dooogs

Then you should be enjoying life and not worrying about CaRMS for another 3 years

As someone who lived there most of my life, I can say that at least half of the patient population will be French-speaking. Therefore, what I said still stands, especially for a potential resident. Sure you can learn, but going in with basic functioning will do wonders. 

It works the same. 
The French med schools are all P/F now as far as I know and are used to getting McGill apps (which has been P/F forever), so it should be fine.
The transcripts will probably be used as a red flag.

"Although I am not yet decided on what kind of practice I would have as a family physician I am strongly interested in rural care and I am aware that unfortunately a lot of rural areas are underserved in terms of diagnostic procedures available. I foresee that I will have patients who will be able to get x-rays and other imaging fairly urgently but not have it formally interpreted for a day or more. As you know, radiology is a field that is woefully under-taught in medical school and a special interest of mine so I took it upon myself to do a number of electives so that I may be able to better make a preliminary interpretation of their imaging, as well as to potentially offer point of care ultrasound during their visit and saving them from having to wait for an ultrasound appointment or travel to a separate site to rule out simple pathology. The additional foundation I have in this domain would be a valuable asset to your program"

It is not only incremental decreases in HbA1c. It is about looking out of your patient.
A 50 year old male can come to your clinic because he has blood in his stool. You can refer him for colonoscopy and potentially pick up an early cancer.
Many people don't feel comfortable sharing their embarrassing problems to new people such as a physician at walk-in-clinic or emergency doctor unless they are anxious or super unwell. However, they trust their family doctor because they believe that their family doctor is their quarterback.
Let's take another example. A patient has a small mole on his skin. He/she is worried that she has cancer. You can do a skin biopsy or small resection under local anesthetic and send it to pathologist for diagnosis. Within a week, you have the ability to potentially diagnose (and even treat) a skin cancer OR give good news that the mole is benign and nothing to worry about. You can possibly pick up an early melanoma and save a patient's life.
There are not that many things in life where you can play such a crucial role in another person's life.

Family medicine is not comprised solely of incremental adjustments of HbA1c and BP...... patients present to you with a multitude of complaints, literally anything and everything. Career satisfaction comes from being a generalist and knowing a little about everything. Throughout my residency, I have counselled parents about newborn problems, delivered babies, inserted IUDs, counselled about diabetes, counselled for depression, performed a multitude of intraarticular injections, accompanied families when their loved ones were losing their autonomy / facing a cancer diagnosis, helped someone quit smoking, diagnosed skin ailments, removed foreign bodies, given patients the knowledge/tools to better their health / to prevent ER visits / reduce their health anxiety, etc. My patients trust me to tell me their secrets and fears. My staff have diagnosed malaria in walk-in, performed abortions, worked in rural Northern Canada, worked for Doctor's Without Borders, worked as hospitalists/in obstetrics/in EM. As a family doctor, you are the first line of contact. You have the flexibility to transform your practice throughout your career.
Throughout my residency, I saw the value of my generalist training. The staff that performs scopes doesn't remember how to treat HTA, defers to the patient's family doctor, delaying care. The IM subspecialist didn't remember how to treat hyperkalemia. The pediatric subspecialist doesn't remember what is a normal adult HR. The medical team doesn't think of fracture to explain the patient's sudden decrease in mobility. Of course for a lot of these specialties, they don't need to know these particular things to function within their domain. I am a specialist of common diseases in the general population. I don't want to only know one organ system. I don't want to only treat one small subspeciality of medicine. I don't want to know how many different ways we can resect a certain body part. I love working with people of all ages. I derive career satisfaction knowing that I have the knowledge to guide my friends and family through a large range of health issues.
 

I feel the exact same way. The thing that makes me feel better is that it's not just me feeling these hardships individually and that all us M1's across the country are in this together

As rmorelan says, "superstar researchers don't always make good residents". They need to be a good fit with the team and with the patients!

