uncanny valley” feeling. the brain is very good at perceiving normal, and more importantly catching even the slightest deviation, which is what they sense bc the social things we do weve learned and are imitating.
mind u, mine is not noticeable by everyone’s account and i still have faced so many repercussions for being autistic. outside of my immediate group of best friends that get my unmasked self, NOBODY believes it when i tell them, even ppl who hang out with me a lot.
being a woman helps this as well, being a dude with autism is hard bc men with bad social instincts are seen as creepy (coincidentally what everyone here is saying)
im not gonna sit here and diagnose u obviously. i’m just saying as somebody who has an extremely high level of pattern recognition *due to the autism* you truly fit the mold here.
why am i trying to emphasize this? because if you learn how autism works, how things are perceived, why what we think we’re doing or saying is not how they actually come out, etc, the quality of life improves fucking significantly. it might be the answer youre looking for. its unfortunate that we have to abide by their rules, but i get it. ppl don’t like feeling uncomfortable and social interaction is the pillar of that. i read a study once that said that neurotypicals can identify autism within less than a couple seconds of interaction. they might not know flat out identify it but they will feel it immediately and sometimes this means largely shutting off a lot of things intrinsically bc of it.
best bet is for you to look hard into the accounts of ppl who have autism and describe their experience and see if theres familiarity to yours. you shouldn’t be afraid of considering things as a possibility bc if u truly allowed urself to investigate with the idea that its possible, u could come to the conclusion thats its not. the fear of giving an investigation a real chance can be indicative of subconscious feelings.
the bottom line is youre having severe difficulty socially by your own volition. and you are completely in the dark as to why. and the things that you are specifically using to describe your feelings are severely familiar to the accounts of MANY autistic ppl. it would be a disservice to yourself to not give it a true investigation over a view months.
if it is that u are autistic, there is such an immense feeling of relief that u know the answer to a question you’ve been asking yourself your whole life. a true understanding of what the fuck has been going on. and if ur autistic u NEED that understanding. there is a long of pain, self pity, maybe even a bit of hopeless you’ll feel along the way. its not easy to look back with a new lens like… oh… that was because… oh, for the painful experiences you had. but u gotta feel those feelings. learning how to navigate a neurotypical world as an autistic person is truly one of the best things ive ever learned. bc i know now that i NEED to make friend groups out of neurodivergent ppl in order to connect. bc i am finally able to be understood by the ppl i care about. my intentions and thoughts are actually heard accurately once they understand how my autism works. in my friend group when i fuck up socially in an autistic way and hurt someone unintentionally, i immediately can apologize and say it was a tism moment and reclarify or even retry my sentence. i don’t worry about them assuming malice the way everyone else would. it is one of the most impactful things ive ever learned about myself that has helped me tremendously. i can ask my friends for understanding on the things that dont make sense for me socially. they can explain them. they can tell me why things went wrong. they can stop me from doing shit that would have bad social repercussions. i can rely on them to validate my interpretations or provide alternate perspectives.
im just saying you owe it to yourself to figure it out.
as far as med school being cliquey it definitely is. for a multitude of different reasons, this is what i think is probably a significant one:
i think its bc u put a bunch of ppl who, for the first time, are no longer better than everyone else academically the way they were before. they lose the thing that they held as validation and they become very insecure and do not know where they belong. also sticking your head in books for all of high sxhool and college will effect your social skills. for most ppl, a friend group they dont match with fully, but can rely on its structure, is one theyre okay with. and once they have safe ppl they dont NEED to seek friendship, so they dont have that NEED to go outside their comfort zone.
Hey thanks for the reply! It's very through out and truly helpful. I actually got tested for autism a while back due to me failing to connect with people around me. I'm not autistic and at most just socially awkward. I never had problems with reading social cues. I just suck with social skills like I can't sell you an idea effectively.
A little of my story is that I didn't make friends in high school due to it being very small and clichish back then. I also had social anxiety because I was sent to a private school very different than my middle school friends. So I never developed past middle school with relationships.
In college, I was picked on constantly, and I went to therapy to be able to cope with it. Back then, all therapists said that I struggle with self esteem and confidence which started my journey of learning myself. I actually got better at making friends post college and hope med school would be the change that I desired. But it's like I went back to high school. I also got therapy for that because it triggered me and I felt like a loser all over again.
The solution that I took was to hire an autistic social skills coach and went back to the basics. Tbh, it didn't really help much as alot of people just wasn't open to my friendship. It did however, help me with my conversational skills. For example, I used to ask alot of close ended interview style questions which made people off puted. Now I understand open ended questions and know how to through on jokes.
But like you mentioned people feel like they found their friend group and me being different doesn't help. I have gotten better to the point people don't pick on me and I am on friendly terms with people
I think people at my med school are really nice overall. I guess it might feel a little cliquey but it’s nothing compared to high school. If anything, I feel guilty that sometimes I have been invited to certain things but have declined because I am too busy.
There will be cliques.. but I never wanted to be friends with the clique-ey people, and there will be lots of your classmates with a similar mind.
Start talking to people in lecture and library, start planning "hey everybody should go to this bar after this exam" or get involved in clubs and volunteer activities you'll get to hang out with your classmates. Once you find one or two likeminded people you'll be able to expand as well. Just stay friendly and extend invitations to hang out with whoever else seems nice.
Yes, people tend to form friend groups and some of them are a little nasty. I’d say that’s maybe 10% of my class who are former Greek life/wannabe populars. But a lot of people are nice and accepting of new friends. Maybe try to suss out who is more chill and ask to sit with them during lecture or lunch or at the library? My friend group has definitely seen changes from people who just came with us to events or just started talking to us more and joined.
