This past Friday, I “walked” at my official, Ross University School of Medicine graduation ceremony at Madison Square Garden in New York City. My parents, my youngest sister Corina, my partner Micah and my adopted son/good friend Tom were all able to attend. Unfortunately, my grandmother and two other sisters, Julena and Briana were unable to make it.
My parents drove up from Virginia on Thursday for the festivities. I can’t express how wonderful it was to have them here, and they filled my belly with all kinds of good food!
For those of you considering whether or not to attend the graduation ceremony for Ross, I highly recommend that you do so! I thought it was a very nice ceremony, and I had to hold back tears more than once (and failed miserably, of course).
The president, Dr. Thomas Shepherd, and the dean, Dr. Mary Coleman were both there, along with other faculty and the guest speaker. There was even a special, surprise guest…Alexis George! All you fellow Rossies out there probably know who that is!
I plan on uploading some videos soon, but in the meantime, please enjoy the photos that I have posted here, along with the one’s in this post.
It was incredibly awesome to see so many fellow students (doctors!), whom I hadn’t seen in a very long time (most since Dominica).
Interestingly enough, the point when I cried the most was not when I walked across the stage to be hooded and receive my “diploma.” Nor was it when I read the hippocratic oath (although I did cry then, as well). The most touching moment was when I ran into Alexis after the ceremony. Alexis is a Dominican man who is known to pretty much every Ross student. I still remember stepping out of the Dominican airport, and seeing Alexis greet me and sell me a cell phone! He is a well known taxi driver in Dominica, and he drove us all to the campus from the airport on our first day in Dominica.
After the ceremony, I found Alexis and thanked him for coming. He told me something that brought me to tears. This was his first time attending the Ross graduation ceremony. He told me that he recognized many of our faces, from four years ago, when we were just landing in Dominica. That first day, most of us looked scared to death, and some of us were even crying. We had no idea where the next four years of our life would take us. We couldn’t comprehend at that moment how the journey through medical school would affect us all. We were in a strange and foreign land about to begin a strange and foreign journey through medical school. And Alexis told me that seeing us same med students, four years later, walking across the stage at Madison Square Garden, made him impossibly proud. We were doctors. And he had been there for us, to welcome us to the country, and to witness the beginning of our transformation.
That’s when it really hit me. I am a doctor. I have come so far, yet I have so far still to go. I was terrified and excited and hopeful that day, almost four years ago, when I first set foot on Dominica soil and began my journey through medical school. And now that I am about to begin my journey as a doctor in residency, I am just as terrified and excited and hopeful. Let the journey begin!
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