There are three elements: time, your mental/emotional health, and your physical health.

TIME MANAGEMENT: THE CRUCIAL SURVIVAL SKILL

At my orientation, a UCSF faculty member, Dr. Ellen Hughes, told a horror story about being advised before her clerkships to buy 30 pairs of underwear, because she wouldn't have time to wash them!

I was relieved to find that I had time to wash my underwear. And even my socks. Even during inpatient rotations, you will usually have your weekends off. My advice: USE THEM. Use your weekends to at least do your laundry and buy food for the week. I also adopted a “same day” policy on paying my bills – in other words, as soon as I opened it I wrote a check and dropped it in the mail.

Doing chores like this, especially when you're tired, is a pain. But it keeps the work week saner. It may suck to spend part of Saturday at Costco, but it sucks more to get home at 8:00 P.M. after a long day and have nothing to eat.

If you're already on top of stuff like this, breathe easy – you will probably be able to maintain that. If you're not, getting more organized will help you to stay sane.

Also, many people post-call have an adrenaline surge going and may be tempted to go out with friends, etc. after work. This may be an act of resistance, fighting the feeling that med school is “stealing” your life away.