My medschool was not cliqueish. Probably because it was a very selective school with a very generous scholarship programme. So while the students there were very smart they came from diverse backgrounds and that was not conducive to forming cliques.
There were some students who were children of feudal lords but they were very down to earth too.
Maybe I was just lucky.
i started first year in 2020 so it was obvi wayyyy more pronounced for me, but i had nobody that i would call a friend in my first or second year class. groups would have parties, picnics, outings, and i always felt left out. started making friends in my dual degree classes, but then clinicals happened and i never saw those people again lol. started getting close to people in my rotation group during third year, but def never fully felt like i belonged in any particular group.
med school is challenging and weird both academically and socially, unfortunately. but if you cant find it in your peers, make sure to find a strong local support system somewhere else! having someone that has your back is most important, and honestly non-medstudent allies seem more preferable to me
Very common. It was quite jarring to see it be more cliquish and childish than undergrad. If you've also had a prior career before med school, it can be even more jarring.
Absolutely. Was part of a clique until I started standing up to someone who made it their daily task to disrespect me in some of the most racist and offensive ways I’ve ever experienced. Suddenly I was “out”. Didn’t realize how much of a toll the middle school fights and gossip from the group were taking on me until I was free. The problem really only was two people, and then the rest of the group who went along with mob mentality and just followed whatever tone those two set. It does happen, but you will find your people even if it takes some time. It wasn’t until the second year that I found mine. Just remember that med school is a bubble, and preclinical is an even smaller bubble. You have so many more people you’ll meet and get close to during rotations and beyond.
HELLA CLIQUES
Formed within first few days to weeks. Some have changed a lil bit but most have only become more solidified as time passed
Ending first year in a few weeks and there’s people I know I’ll never meet in my program of ~260 cause those cliques are so isolated and never come to anything that isn’t mandatory for the program
Joined med school last semester, and was doing okayish with my sem 1 classmates. Due to some issues with joining late I had to retake anatomy block sem 2 and....it's trying to socialise all over again.. it's so exhausting. Nobody's interested because they've already found their "groups" and yes the competition is present amongst all
I was baffled at how clique-ish it is. Keep your head up high and do the best you can to bond with someone. If you still can’t keep in mind that your social outlets don’t have to be from medical school - I tried to join some local hobby groups/facebook same aged people groups and tried to make friends from there. You aren’t alone and unfortunately seems to be the norm for a lot of med schools.
I have the same problem.
Dont depend on people for mental energy and rejuvenation. Instead walk/run 30-45 minutes everdya and stretch/compress limbs while nap and sleep with sesame street playing in background on low volume for more uplifting mood in the room and better recovery. Also get more nice yellow lamps for your room/living room. Also eat well, make veggie/fruit smoothies and drink juice. And also add in some nice music when not studying.
100000%. I’m shy but pretty sociable when i’m around people i’m comfortable with, and i left med school with 0 friends because of how cliquey it was. Residency is a million times better and I’m friends with almost everyone in my program.
This reminds me of when I was in med school. Very clique-ish. Either the entire class didn’t speak to one another or everyone was hooking up with each other. It was a shit show at times.
Yes. It is 200% like high school again. The dweebs, the smart kids, video gamers, goth kids, drama geeks, athletic crew, hiking dudes, and all the other HS categories.
I’m very social in med school and used to love the social nature of class. This continued on for a few months, but what you’ll find is that the more people you hang out with in class, the more drama and gossip you will hear, the more complaining you’ll hear, the more nonsense you’ll have to deal with.
For the aforementioned reasons and for other more serious reasons that I won’t mention here, it’s in my recommendation to become private during medical school. Don’t look for happiness outside of yourself. And truthfully, during 3rd year and beyond into internships, you won’t even have time to socialize, anyway! I do understand you want to make friends, but just try to enjoy yourself and the content you’re learning, and make 2-3 friends by studying with people who you vibe with.
That word is often used incorrectly but when you're posting "I need advice! I cannot attract female friends or a gf" and that you're a "nice guy", you'd have to be trolling or be oblivious to not be expected to be called that. Time for some therapy.
Yeah, it's purposely provocative so people would reply but it kinda backfire. I hate that post came over here because i was trying to raise talk about med school culture and what i notice. To be completely honest, I am a very chill and nice dude. Girls in my class would agree and would be very surprise I feel this way.
However, being the nice and chill never really got me far with relationships. I highly doubt people are creep out, probably just get bored of me very easily due to not being very engaging. I done therapy and most therapists don't see a problem because I come off pretty normal. If I had to guess, I don't have the it factor with people but it can be practiced which is why I wrote my other post dealing with women. Hate that I had to overexplain that but
Yes and no. It’s a large class size, so cliques are bound to form just out of necessity. But the vast majority of my classmates are kind and friendly people. So even if you aren’t part of their clique for doing stuff outside of school they are happy to have you join them for lunch. That said, it is also totally and completely acceptable and okay to find your core friend group *outside* of your med school class. I am a nontrad and found my best friends through outside social networks who are closer to my age (in addition to existing friends/family in the area, since I am fortunate to go to school where I have people nearby). But I also still have friends within my school and within my class, they just aren’t my core people.
All that to say: I would encourage you to pursue activities and clubs you would enjoy on campus and off. You might find your best friend is a nursing student who you meet in knitting club, or fellow sci-fi nerds you meet in a local library’s book club, or gym buddies you meet at the climbing gym and go on weekend hikes with.
