The Curse of Burnout: Turning it into a Blessing!

As an IMG from Bangladesh, I moved to Canada in 2021 within 3 months of medical school graduation. The reason of migration was mostly marital and in this new country, I felt hopeless and helpless to navigate around for a career in medicine. I had no idea about the licensing procedure in Canada and without any clinical experience in the field, I felt more paranoid about my abilities. I remember the first few months of sleepless nights and feeling of depression, frustration all eating me out bit by bit. But finally I decided to fight back my own demoralizing thoughts, I sat on my laptop and kept searching. And luckily I started to gather information, resources and even friends through the internet to pull myself out from this depressed, burnt out state. But it wasn't over yet. Preparing for the MCCQE1 took me through another round of burn out. It took every effort of mine to wake up each day and remind myself that I need to take one step at a time and if I have already managed to reach till that day, I can push myself further. It wasn't easy. Settling in a new place on top of building a career from scratch felt hard, even heartbreaking sometimes. I remember spending lots of days in such a burnt out state that I almost gave up. But today I feel happy that I didn't. Pushing myself out of bed everyday to take care of my study, my career and also my family has worked out. after a whole year of preparation, I have passed my MCCQE1 and NAC OSCE in consecutive sessions. Now when I remember my burnt out days, I understand it was a lesson for me. A lesson to never give up, to never stop believing. And I have faith, these lessons will help me to complete the rest of my journey as well!