Personal Statement review - Dr. Wood

I also sent my personal statement (draft 3) to a doctor I had shadowed. 

Dr. Wood is an OB/GYN who works in a practice with several other doctors.

She graduated with a Psychology major. After college, she found a job and started a family. 

After eight years off, she decided to apply. 

She took an MCAT review course and I think she was only accepted at MCG.   

 This is the feedback and again, my thoughts are in white.  

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 I really like the first paragraph, it grabs attention (which is important) and is descriptive.  

(This made me feel better. I had really worked on creating a first paragraph that would catch the attention of the reader and she appreciated it, unlike Sergei.)

I would consider going from there into what is the 4th paragraph now "In elementary school…"  (Interesting..) After the sentence "I wondered if it was just because that's what I had always said and I didn't want to consider another answer", you could talk about answering that question by shadowing. (Hmm. I like the way that sounds. 

But how would I make that transition? Moving from holding a gallbladder to being asked what you want to be when you grow up seems a little rough.)

Don't get too hung up about explaining what specialty you want to pursue in your personal statement, because they know that most people change their mind in medical school.

 (But I didn't mention a specialty.) They are looking for people who are interested in primary care, however, so mentioning that you are interested in internal medicine isn't a bad thing. 

(I figured, especially for Mercer.) 

In the next paragraph you could focus on the characteristics/ personality traits that you think will serve you well in medicine.  Is there a particular band or tutoring experience that pushed you?  Specific examples are always good and interesting to the reader.

 (Aww, I should have know someone would tell me I really need examples! Crap.)

You have lots of those traits tucked into the essay:  PRIDE, tutoring teaching communication and problem solving, being a teaching assistant challenging you academically and expanding responsibility/ leadership.  I don't know that you have room for every one of those. 

(I was totally expecting this.)  Pick the ones you think are most important and use a paragraph to focus on them. (Just one paragraph? That's still alot to talk about in one paragraph.) 

Use the last paragraph as a wrap-up.  I like your sentence "Perhaps my answer to that familiar question never strayed from medicine because I was meant to care for patients." 

 (Yay! I was hesitant about that sentence.)

Try to get the whole essay down to a page. (I knew this was coming too.) It seems very difficult at first, but sometimes when we write we say the same thing a couple of times, and trying to pare it down makes you get rid of the redundancy.  You have a great start and getting started so early gives you time to rework it. (Eactly.)

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She liked my draft better than Sergei and was not blunt about anything.  
She also emphasized that I don't have to change anything if I don't want to because this is my personal statement and it's important that it's mine and I'm happy with it (I left that part out). 
She also made suggestions, which was very helpful. 
She didn't have as much to say as Sergei, but in a way, I think she spoke more. 
She looked at the big picture and overall structure andflow. 
Sergei focused on individual ideas by commenting on almost every sentence. 
I definitely will consider what Dr. Wood had to say, when I redraft.