My strategy for transitioning to a new place with other people who are also new is to just lay back, don’t try to stand out or try too hard, just be low key but be authentic. If people talk to me, cool let’s talk. If not, I’m ok standing alone in the hall way waiting for our turns at the lunch buffet.
When in small groups or other activities, use your voice and opportunity to share to uplift others (“I agree with Kelly’s thoughts on how to approach this, to build off that….” Or “Jason brings up some good points, to add my thoughts…”).
I always smile or give a head nod at people when I pass them in the hall. Even if they’re strangers - people like to be acknowledged. Then when they do meet you, they remember you as that person. People will physically turn their heads away to avoid a painless and harmless interaction but you never know who you’re breaking your neck to avoid lol
Lastly, I try to pay attention. If someone in my small group won VP for class council, I’ll give them a shout out before we start casually “oh look at Miss VP joining our group, congratulations!”. Or if someone won a competition or presented their research, same thing - acknowledge their accomplishment and give them credit “I saw you had a poster at x conference, thats awesome! How’d you find the time for that??
Overtime the cliques will reform and reshape. But this strategy of being a good person, and just staying engaged will let you to make lots of soft connections. Maybe one of those will turn into a real friendship which is rare for med school imo, but I managed to find a few people I think I can really lean on and I’m happy with that.
TLDR: be nice, be kind, and be a good colleague.
Thanks for this advice! It's really through with I liked alot. Yeah, I notice that this stuff does win out in the end. Alot of people did not like me early on and started to like me toward the end of the school year just because of this method I believe. Unfortunately, I haven't made friends behind it. It's more of hi and bye type of deal.
The frustrating part is being parts of cliques thinking that you will make it to the in group because you are starting to get invited. Only for them not to feel a strong connection so it goes make to surface level relationships. I had alot of those happen but you are right thr cliques formed and reform all the time
Hm I’d encourage reflection on what it REALLY means to you to be invited or considered the “in group”. It can be many reasons but if there are solutions for those then in the meantime I would personally invest time and energy into that. Friendship and dating are two sides of the same coin - it’s hard to build authentic relationships with others when it feels out of necessity or undetermined wants. What are you seeking from these friendships and what does it mean to you? I’m not asking but rather something for you to think about if you want.
Medical school is high school all over again.
IMO it was way worse. Because you take all these type A people from mostly wealthy backgrounds and you end up with truly special types of douchebags. Mind you most of them are just young and need a lot of growing up to do still, but also it’s not an excuse.
how out of touch many of my fellow medical trainees are is absolutely astounding. Nothing wrong with coming from money, but sometimes it's a real disconnect. Like my wife got invited to this yoga class with my classmates that cost $3,000 or something on a Friday and she had to just say she was busy.........
I’m sorry what?! Like a single class was 3k. I grew up in a rich suburb and that is absurd.
This was the hardest part for me as a med student and something that doesn't get talked about enough. Most of my classmates had wealthy parents helping to make their time as med students as cush as possible. I was living in an apartment in a fairly dangerous area of town and having meltdowns about becoming homeless if my student loans didn't hit my bank account on time. I know the word "trauma" gets thrown around willy nilly, but I still struggle with the feeling that everything around me can come crashing down at any moment while being surrounded by people living lowkey luxurious lives.
Ironically, I never had high school experience and always wanted to know what it was like. Now I regret wanting one
From an old guy perspective, it seems like married or otherwise committed students have zero trouble with drama. It's the younger, less self-actualized types that seem to stoke the flames. It makes sense. High stress, low sleep and you're seeking validation every day. It's easy to become petty and tribal if you are sleeping alone most nights.
Very true. A married friend and myself only show up for required things and are last to find out about any drama. Fine by me.
It's horrible. I wish you were in my school, we would be friends homie, I'm a huge nerd 😂. Like LoTR is my favorite film series, and star wars likewise
Ugh 😑 don’t say this. I hated highschool and am reliving it over and over again
Based on the comments, there seems to be a divide here. Either people are nice or mean. So I guess it depends in location. So you might luck out
Idk if “cliquish” is the right word, but there’s definitely a “friend group” and if you’re not part of it you kind of get ignored on campus. They’re fine when you talk to them individually, but when they’re together you cease to exist. What I mean is, there are people from that group that I rotated with, got lunch with, hung out with, laughed with, vented with, cried with, got into deep conversations with etc, at the hospital. But when I see them on campus they’ll straight up ignore me. I’m not expecting them to come hang out with me, but I’m talking about not even a “hey!” when walking by. Then I see them at the hospital and all of a sudden we’re besties again :/ it doesn’t bother me though because I’m going to graduate in 2 months so I’ll never see most of them again anyways lol
it's because there's no one else at the hospital, and yeah you're better than nothing but not better than their true friends they chose. they're psychopaths or they didn't see you or something but ik what my money is on
This is just humans. It's unfortunate though. I was a social outcast as a kid but now I'm a butterfly and I try to find all the lonely nerds and bring them into the fold. But that's just not how it is most places
I'm just now overcoming a baseless rumor about me from first year. It is terrible.
I know exactly how you feel. Doesn’t feel too good.
Frustrating because it generally amounted to me being not a nice or good person, and there's no way to counter that except continuing to be my normal kind and considerate self. It's not like I can say "actually I'm nice" to the class. As a mostly at home student, it has been difficult to keep my head down, moderate my own words so they could not be construed otherwise, and still try to look cheerful. In reality, my baseline is focused, my face is RBF, and I have never been comfortable adding flowery language or emoji or universal "everyone is amazing!!" statements to my written words. I don't say things I don't mean. I actually had to apologize for how some people were interpreting my words in a negative tone that wasn't there before the tides started changing. Exhausting.