One other perspective here I have heard from some people about - 
superstar researchers don't always make good residents. Precisely because they care about research so much. Any time you spend doing research you are not say studying or looking after patients - point is there is a price to doing anything that takes away from something else. Residency is a job - and many programs are looking for people that are good at the job. Research is often a tangent to the job. Any resident/staff knows of people that are extremely academic/research focused that may be losing out on practical things. In residency selection in the age of pass/fail I think research as well is just used sometimes as a proxy (if the person can do a ton of research and still do well in the program then he is a smart/hard worker which is probably something we are looking for. That doesn't actually mean they care about research directly though. Programs vary but I think it is always important to ask why programs are looking at whatever they are looking at). 
Even highly academic residency programs when you look at it often have very little requirements in the way of actual research. Honestly if you look at things closely it is surprising how little research people doing actual academic medicine have to do in many cases (unlike the US there is little real advantage to someone to advance up the academic ranks - lecturer, assistant professor, associate professor, and full professor all earn exactly the same and have the exact same amount of research time directly ha. There ways around that but the base levels don't). 
Point is that after a point pumping out more and more research is at best diminishing returns, and as I mentioned I guess recently there are no absolutes there. Some places will love research, some will be unconcerned by at it, and some may even be wary of it. There is no prefect path where you XYZ and you will be universally liked.   
 

Usually when you do enough research with someone for them to know that you are interested in their specialty, they will go out of their way to get you into clinical scenarios so they can write you a letter. If they don't go out of their way, then usually they are receptive to the suggestion if you bring it up. Don't underestimate the important of having good people in your corner go to bat for you when the time comes. (sorry for the mixed boxing/baseball metaphor).

I'm thinking that research that is in a close field to the first choice speciality should be valuable too... right?
like for example research in neurosurgery - would it not still be good for ophtho?

It's inevitable to have debt if you don't have parental support. The amounts you are claiming are normal for many parts of the country. You'll be able to make a dent during residency depending on where you do your training. I would honestly just try to make your stressful years tolerable as the training can get quite busy. You'll pay it off as a staff no problem.

Once I left high school, I have survived on student debt, which consolidated into my LOC. I've done PGY5, Royal College and am entering practice with a debt of 250K. I anticipate paying it off within the next 5-7 years, it is manageable and I do not consider it a huge burden on my shoulders. It is part of life. I have always lived a frugal life, and life is about to become more affordable now notweithstanding this debt.

It's inevitable without parental support, a spouse earning substantial income, or substantial savings of your own.  Unfortunately it's just part of medical training that we all have to accept.  I am also very uncomfortable with debt but there's really no way around it.
I started medical school with no debt from undergrad (very lucky), no savings, and no parental support.  Went to medical school in a low cost of living city (London) partly to save money, partly for other reasons.  I personally tend to live fairly frugally - I never travel, don't drive, etc - but I didn't severely restrict myself by any means - I ate out, ordered takeout, bought myself the occasional thing I wanted.  Finished medical school with about 140k in debt.
Did residency in Toronto, much higher cost of living, lived alone.  Still not married, no dependents.  Managed to pay off about 30k in residency, mostly in PGY1-2 (when I had tons of tax credits left) and in PGY5 (when I was making more).  If tuition tax credits are no longer a thing, that will cut into it a bit but I think it's still possible to pay down some.  As a (fairly low earning on the doctor-scale) staff I'm able to pay off about 2k/month.  I am hoping to start paying down more of it.
That said, I haven't put anything into TFSA/RRSP which I probably should start doing (however, I am very uncomfortable with debt so there's that).  So I don't know - in my specialty it doesn't suddenly disappear once you cross the threshold into staff, but it's definitely manageable.
The biggest thing that helps me feel in control of my finances is having a clear budget.  I use an app to track my spending.  I really only started this in PGY1 but I wish I'd started earlier.  As a medical student, I tried to live approximately under what I would be making as a PGY1, but not too much under.  Then you can give yourself a small quality of life boost once you start residency and that feels nice.  

The way that you are feeling isn't uncommon in medical school.  COVID sucks and I'm sorry to hear the effect it has had on your experience.  The unfortunately reality is that this pandemic is really adversely effecting the social lives of young people and pre-clerkship is a valuable time for social connections.  However, it's not going to be your only chance for it.  Even if you feel that you're not that close with people right now, there's clerkship, 4th year and residency where you will have a chance to connect with like-minded people.  I would say that residency is an even better bonding opportunity than medical school as the group is smaller and focused on a very similar common goal. Reflecting back on medical school I can say that I wasn't in any cliques either, I was just on a superficial friendly basis with most people and a bit deeper with a few people.  Now that I am a fully trained physician I occasionally come across people from medical school, but it's not very common.  For me my relationship with my partner became the primary relationship of importance throughout medical school and then in residency/now it became family/kids. Your time in medical school will pass, and it generally feels like it flew by.  A lot of it is a means towards and end (trained physician).  Not all of it will be awesome, but some of it will be pretty good.  I would encourage you to try to remind yourself of longer-term goals when you feel disheartened by the short-term. 

