I Didn’t Love the Specialty I Shadowed—Does That Mean Medicine Is Wrong?

It’s 3:15 p.m. You’re standing in slightly-too-stiff shoes in the corner of an exam room, pretending your arms are crossed “professionally” and not because you don’t know what else to do with them. You’ve been shadowing this doctor all day. You expected some big this is it, this is my calling moment.

Instead?

You’re bored. Or uncomfortable. Or low‑key grossed out. Or just… not feeling it.

And now your brain has gone straight to:
“I didn’t love this. Oh no. Does that mean I don’t actually want to be a doctor? Have I been wrong this whole time?”

Let’s sit in that panic together for a bit, then pull it apart piece by piece.

---

First: No, One Shadowing Experience Does Not Mean Medicine Is Wrong

Your brain is doing that very predictable anxious thing: taking a tiny slice of reality and turning it into a global verdict on your entire future.

You didn’t love:

• One day (or a few days) of
• One specialty
• With one attending
• At one specific workplace
• On one specific type of day

That’s like watching 20 minutes of a random episode in season 7 of a long TV show and deciding you hate the entire series.

Medicine isn’t a single job.

It’s:

• Emergency medicine at 3 a.m. in a chaotic ED
• Pathology in a quiet lab with slides and reports
• Psychiatry in a calm, talk-heavy outpatient clinic
• Radiology in a dark reading room with barely any patient contact
• Surgery in an OR with high intensity and long cases
• Family medicine in a small town where you’ve known your patients for years

Not loving one shadowing experience doesn’t mean:

• You’re too soft
• You’re not “doctor material”
• You’ve been lying to yourself
• You’re doomed to be miserable in medicine

It literally just means: “I did one trial run with one version of this, and it didn’t fully click.”

That’s all. Your anxiety is trying to turn it into a prophecy. It’s not.

---

Why Shadowing Can Feel So Underwhelming (or Weird or Boring)

You probably imagined shadowing as this dramatic, life-affirming moment where you’d think: “Yes, this is my purpose.”

Then what actually happened was… a lot of:

• Typing into the EMR
• Asking the same 3 questions over and over
• Waiting around
• Quick in-and-out visits
• You standing in the corner silently, not really part of anything

Here’s the honest part that no one really tells you:
Shadowing is often the worst way to judge what being a doctor is like.

Why?

1. You’re not actually doing anything.
   You’re observing. That’s inherently boring. Even cool stuff feels flat when you’re not engaged.

2. People act differently when they’re being watched.
   Attendings might be stiff or rushed. Patients might hold back or overshare. It’s not “normal life.”

3. You’re seeing a tiny slice of the job.
   If you shadowed outpatient derm, you saw acne, rashes, and biopsies. If you shadowed internal medicine inpatient, you saw rounding and documentation. That’s not all those docs do.

4. You’re hyper-aware of yourself.
   You’re thinking:

   • Am I in the way?
   • Did I shake hands weirdly?
   • Do I look interested enough?
     It’s hard to absorb “Do I like this?” when your brain is stuck on “Do they like me?”

5. You might’ve walked into an off day.
   Maybe clinic was overbooked.
   Maybe the attending was exhausted or on call last night.
   Maybe the coolest cases got canceled.

And all of that gets packed, in your head, into:
“I guess this is what being a doctor is. And I didn’t like it. So I must not like medicine.”

You’re making a huge, high-stakes decision based on a sample size of… basically 1.

---

Let’s Separate Three Different Questions

Right now, your brain is mushing these together:

1. Do I like this specialty?
2. Do I like clinical work in general?
3. Do I want to go into medicine at all?

You shadowed one specialty and jumped straight to question #3:
“Maybe I shouldn’t be a doctor.”

Slow down. Let’s untangle them.

1. Maybe You Just Didn’t Like That Specialty

This is way more common than people admit.

Examples:

• You shadow surgery and think:
  “The OR is so intense. I hate standing for hours. I don’t care about this anatomy as much as I thought.”
  That doesn’t mean you won’t love psych, peds, or family med.

• You shadow family medicine and think:
  “I’m bored. I want more acute stuff, more procedures, more adrenaline.”
  That doesn’t mean you won’t love EM or anesthesia.

• You shadow ob/gyn and think:
  “This is way more blood and emergencies than I expected.”
  That doesn’t mean you won’t love outpatient derm or rheum.

You’re allowed to say: “Cool specialty. Not for me.”
That’s not failure. That’s progress.

2. Maybe You Didn’t Like That Setting

Same specialty, completely different vibe:

• Outpatient vs inpatient
• Academic hospital vs private clinic
• Urban vs rural
• Big system vs small community hospital

Shadowing in a rushed community clinic with short visits feels wildly different from a slower-paced academic clinic with learners, teaching, and complex cases.