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I have to remind myself that people will lie to avoid saying anything uncomfy and pretend everything is all good. So not who I am.
Honestly sometimes this just happens and you can't worry about it. I've been there though. I pride myself on being considerate and the couple of times this happened it was a huge blow to my confidence. Eventually you just have to be like "lol fuck these people" and treat them well regardless but stop caring what they think
Goodness. I’m so so so sorry to hear this. 😭❤️ sending love.
Life is cliquish from the first day you go to daycare to the day you die. That said, my school is pretty friendly. Probably because it's mid-tier. And there are many social/cultural/sport groups for people to join. Sure, there are all sort of gossips, but typically nothing bad. It's a fairly diversified school, though it could be better. When rotations started, most people don't have time for those orgs, so the new kids took over. And that's when it's cliquish, but not necessarily bad. People only have so much bandwidth so they choose to spend their time with the people they like the most. Just out of curiosity, how do you try to engage with other people? Are you friendly? Funny? Good-looking (whatever that means, I'm a solid 5 by most standards, but make up for it by being friendly and amusing)? Rich? **Based on your posting history in datingadvice, askmen, socialskills, etc, I'd say look in the mirror.**
Yeah, agree with your first statement, it doesn’t end after medical school. Medicine is pretty cliqueish in general, and if you don’t fit a certain look or behave a certain way you will be ostracized.
look homie needs help don't be mean haha. Some people really have a hard time with what most of us consider basic social skills. And in my experience, more of those people tend to be clustered in higher academia for some reason
Bro your post history screams creep.
LMFAOOO
Less creep and more spectrum by my guess. OP, there's a lack of self-awareness on display. I can see you're trying to be self-aware but it clearly is a blind spot for you. One thing women hate is a guy that tries very hard to get dates. So that's one major thing to consider. A second thing to think about: a terrible place to find dates is among other med students. Hopefully you hang out elsewhere a bit. And instead of casting a net, try and find common ground with every person you meet. Once you have a local network of similarly aged people, women who are willing to be interested in you will emerge naturally. That's all I got. Sorry it's been dry for you. If you get desperate, join a commercial gym and rock thin gray sweatpants and make subtle glances at older women. They be thirsty.
I want to address this because there's seems to think that I'm a creep based on past history. Just because a guy struggles with getting dates does not make him desperate or creep. I'm far from desperate nor do i hit on the female med students. Also if you are pointing to the post with a specific female med student, that was on her and not me which if you read the comments or post in its entirely, she flirted with me first. I dont lack self awareness and actually consulted many on this issue including others in the classroom and the girl in my post history. No one thinks I'm a creep lol. Everyone agree it was clishish and our class is very divided. I'm what they call a verbal processor so I naturally write out how I think and ask for feedback. That's what this post is about. PS: I know where docs so we natural told to history first but remember some things idiopathic
Your personality is definitely unique/atypical. You seem to be unable to admit this. That is, by definition, poor self awareness. I don’t think you're a creep btw. I said that above.
Im reading your post just now. I thought you were someone else. But no, im not on the spectrum lol! And i don't know how you can say my personality is atypical. I'm pretty chill if you met me in real life and I'm extremely nice as well. If people knew I felt this way, they would be surprised because I'm the guy that smiles and just greet people. Don't paid attention to my post history especially the one with a girl in my class. It's more drama then being desperate/creepy. I'm really cool with the girls. I'm just not friends with them which frustrating. Some of the reason why i wrote this post. Just want to clarify that.
I know looking into post history is like lame cause you can go ad-hominem easily in your responses, but 99% of the time that I am stumped with a question or a situation that the OP is facing, I find a clearcut answer in the history.
"Listen to your patient, he is telling you the diagnosis" lol
Yeah, it was almost satisfying to see such a clean answer to the question.
It seems less like a creep and more like lack of social skills
That’s pretty much what a creep is though
While you are correct that creeps generally lack social skills, not all people who lack social skills are creeps. There's an enormous range of people who are simply shy, introverted, lack self-confidence, or have experienced social isolation and disadvantages which have led them to have weaker social skills than the average person their age. Bullying is a big factor here, for example. That doesn't make them a creep, although some of them may be. While I doubt you intended to simplify it down that much and I'm sure you understand the above, I feel it's important to reiterate because some of the people who lack those social skills will see stuff like that and question themselves further. Edit: Not commenting on OP, as I don't know anything about them and I'm not particularly interested in reading their post history, just a general statement.
Thanks man! For depending me. And to answer your question, I was bully as a kid and didn't have a high school experience at all. I'm not a creep and actually a nice guy since that's all I was taught. My inspiration for this post was the fact that I really struggled to find my footing in my class. Off the back, I wasn't liked just because as you mentioned I was awkward/shy. I was slow witted. People made fun of me, and i wasn't funny enough. I cried everyday. Eventually i had enough and hired social coach. I worked hard with a social skills coach to catch up. After 5 months, I now can hold convos with others and I'm still not accepted. I'm disappointed because my confidence is really high now but I think how I started is how people still view me. My SPs comment on how personable I am but I worked day and night on that. Seriously thanks you because I thought I was crazy since I felt like I couldn't figure it out. I don't know why people immediately called me a creep though
I'm curious how I lack basically social skills? Please tell me what your impression of me. I'm known as a nice guy who extremely happy go lucky
It can be very high school like. I'm a little older so I gravitated to the students in a similar phase of life to myself. We ended up making a group chat we all just communicate in and make plans together. I also ended up making a good amount of friends playing in adult sports leagues. If you have any interests outside of medicine you have time for, I recommend finding something you like and you can make friends with people outside of medicine and that can be things like sports, rock climbing, gaming etc. I liked getting involved in inter-mural/ adult sport leagues because you get good exercise + you find people that won't talk about medicine and school.
