Should I pursue medicine regardless of condition?

Hi everyone.. Hope you are all doing well..and in case you're not I hope you're doing well soon : )!

So my story.. I always wanted to pursue medicine but went to law school due to practical reasons. Next year I'm a JD but I don't want to be a lawyer.
The thought of pursuing medicine/dentistry has never really disappeared.

It's been one year since my diagnose of Crohn's ..and even though I'm not on medicine (anymore) I am low energy, have headaches and I have to wake up 1 hour earlier just for my stool..

I am so scared of failing.. Should I pursue my dream regardless of Crohns?
And is Dentistry maby a little less stressing and therefor a better choice?

Having gone to law school, you should have some sense as to what kind of stress you're going to be under as far as schooling/training goes. The medical field is a high stress field, but I would thing law is too. With a chronic illness, it will most likely take more out of you than your healthy peers, but that's going to be the case with any undertaking.

Unless you already had some tracking toward the medical field, I would think you would have to take undergraduate courses in pre-med. You also have to think about how much debt you would be having to take on and how much debt, if any, you may already be under in student loans. If you have financial means that affords you the option and you feel well enough for the challenge, you will have that advantage, but alas, most of us have to think about how to pay.

No one knows their future, so it's not for anyone other than yourself (and your parents if they're involved in paying for it) to decide. My daughter put herself through college and started graduate school before becoming too sick to carry on. She has a different chronic illness that has escalated into her becoming homebound after such a promising start to her career. In hindsight, she so wishes she had taken a deferment after undergraduate school to try to get her health back on track, but the outcome may have been the same. Thankfully, she had only taken out one small student loan because it has to be paid back regardless of her inability to work. That's something you have to think about.

I'm not saying your should stay on the lawyer track if you're going to be miserable doing it. That wouldn't be good either. Your GI would be a good person to get advice from since he/she knows your case and is someone who went through medical school and knows what it takes stamina-wise. I had a relative with the disease that had a very outstanding career while living with Crohn's, but he wasn't as sick as some of us. The disease is different in each case.

Do you have an academic adviser currently that could give you some advice on what you're going to need in changing fields? These are just ideas that may or may not be helpful while you think about changing.

I hope it works out for you. -Joy

With the ACA, the predicted trend is higher utilization of advanced practice nurses and physician assistants. Have you considered either field? The debt from education would be less than medical school, the training fewer years and you could potentially create your own professional niche having a JD. In addition, I think having a chronic illness makes you more compassionate and gives you more insight to the patient's perspective thus making you an excellent physician/nurse/healthcare provider of your choice.

Don't let your CD dictate your career. While going back to school may me stressful and probably will be, working in a career that makes you unhappy is also going to effect your health.