Before you throw the whole dream away, ask:
“Is it the work I didn’t like, or this specific environment?”

3. Maybe You Really Aren’t Excited by Clinical Care

And yeah, we have to say this out loud too.

If, over time, across multiple environments and specialties, you realize all clinical stuff feels:

• Draining
• Meaningless
• Forced
• Emotionally unbearable

Then that might be a signal that clinical medicine isn’t a good fit for you.

But you can’t honestly know that from:

• One derm clinic
• One primary care day
• Two ER shifts

Your anxiety wants certainty now. Your career needs more data.

---

How to Tell If This Is a “Bad Fit” or Just Anxiety Talking

Ask yourself some brutally honest questions. No one else has to see the answers.

1. Before shadowing, what drew you to medicine?
   Be specific. Not “helping people.”
   Things like:

   • Problem-solving complex cases
   • Long-term relationships with patients
   • Advocacy work from a position of authority
   • Integrating science with human stories
   • Being part of a respected, skilled team

2. Did shadowing completely contradict those values… or just not show them clearly?
   For example:

   • If you value long-term relationships and you shadowed an ED doc, you probably didn’t see that.
   • If you love complex internal puzzles and you shadowed quick urgent-care visits, you might’ve missed that part.

3. What exactly bothered you? Name it.
   Was it:

   • The pace?
   • The EMR and documentation?
   • The emotional intensity?
   • The lack of time with each patient?
   • The bodily fluids and procedures?
   • Feeling useless and awkward?

Those are different problems. “I hate feeling useless and awkward” is not the same as “I hate medicine.”

4. Did you feel even a tiny spark at any point?
   • A question you really wanted to ask
   • A patient you felt drawn to
   • A moment of “Wait, that was kind of cool”
     If you had even flickers of interest under all the anxiety, that’s worth paying attention to.

---

Getting More (and Better) Data Before You Decide Anything Huge

You don’t have to decide “medicine vs not medicine” right now.

What you can decide is: “I need more experiences before I can trust my conclusion.”

Here are some concrete next steps:

1. Shadow a very different specialty next.
   If you shadowed:

   • Clinic-based: try ED, OR, or inpatient
   • Hospital-based: try outpatient primary care or psych
   • High-intensity: try something slower-paced like geriatrics or endo

   You want contrast, not more of the exact same thing.

2. Shadow a different doctor in the same field.
   Personalities matter. A lot.
   One exhausted, burnt-out doc vs one who genuinely loves teaching can totally change how the day feels.

3. Do some non-shadowing clinical exposure.
   Where you actually do something:

   • Hospital volunteering (transport, front desk, patient liaison)
   • Hospice volunteering
   • Medical assistant or scribe (if time/setting allows)
   • EMT, CNA, or phlebotomy (for more hands-on people)

   These give you a sense of: Do I like being around patients? Around illness? Around this kind of environment?

4. Debrief with someone who knows you.
   Friend, mentor, advisor, family member.
   Not to tell you what to do, but to reflect patterns they see in you outside this one day.

5. Journal right after each experience.
   Don’t worry about sounding “premed-y.” Write for you:

   • “Parts I liked:”
   • “Parts I hated:”
   • “Things that surprised me:”
   • “How I felt leaving today (1–10):”
     Over time, you’ll see themes.

---

The Fear Behind All of This: “What If I Invest Years and Hate It?”

This is the nightmare, right?

You’re scared that:

• You’ll force yourself into medicine
• You’ll spend years and a ton of money
• You’ll wake up as a resident and realize you hate the job
• And then you’ll feel trapped, ashamed, and stuck

That fear deserves to be acknowledged, not brushed aside.

Here’s the uncomfortable but reassuring reality:

1. Lots of people have doubts before and during med school.
   Doubt doesn’t mean you’re on the wrong path. It means you’re taking it seriously.

2. There are many, many kinds of physicians.
   You’re not locking yourself into “the exact specialty I shadowed that one time.” You have years of exposure and training before you make that call.

3. People do pivot.

   • Some switch specialties during training
   • Some move to non-clinical roles (industry, consulting, policy, teaching)
   • Some reduce clinical time or change practice settings
     It’s not all-or-nothing.

4. The thing you’re doing right now—questioning—is exactly how you lower the risk of long-term regret.
   Blindly pushing forward and ignoring discomfort is riskier than pausing to ask, “What did this experience actually mean?”

You’re not “behind” just because someone else shadowed pediatrics once and declared they’re 100% sure for life. Half of those people will change their mind in med school anyway.