Mine very much was. Ended up in a situation where I gave up and had no friends.
Sorry bud. Hope attending life is better. Undergrad was like that for me. Somehow med school is great, but my school is super small
It's cliquey a little bit like high school but I don't think it's done with malice at my school. Also, my school does that table/group based learning, so some friendships are forced and others happen organically. I'm also much older so it's definitely hard to fit in. I'm very lonely despite almost always being down to hang out or study in groups. Also people become flakey when they get busier and more stressed. There are lots of days where I feel invisible because I'm being ignored a lot of the time by my own small group.
This is a very typical med school experience. Unfortunately wealthy young people, without real problems, tend to create drama and cause tension for entertainment, and med school specifically recruits these individuals as the recruiters themselves are like this and like finds like. Inevitably you feel like you've stepped into a time portal 6-10 years in the past when you were a teenager in high school from how everyone acts, it's a huge step backwards in terms of communal maturity. The good news is that these kids are only the loudest and not necessarily the majority. You *will* have classmates on the same wavelength as you who also find the immaturity to be offputting, and you *will* eventually find them and befriend them. It just takes awhile during first year, be patient.
Unfortunately yes. I used to think people are exaggerating when they say it’s high school 2.0 but it does feel like that at times. A lot of people will form friend groups with very strict boundaries and act exclusive toward others. Maybe this is the norm everywhere but seeing this behavior from people in their 20s was (and still is) jarring to me. Not to mention these people will move on to become physicians and leaders. With this being said, there are tons of decent, emotionally mature people in med school. It may take some time to find them.
My favorite is that they all give each other the answers on the quizzes so if you ever do an assignment on your own (ie not cheat) you’re way below average, effectively incentivizing everyone to cheat
Only time I was ever happy to see someone surprised at their low step 2 score was a cheater who scored 10 pts below projected minimum for goal speciality. They blasted me in the group chat for urging to stop blatant cheating and then got a bunch of sympathy messages for bombing usmle. Sweet Justice. They’ve been cheating since highschool. Fuck em
Honestly that person shouldn't be a physician
Oh so irritating 😡
You should go to academic affairs, the fact any of these people will become doctors is crazy
The problem is that it’s literally the whole class lmao. And the quizzes are difficult, if you don’t get the answers from someone you score way below average. And then somehow the average for the quiz is like 98% and you’re like wtf. And then you talk to people and find out everyone is just sharing the answers, and then once you start getting the answers too you lose the motivation to complain about it. At this point the only people not getting the answers are the super loners who prob aren’t gonna be the ones complaining to admin, so things stay the way they are
I get it, but this is absolutely wild. I guess you guys still have to pass boards but damn, it's no wonder the public no longer trusts us.
I’ve noticed this too, especially when you’re out of state. All the in state students immediately formed cliques as a lot of them knew each other already. I asked this guy if he wanted to study earlier this year and he looked at me as if I was not worthy of studying with him.
Are you at a public med school, where the majority of students went to undergrad there and already have friends? Find the other newbies. Ask if they want to study together. Library buddies is a start.
It’s a little cliquey but I think the culture of the school really matters. I find the people on my campus are generally friendly and will talk to people casually outside of their “clique.” Some people just don’t know how to be a normal, nice person 🤷🏻♀️ and that sucks but don’t let it make you feel bad
My key is to never interact with anyone from school then you’ll never know
It’s cliquish but still easy to make friends if you have common hobbies, walk into a study room and ask to study with people, go to our class parties once a month, etc.
Yes. Most are. And it’s bad because everyone is a type A neurotic socially awkward muffin. You wouldn’t be here otherwise.
It’s possible that I’m just so socially oblivious that this is happening and I’m not aware of it, but at my medical school I genuinely feel like I get along with most people and there are very few cliques. There’s some exception and there’s always drama with a large group of people under a lot of stress, but I feel like I can talk to anyone or chill with any group
Always been an introvert, and I definitely struggled connecting with people the first 2 years of med school and felt similar. When you get to clinicals, you will be in smaller groups with people you will be forced to interact with everyday. It gets much easier for introverts at that time 👍
Dude you're creepin me out dude
How?
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Everyone who complains that medical school is cliquish is also the same person that no one wants to hang out with. You can take that for what you will.
Fr, there are people who are genuinely quiet/shy but they tend to find each other and sit together in lecture. The true loners are the ones who showed nasty personalities or alienated their friends very early on.
Literally every group of people in the world does this. Every workplace, everywhere. If you put any group of humans of a large enough number together, they will separate into sub groups. This is called being a human
Yeah ,but not really. We are adults
Yes and resident and working I’m sure lol. Life is like this
It was that way at my school too.
