*when i grow up*

Remember preschool? Those were the times when we were miniature versions of ourselves. We were a whole lot cuter then, too.

“And what do you want to be when you grow up?”

Does this sound familiar?

Innocence made us believe we could conquer the world. We could be anyone we wanted to be. Teacher… lawyer… nurse… businessman… scientist… priest… seaman… astronaut…

There was no stopping our young minds. There was no limit to what we could be… when we grow up.

Young as I was, I already knew what I wanted to be. To everyone who asked this all-important question, I had only one answer.

“When I grow up, I want to be a doctor.”


Fast forward. Technically, I have now grown up.

I’ve had four graduations since then (preschool, grade school, high school, college). And I look back with fondness at that little girl who refused to be anything else but a doctor.

And I wonder… What in the world made me want to become a doctor?

Did environmental factors come into play? My mother, a nurse, often took me along with her to the hospital. I practically spent my pre-preschool days playing with tongue depressors, stethoscopes and discarded medicine boxes. But then again, I could just as easily have wanted to become a nurse. The fact is, I didn’t. It never entered my young head.

Is it genetic? There isn’t a single doctor in my direct lineage. Mine was a family of farmers and fishermen. I did have second and third degree relatives who ventured into the field, though.

I have no answer.


I’m well into my fourth month of medicine.

And I’m loving every single minute of it.

Yes, even the sleepless nights and the sleep-inducing lectures and the killing of innocent frogs. And while like perhaps every single medical student, I literally sleep on my books, there’s no satiety to my craving for knowledge. I am fascinated by the workings of the human body. I stand in awe at the majesty and beauty of it all.

I’m living my dream. Not everyone is given the chance. It’s both humbling and uplifting.

I’m a long, long, long way off from becoming a doctor. And the truth is, it will perhaps be an even longer time before I’m all grown up in every sense of the word.

But God has woven this dream into the very fabric of my soul. And that little girl who was dead set into becoming a doctor is just as stubborn now as she was then. There’s simply no stopping her