---

How This Plays on Applications (Because Yes, That’s Also Stressing You Out)

You might be thinking:
“Well, adcoms want me to love medicine. If I admit I didn’t love shadowing, I’m done.”

No.

What they actually want:

• Self-awareness
• Reflection
• Growth
• A realistic understanding of what being a doctor involves

It’s totally okay to frame an experience as:

• “I thought I would love X. I didn’t. Here’s what I learned about myself and what I’m looking for in medicine.”

Example way of thinking about it (not exact wording for apps, but conceptually):

“I shadowed a busy outpatient internal medicine clinic and was surprised that the day felt more like managing paperwork and time pressure than the deep conversations I’d imagined. Instead of seeing that as a sign that medicine wasn’t for me, I used it to explore other settings and realized I’m more drawn to fields where there’s more room for longitudinal relationships and counseling, like psychiatry or primary care in a slower-paced setting.”

That doesn’t make you look flaky. It makes you look thoughtful.

You don’t need a perfect, linear “I shadowed once and knew forever” story. You need a real one.

---

When Should You Start Seriously Questioning Medicine?

Here are some red-flag patterns where it’s worth pausing hard:

• You’ve had several different types of clinical exposures (different specialties/settings), and in all of them:

  • You feel dread before going
  • You count the minutes until you can leave
  • You feel emotionally flattened afterward every single time

• You’re excited about:

  • The prestige
  • The stability
  • The title “doctor”
    …but not about anything in the actual day-to-day work of patient care.

• You consistently find more energy and satisfaction in:

  • Non-clinical roles (research with zero patient interaction, coding, policy, business)
  • And the thought of giving up those paths for medicine feels like self-betrayal

If you’re seeing yourself in all of that, it’s not time to panic—it’s time to talk to people who can help you explore alternatives: premed advisors, career counselors, physicians who left clinical work, people in related fields.

But again: most premeds are not actually there. They’re just scared they might be there because one shadowing day wasn’t magical.

---

A Quick Reality Check: What Did You Expect Shadowing to Feel Like?

It might help to be brutally honest about the narrative in your head.

Maybe you expected:

• To feel “chosen” or “called”
• To instantly understand everything
• To naturally fit into the team
• To be moved to tears in some profound way

Instead, you:

• Didn’t understand half the medical language
• Felt like a coat rack with a pulse in the corner
• Were awkward with patients
• Felt bored or grossed out or just kind of… meh

You know what that actually means?

You’re new.

That’s it. You’re new.

You’re supposed to feel out of place as a college student in a professional medical environment.
You’re supposed to have moments where you think, “Am I cut out for this?”

Those feelings don’t answer the question for you. They’re just part of the process of figuring it out.

---

FAQ: 5 Common “But What If…?” Questions

1. What if I really didn’t like it—like, I dreaded going back?
If it was just one or two days, don’t build your entire future on that dread alone. Note it. Then intentionally set up at least 2–3 other, different clinical experiences. If the dread repeats across all of them, then yes, that’s a serious signal worth exploring. But you need a pattern, not a one-time reaction.

2. What if I liked the science but not the patient interaction?
That’s important information. It doesn’t automatically kill the idea of medicine, but it might nudge you toward:

• more procedure- or diagnostic-heavy fields (radiology, pathology, anesthesiology), or
• non-physician paths (PhD, biotech, research, data science, etc.).
  Right now, just write it down as “I lean more toward X than Y” rather than “I must abandon medicine.”

3. Will med schools judge me for not loving every shadowing experience?
No. They’ll judge you more for pretending everything was perfect. You don’t have to list every single shadowing day on applications. You can focus on the experiences that were meaningful and still internally acknowledge, “Some others weren’t a good fit, and that helped me clarify what I want.”

4. What if I never feel that dramatic ‘this is my calling’ moment?
Plenty of excellent doctors never had a cinematic calling. They had: “This seems like meaningful work that fits my strengths, and over time, it grew on me.” You’re allowed to make a thoughtful, deliberate choice instead of waiting for a lightning-bolt revelation that may never come.

5. How many shadowing experiences should I try before making a decision about medicine?
There’s no magic number, but as a baseline, aim for:

• At least 2–3 different specialties
• At least 2 different settings (e.g., outpatient clinic and hospital)
• Some role where you’re actually doing something (volunteering, scribing, etc.), not just standing and watching
  After that, your feelings will usually be clearer—maybe not crystal clear, but more grounded in reality than in fear.

---

Open your notes app (or a notebook) right now and write two lists:

1. “Things I disliked about my shadowing experience” and
2. “Things I thought I would see or feel but didn’t.”

Then circle the items that are about that specific day versus the ones that might be about clinical medicine in general. That distinction is your starting point—not a verdict on your future.