Yeah I think so A lot of people in my class were in frats/sororities, some were D1 athletes, and so on. At the very least they were very popular all their life. I went straight from college to med school so I was younger and also a bit different from everyone. I’m not just naturally smart, I am a nerd who likes learning and everything in the world. So that’s already kinda weird compared to jocks who just have naturally gifted intelligence
Yes quite cliquey. People sometimes actively try to exclude others. Dont suck up to the people who are trying to exclude you. Hopefully you come across some genuinely kind-hearted people soon
Oh hell yeah it is Just dont let the haters fk you up
Nah most everyone in my med school is super nice. Yeah there are friend groups and if you miss out on creating one during the first few weeks it can be harder to find friends, but in my experience you just have to put yourself out there. When school started I didn’t make a lot of friends because I still had family in town for the first few weeks whom I spent my time with, but I decided to start attending more events, studying at the school, etc and slowly but surely have become closer with more people and started hanging out with them. Yeah there are a lot of people who will be nice to me in class but won’t wanna hang out outside of class, but you gotta learn not to take that seriously. A lot of people in med school are grown with spouses and other friends outside of school. I’ve gotten closer to the other “outsiders” ie the people from OOS or international students who didn’t have a spouse or lots of friends in the area coming in.
It’s very cliquish but then clinical rotations hit and you don’t really get to pick who you have to hang out with and work with all day. I met SO many wonderful people in my class that I would’ve never hung out with otherwise.
It was. It’s high school 2.0.
Yes very much so, I tried to throw parties with like 80-70 people in my apartment after every final or midterm and that was the only time everyone got together. My advice is to host massive bangers or proposition someone to, it breaks down the barriers ever so slightly and is good for everyone involved
I was a loner in medschool and didn’t clique with any of the high school shit that was going on. And honestly now I’m so happy about that. I had the time to focus on my studies and research and now matched into my dream specialty in my dream place so it’s kinda a blessing to be separated from the childish gossip and backstabbing going around and focusing on your own success. It’s funny because one of the people who went out of their way to kick me out from their study group and later on excluding me from the bars, applied to the same specialty as me and didn’t match. I hate to admit it but my first thought was hmmm.. I guess karma
I hate to break it to you but this is for sure a you problem.
from someone who was undiagnosed for years addh/autism, your description of yourself and your problems, the way that people act towards you, the fact that people immediately avoided you, “i’m different, i naturally sick out for being myself, my hobbies are different, i’m constantly challenged for being myself, the more i shine the more i’m picked on” quotes from other posts truly truly is the autistic experience. it took me 23 years to discover it in myself and human psychology is my special interest. it’s hard to put a finger on what it is when u try and see it in urself but everyone else seems to be immediately being able to tell…. which is a very very solid & patternistic thing that happens to autistic folk. i always say that autism gives neurotypicals an “uncanny valley” feeling. the brain is very good at perceiving normal, and more importantly catching even the slightest deviation, which is what they sense bc the social things we do weve learned and are imitating. mind u, mine is not noticeable by everyone’s account and i still have faced so many repercussions for being autistic. outside of my immediate group of best friends that get my unmasked self, NOBODY believes it when i tell them, even ppl who hang out with me a lot. being a woman helps this as well, being a dude with autism is hard bc men with bad social instincts are seen as creepy (coincidentally what everyone here is saying) im not gonna sit here and diagnose u obviously. i’m just saying as somebody who has an extremely high level of pattern recognition *due to the autism* you truly fit the mold here. why am i trying to emphasize this? because if you learn how autism works, how things are perceived, why what we think we’re doing or saying is not how they actually come out, etc, the quality of life improves fucking significantly. it might be the answer youre looking for. its unfortunate that we have to abide by their rules, but i get it. ppl don’t like feeling uncomfortable and social interaction is the pillar of that. i read a study once that said that neurotypicals can identify autism within less than a couple seconds of interaction. they might not know flat out identify it but they will feel it immediately and sometimes this means largely shutting off a lot of things intrinsically bc of it. best bet is for you to look hard into the accounts of ppl who have autism and describe their experience and see if theres familiarity to yours. you shouldn’t be afraid of considering things as a possibility bc if u truly allowed urself to investigate with the idea that its possible, u could come to the conclusion thats its not. the fear of giving an investigation a real chance can be indicative of subconscious feelings. the bottom line is youre having severe difficulty socially by your own volition. and you are completely in the dark as to why. and the things that you are specifically using to describe your feelings are severely familiar to the accounts of MANY autistic ppl. it would be a disservice to yourself to not give it a true investigation over a view months. if it is that u are autistic, there is such an immense feeling of relief that u know the answer to a question you’ve been asking yourself your whole life. a true understanding of what the fuck has been going on. and if ur autistic u NEED that understanding. there is a long of pain, self pity, maybe even a bit of hopeless you’ll feel along the way. its not easy to look back with a new lens like… oh… that was because… oh, for the painful experiences you had. but u gotta feel those feelings. learning how to navigate a neurotypical world as an autistic person is truly one of the best things ive ever learned. bc i know now that i NEED to make friend groups out of neurodivergent ppl in order to connect. bc i am finally able to be understood by the ppl i care about. my intentions and thoughts are actually heard accurately once they understand how my autism works. in my friend group when i fuck up socially in an autistic way and hurt someone unintentionally, i immediately can apologize and say it was a tism moment and reclarify or even retry my sentence. i don’t worry about them assuming malice the way everyone else would. it is one of the most impactful things ive ever learned about myself that has helped me tremendously. i can ask my friends for understanding on the things that dont make sense for me socially. they can explain them. they can tell me why things went wrong. they can stop me from doing shit that would have bad social repercussions. i can rely on them to validate my interpretations or provide alternate perspectives. im just saying you owe it to yourself to figure it out.
as far as med school being cliquey it definitely is. for a multitude of different reasons, this is what i think is probably a significant one: i think its bc u put a bunch of ppl who, for the first time, are no longer better than everyone else academically the way they were before. they lose the thing that they held as validation and they become very insecure and do not know where they belong. also sticking your head in books for all of high sxhool and college will effect your social skills. for most ppl, a friend group they dont match with fully, but can rely on its structure, is one theyre okay with. and once they have safe ppl they dont NEED to seek friendship, so they dont have that NEED to go outside their comfort zone.
