Traumarama: Cake does NOT get you off the wait list

I had a full year before medical school started to play guitar, take my dog on daily five hour walks, work in a trendy coffee shop, and teach MCAT classes. It was during my year of relaxation that I realized the terrible nature of medical school applications. I always knew it would be competitive, but I never considered the strategy and research involved. I quickly discovered Studentdoctor online forums where students compulsively called admission departments for the status of their applications. Not a very forceful person, I relied on the aggressive nature of my fellow applicants to supply my information. I knew which schools I had applied to in vain (U. of Washington - out of state, never would've happened), and which schools had late interviews. I reluctantly added MCO/MUO/UTCOM because my sister moved to Toledo with her husband who started his residency. I didn't have any desire to live in Ohio. From the outside looking in, Ohio looks like all the other flat, humid, Midwestern states I couldn't identify on a map. I don't really believe in fate, but my sister is somewhat convinced she's the reason I'm in medical school. This last minute Midwestern addition was the first school to request an interview, and I was fortunate enough to be accepted by December. I was going to medical school, but I was still holding out for a different location.

Everybody I encounter soon discovers my extreme preference for Colorado over all the other states and territories of the United States. I wanted to stay in my home state for medical school. There aren't very many medical schools in the west, so it gets competitive. Fortunately, I had a confident interview in early January. In March, I was put on the wait list in the 2nd third. I managed to restrain myself to monthly e-mails to the admissions department. As the summer wore on, I started to get more frantic. By June, afflicted with some sort of Stockholm syndrome from studentdoctor network, I was sending daily e-mails. I was backpacking through Europe that summer with my position on the wait list adding to the weight on my shoulders. When I finally came back from my trip, I had progressed to daily calls to the admissions office. My conversion was complete - I had become one of those crazy obsessed applicants from the online forums.

It was during the peak of my obsession that I was unfortunate enough to get some advice from my brother (a once obsessive law school applicant, now a successful lawyer!). I found out from one of my dad's sources that I was 5th on the waitlist to get in, a week before classes started. My brother decided that I would have to make the admissions department remember me. He convincingly argued, "If they have to chose between the applicant that they know nothing about, or the applicant that called every single day and did something memorable like take a cake to the admission's department with their name on it, they will chose the applicant that cares more." With my rushing adrenalin and anxiety over my impending move to Ohio, I believed him. The next day I went to King Soopers and bought a sheet cake, and on it we wrote "Farrah R. hearts CU medical school." I know, I know - I still cringe when I think about it, and it gets worse. My younger sister intervened to tell me that taking the cake to the medical school would be crazy. My brother aggressively argued for the cake, and I was so stressed out that about it that I cried. My brother is the more effective arbitrator, and won the argument. With the support of some of my very best friends, I drove to medical campus.

In the car ride over, my friends argued over the merits of using cake to get off the wait list. It was a Saturday, and Brittany noted, "They're probably closed," and then sat rather quietly.
"Oh no, you think it's crazy don't you," I asked her.
She hesitated, and replied, "I just don't think it will make a difference."
Anna-liisa tried to comfort me and said, "It's worth a shot, and at the very least, it will be a really funny story they can tell future applicants. There's no doubt that it'll be memorable."
I was content to be give the admissions department something that will be memorable and hopefully a little funny, and I figured I could laugh about it one day too. When we finally arrived at the school, it was locked. I was slightly relieved as I was building up adrenalin for my impending embarrassment. Just then, a student walked out of the building - shit.

We walked down the hall to the admissions department. The man I had been talking to on the phone everyday was working extra hours that weekend because school would start the next Monday. I am sure that this man is a very kind person when he's not rejecting people from medical school, but here we will refer to him as big-fat-stupid-heifer or BFSH. I introduced myself and explained my spot on the wait list and the cake, with Anna-liisa and Brittany faithfully by my side.
"I just thought it would be pretty funny. I don't think I have much of a chance at this point, so I though I would go all out," I told him with the awkward nature of the situation looming.
"I wish I could help you, but there's really nothing I can do. Um... how did you get in the building?" BFSH suspiciously asked.
"A student let us in."
"They're not supposed to do that."
"Oh... uh, sorry. Anyway, I'll just leave this cake here. So there haven't been any openings on the wait list since I called you yesterday?"
"No, again I'm sorry. You can take the cake with you and eat it with your friends. I don't think anybody here will eat it. I can let them know you brought it. You can call during orientation, and I will let you know about the list. But again, I wouldn't count on anything."
At this point, I never wanted to see the cake ever again. At the same point I lost all hope on top of my embarrassment from the over-the-top gesture, Anna-liisa started to cry.
"Don't move away. I really don't want you to move away," she told me through her tears.
"She seems more upset than you are," BFSH interjected.
I ignored him and gave Anna-liisa a hug. It didn't matter how awkward the cake was, or that we had broken into the building, or that I had clearly gone off the deep end, I was really going to miss my friends and family. In this moment of reality, my new found obsessive nature dampened and then disappeared. We thanked BFSH for his time, and left the medical campus.

I spent my last few days in Colorado mellowly hanging out with my family and friends. I had been a homebody in undergrad, driving home often on weekends, so it was unnerving to travel so far from home. I easily adjusted to life in Ohio with frequent phone calls home - it helps that my older sister is here. From the inside looking out, the scenery is dull as I imagined, but I managed to befriend some great people here. I still take any break to fly straight home - what can I say, I need my Rocky Mountains. Anyway, to the kids - just say no to studentdoctor network, or at least use it in moderation.

--By Farrah, who would like to emphasize how much this story makes her cringe