I feel like this was supposed to be the greatest year of my life. Starting med school, a new chapter, going to make new friends and connections that should last a lifetime. Then COVID happened. I am usually someone who is very stoic and resilient, however I feel like this year has had an immense negative impact on my mental health (and it's only November). 
Pre-clerkship years are supposed to be the "fun years" in med school, before increasing responsibilities and decreasing free time happens in Med 3. I had such high expectations for med school, and everything being online/all the restrictions in place really foiled it all. Trust me, I am very grateful to be in the position I am in (I would never be ungrateful, as so many would love the opportunity to become a doctor)... however, I am conflicted as this year is really nothing like what I imagined it to be. My interactions with classmates are relatively superficial and mostly based around schoolwork. What's worse, I feel like there are several cliques which have formed around me and I'm part of none of them... if next year even is in-person, it feels like it will be impossible to make meaningful connections at that point. The one word I would use to describe how I'm feeling is "isolated". 
Does anyone else feel the same? How has your med school experience been impacted by COVID?

As a fourth-year medical student, what costs should I be aware of/account for during the next 1-2 years? I understand that there will be a cost associated with CaRMS applications (no interview fees this year), LMCC Part 1 and 2 writing fees, USMLE Step 2 CK and CS for those with US fellowship aspirations. There will also be costs associated with relocation and home purchasing/increase in rent if moving to a HCOL city. 
I was wondering what else I was missing and the approximate costs of these things (eg CPSO fees? Surgical foundation exam fees?)
Do people still use their medical student LOC in residency? I feel like it'd be hard to afford a semi-decent lifestyle in a potentially HCOL city like Van or Toronto on a resident's salary. 

This may not be relevant and I may be an outlier. I applied to 3 fields, two of which were highly competitive. Ultimately, I was selected in a small surgical specialty. There were 80 applicants, 40 interviewees, the majority of whom were gunners. Not one gunner was selected! It all came down to whom was considered to be “a good fit”. The time I devoted to this specialty was minimal. However, I quickly got along with the resident and attending, they found me to be a hard worker, collaborative, easy to get along with, and I believe that I was preselected before the 10 minute interview. On the basis of “qualifications” in the field, I was the least qualified! I was a perfect fit and it worked out well for all.

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Anybody else hate these ads ? If you want to help someone do it for free ... I've had multiple med students help me out with info in one way or another because they are great people. Not friends or anything. Why are you charging people for this ? Kinda of a crappy thing to do TBH 

It's just sad to start with this bitter taste. Looking for positives though... please someone .... I'll start: London has great gyms! 

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I think it is good to have a honest introspection and see what actually did change during your first year that changed your interest in medicine since I assume you were interested in being a doctor one year prior to that. If it is the volume of work, I think you should kinda accept that medicine is a heavy-load course anyways so you should adapt yourself to putting in a considerable amount of your time if you want to continue in it. If you are fine with putting in time but you only find the materials insufferable/boring, it is better to talk to people who are your senior since the nature of pre-clinical and clinical work is hugely different in medicine. If you feel insecure about not knowing all sorts of medications, symptoms, etc. I am going to reassure you that many people feel like that even being years into medicine as a doctor, see the “The Velluvial Matrix.”  by Atul Gawande. No doctor knows everything and thanks to tools like uptodate, it is rarely needed to memorize stuff that are not common instead it is just one search and click away. Don't look at other fellow students and think they know more than you. Most of people actually try to fake it when in fact, deep down, they are as insecure as you, no matter if they are other med students, residents, or attendings. Finally, there is no guilt in thinking that medicine is not for you. You don't owe anything to anyone. This was a position that you earned it and you decide if you want to stay on it or leave it. Life is full of experiences, last year this time, this was the best decision you could think of based on the information you had. Now with more information and first-hand experience, you have all rights to change your mind about your future.
Good luck to you!!
 

Yeah. Find that weird too. What's the difference  ? My guess is the school doesn't want to be liable ? Idk but it is what it is I guess 
I hope the gym will be open get fit af this year LOL