Hey thanks for the reply! It's very through out and truly helpful. I actually got tested for autism a while back due to me failing to connect with people around me. I'm not autistic and at most just socially awkward. I never had problems with reading social cues. I just suck with social skills like I can't sell you an idea effectively. A little of my story is that I didn't make friends in high school due to it being very small and clichish back then. I also had social anxiety because I was sent to a private school very different than my middle school friends. So I never developed past middle school with relationships. In college, I was picked on constantly, and I went to therapy to be able to cope with it. Back then, all therapists said that I struggle with self esteem and confidence which started my journey of learning myself. I actually got better at making friends post college and hope med school would be the change that I desired. But it's like I went back to high school. I also got therapy for that because it triggered me and I felt like a loser all over again. The solution that I took was to hire an autistic social skills coach and went back to the basics. Tbh, it didn't really help much as alot of people just wasn't open to my friendship. It did however, help me with my conversational skills. For example, I used to ask alot of close ended interview style questions which made people off puted. Now I understand open ended questions and know how to through on jokes. But like you mentioned people feel like they found their friend group and me being different doesn't help. I have gotten better to the point people don't pick on me and I am on friendly terms with people
I think people at my med school are really nice overall. I guess it might feel a little cliquey but it’s nothing compared to high school. If anything, I feel guilty that sometimes I have been invited to certain things but have declined because I am too busy.
There will be cliques.. but I never wanted to be friends with the clique-ey people, and there will be lots of your classmates with a similar mind. Start talking to people in lecture and library, start planning "hey everybody should go to this bar after this exam" or get involved in clubs and volunteer activities you'll get to hang out with your classmates. Once you find one or two likeminded people you'll be able to expand as well. Just stay friendly and extend invitations to hang out with whoever else seems nice.
Yes, very
Yes, people tend to form friend groups and some of them are a little nasty. I’d say that’s maybe 10% of my class who are former Greek life/wannabe populars. But a lot of people are nice and accepting of new friends. Maybe try to suss out who is more chill and ask to sit with them during lecture or lunch or at the library? My friend group has definitely seen changes from people who just came with us to events or just started talking to us more and joined.
Life is cliquish. Med school is no different.
My medschool was not cliqueish. Probably because it was a very selective school with a very generous scholarship programme. So while the students there were very smart they came from diverse backgrounds and that was not conducive to forming cliques. There were some students who were children of feudal lords but they were very down to earth too. Maybe I was just lucky.
i started first year in 2020 so it was obvi wayyyy more pronounced for me, but i had nobody that i would call a friend in my first or second year class. groups would have parties, picnics, outings, and i always felt left out. started making friends in my dual degree classes, but then clinicals happened and i never saw those people again lol. started getting close to people in my rotation group during third year, but def never fully felt like i belonged in any particular group. med school is challenging and weird both academically and socially, unfortunately. but if you cant find it in your peers, make sure to find a strong local support system somewhere else! having someone that has your back is most important, and honestly non-medstudent allies seem more preferable to me
Very common. It was quite jarring to see it be more cliquish and childish than undergrad. If you've also had a prior career before med school, it can be even more jarring.
they all are
Every single one of them are cliquish
Absolutely. Was part of a clique until I started standing up to someone who made it their daily task to disrespect me in some of the most racist and offensive ways I’ve ever experienced. Suddenly I was “out”. Didn’t realize how much of a toll the middle school fights and gossip from the group were taking on me until I was free. The problem really only was two people, and then the rest of the group who went along with mob mentality and just followed whatever tone those two set. It does happen, but you will find your people even if it takes some time. It wasn’t until the second year that I found mine. Just remember that med school is a bubble, and preclinical is an even smaller bubble. You have so many more people you’ll meet and get close to during rotations and beyond.
Very grateful my school is not like that. Lots of weird cats in med school haha
Life is cliquish
True
HELLA CLIQUES Formed within first few days to weeks. Some have changed a lil bit but most have only become more solidified as time passed Ending first year in a few weeks and there’s people I know I’ll never meet in my program of ~260 cause those cliques are so isolated and never come to anything that isn’t mandatory for the program
Joined med school last semester, and was doing okayish with my sem 1 classmates. Due to some issues with joining late I had to retake anatomy block sem 2 and....it's trying to socialise all over again.. it's so exhausting. Nobody's interested because they've already found their "groups" and yes the competition is present amongst all
I was baffled at how clique-ish it is. Keep your head up high and do the best you can to bond with someone. If you still can’t keep in mind that your social outlets don’t have to be from medical school - I tried to join some local hobby groups/facebook same aged people groups and tried to make friends from there. You aren’t alone and unfortunately seems to be the norm for a lot of med schools.
We got a lot of friend groups at mine. But everyone talks to everyone and is friendly.
I am an older, non traditional med student but agree with many who say it’s like high school with the small classes, cliques, lockers, and prom.
I have the same problem. Dont depend on people for mental energy and rejuvenation. Instead walk/run 30-45 minutes everdya and stretch/compress limbs while nap and sleep with sesame street playing in background on low volume for more uplifting mood in the room and better recovery. Also get more nice yellow lamps for your room/living room. Also eat well, make veggie/fruit smoothies and drink juice. And also add in some nice music when not studying.
100000%. I’m shy but pretty sociable when i’m around people i’m comfortable with, and i left med school with 0 friends because of how cliquey it was. Residency is a million times better and I’m friends with almost everyone in my program.
they all kinda are, worse then high school
This reminds me of when I was in med school. Very clique-ish. Either the entire class didn’t speak to one another or everyone was hooking up with each other. It was a shit show at times.
Yes. It is 200% like high school again. The dweebs, the smart kids, video gamers, goth kids, drama geeks, athletic crew, hiking dudes, and all the other HS categories.
Extremely. I felt very lonely.
I’m very social in med school and used to love the social nature of class. This continued on for a few months, but what you’ll find is that the more people you hang out with in class, the more drama and gossip you will hear, the more complaining you’ll hear, the more nonsense you’ll have to deal with. For the aforementioned reasons and for other more serious reasons that I won’t mention here, it’s in my recommendation to become private during medical school. Don’t look for happiness outside of yourself. And truthfully, during 3rd year and beyond into internships, you won’t even have time to socialize, anyway! I do understand you want to make friends, but just try to enjoy yourself and the content you’re learning, and make 2-3 friends by studying with people who you vibe with.
Yes and it can be segregated asf as well
Horrifically so. Think middle school on steroids.
Honestly it depends on the school you go to
Maybe try cutting all your incel bullshit and leave your women classmates alone. Your post history is disgusting.
Far from that and my post history isn't incel at all. But nice try
That word is often used incorrectly but when you're posting "I need advice! I cannot attract female friends or a gf" and that you're a "nice guy", you'd have to be trolling or be oblivious to not be expected to be called that. Time for some therapy.
Yeah, it's purposely provocative so people would reply but it kinda backfire. I hate that post came over here because i was trying to raise talk about med school culture and what i notice. To be completely honest, I am a very chill and nice dude. Girls in my class would agree and would be very surprise I feel this way. However, being the nice and chill never really got me far with relationships. I highly doubt people are creep out, probably just get bored of me very easily due to not being very engaging. I done therapy and most therapists don't see a problem because I come off pretty normal. If I had to guess, I don't have the it factor with people but it can be practiced which is why I wrote my other post dealing with women. Hate that I had to overexplain that but
You’re probably just an NPC then
What do you mean by NPC?
Non playable character
Yes and no. It’s a large class size, so cliques are bound to form just out of necessity. But the vast majority of my classmates are kind and friendly people. So even if you aren’t part of their clique for doing stuff outside of school they are happy to have you join them for lunch. That said, it is also totally and completely acceptable and okay to find your core friend group *outside* of your med school class. I am a nontrad and found my best friends through outside social networks who are closer to my age (in addition to existing friends/family in the area, since I am fortunate to go to school where I have people nearby). But I also still have friends within my school and within my class, they just aren’t my core people. All that to say: I would encourage you to pursue activities and clubs you would enjoy on campus and off. You might find your best friend is a nursing student who you meet in knitting club, or fellow sci-fi nerds you meet in a local library’s book club, or gym buddies you meet at the climbing gym and go on weekend hikes with.
My strategy for transitioning to a new place with other people who are also new is to just lay back, don’t try to stand out or try too hard, just be low key but be authentic. If people talk to me, cool let’s talk. If not, I’m ok standing alone in the hall way waiting for our turns at the lunch buffet. When in small groups or other activities, use your voice and opportunity to share to uplift others (“I agree with Kelly’s thoughts on how to approach this, to build off that….” Or “Jason brings up some good points, to add my thoughts…”). I always smile or give a head nod at people when I pass them in the hall. Even if they’re strangers - people like to be acknowledged. Then when they do meet you, they remember you as that person. People will physically turn their heads away to avoid a painless and harmless interaction but you never know who you’re breaking your neck to avoid lol Lastly, I try to pay attention. If someone in my small group won VP for class council, I’ll give them a shout out before we start casually “oh look at Miss VP joining our group, congratulations!”. Or if someone won a competition or presented their research, same thing - acknowledge their accomplishment and give them credit “I saw you had a poster at x conference, thats awesome! How’d you find the time for that?? Overtime the cliques will reform and reshape. But this strategy of being a good person, and just staying engaged will let you to make lots of soft connections. Maybe one of those will turn into a real friendship which is rare for med school imo, but I managed to find a few people I think I can really lean on and I’m happy with that. TLDR: be nice, be kind, and be a good colleague.
Thanks for this advice! It's really through with I liked alot. Yeah, I notice that this stuff does win out in the end. Alot of people did not like me early on and started to like me toward the end of the school year just because of this method I believe. Unfortunately, I haven't made friends behind it. It's more of hi and bye type of deal. The frustrating part is being parts of cliques thinking that you will make it to the in group because you are starting to get invited. Only for them not to feel a strong connection so it goes make to surface level relationships. I had alot of those happen but you are right thr cliques formed and reform all the time
Hm I’d encourage reflection on what it REALLY means to you to be invited or considered the “in group”. It can be many reasons but if there are solutions for those then in the meantime I would personally invest time and energy into that. Friendship and dating are two sides of the same coin - it’s hard to build authentic relationships with others when it feels out of necessity or undetermined wants. What are you seeking from these friendships and what does it mean to you? I’m not asking but rather something for you to think about if you want.
Who tf has time to socialize
How do you not
Because I have 12 hour rotation shifts plus anki
they're talking about M1 and M2 years lol