I Don't Know If I'll End Up Marrying A Doctor Myself: Exclusive Interview With Oyewole Tunmise

First of all, it's my very pleasure to be here, thank you for the opportunity to share some of my views on issues. I am Oyewole Adedotun Tunmise, a 400 Level-A medical student at Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, LAUTECH. I'm very sure I'll have a nice time with this interview. Thank you.

I happen to have my Dad as a doctor, growing up, I had always seen him go to work and that formed a concept in my mind and that of my two sisters who also happen to be medical students. The only profession that we got to know while growing up was medicine. Medicine happened naturally. My dad, being a doctor inspired me, right from Jss2, I had always had it in mind to be a doctor. My Dad played a very big role. It's been a great ride anyways.

Laughs.... I get to hear that a lot, many people feel since it's a family of medics, most probably it's a bookish environment but it's actually not like that. Maybe when you meet my Dad, you would understand better, he's not the typical of doctor, he specialize in psychiatry, and that in my own view is the fun part of medicine, the one with the most fun. I and my sisters don't discuss stuffs at home.

It's quite chill and very convenient. I don't know if I'll end up marrying a doctor myself, but I think I'm convenient with my family as it is. 

Sighs .. This is a big question. My mum is not a doctor and I think that helped us a lot, she was usually more at home. 

When someone does medicine and he's trying to further the career even after medical school, it takes a lot of time and commitment. Imagine if there's a night and I'm on call and she's also on call. Really, left to me, I don't think I like the idea of getting engaged to a doctor but who knows?

I'm not considering it presently and I don't have one at heart.

One of my uncles in UK bought a camera in my secondary school days , it was a very nice camera and I was much younger then, we used to bring it out when we take family pictures during festivities and that's when we usually remember that have a camera, nobody really used it. I did not really think about photography then probably due to medschool. But when I got into 200L, there was this person in my church, one of the media guys, he conducted a 2 weeks training on photography. One way or the other, I got into it, but you know for these things "two weeks isn't enough." During COVID-19 break, I was lucky enough to get enrolled into a studio, I was trained by a great teacher, he took me like a son and that encouraged me. I started taking pictures for people and they appreciated it. The biggest prompt was that a camera was already available and I wanted to put it to use.

Trust me, it's quite challenging a number of times. Imagine you getting a work for a photography gig and they're willing to pay well and then you've E.O.P(End of Posting Examination) the following week or that same week. Many times, it's been challenging but God has been faithful. What I try to majorly is that I take jobs that I'll be able to give my best and full attention . I also try to make sure that the people I work for understand the nature of my department which gives them more understanding of my time, that's really a big plus to me. There was this wedding I was to cover early this year but I had exams very close to that time, but in all, we keep on pushing .

This is a brilliant question. I think I have role models in different aspects of life: politics, business, medicine, family life etc. It's better to have role models in different aspects because nobody will have it all figured out. In my own opinion, some people get to do very well in some partcular things and would have a lot of things to teach the younger generation on that particular aspect of life. I'm a Christian by faith, the only person I take totally is Jesus Christ.

In medicine, my Dad is my role model, I'm looking at specializing in psychiatry. Political wise- I like Barrack Obama, I've listened to a lot of his speeches, and some of the policies he was able to create as the US president. 

Spiritual wise, I listen to Apostle Micheal Orokpo a lot, I also rever my church pastor at school in person of Rev'd Adesina Abegunde. 

Business wise,  I like Mark Zuckerberg, I really love that he was able to build Facebook even right from his time at college.

It's not any special moment that led to it, it's been a lot of moments actually, coming into medschool, I've heard a lot of a lot tales, and then coming into it personally and seeing how it could be depressing, how we need a lot of encouragement, how I need to know the ways I feel or what I'm going through, other medical students are going through it. 

Asides that, one thing that was helpful even before entering medschool was that I had known quite a number of medical students who developed mental illness because of the pressures of medschool. A lot of these moments summed up and created the idea in my heart that something needs to be done.

We thank God, it's been a whole journey, I can't even say in certainty that this was the way I went about it. Because I was young and having to connect medical students across the country, many you've not even met before, having to get people to understand the vision, getting people to work towards acheiving the vision, that made it a very big challenge at the beginning. With the support of people, my sisters were there, my very good friend and brother, Atewologun Faith was also there, there was a particular day I was so stressed up to get things done, I had to go over to his place, and questioned why things were not happening the way it should.

The part that really helped me was that we, medical students go through a lot, because of the medical curriculum, those things such as depression, anxiety unified everybody towards the vision. A lot of friends in medschool really helped to. We are where we are and even better days ahead.

The part of medicine I enjoy most is checking the scoreboard and seeing I and my friends pass. Asides that, I'm really looking forward to my psychiatry posting, hopefully I would get to like a lot of that, then I'll conclude in my mind on specializing on that. But for now, mehn... We're just cruising and making sure we survive.

Thank you for this question. I don't usually want to call it regret but lessons. One of the lessons that I've learnt from past experiences is that, the fact that you've good values does not mean everyone is like that . The values that you've are not necessarily the values that the person beside you has. We all don't reason in the same way because of background and also, people have different intentions even when they do things. That's something I've learnt that I wish I had known much earlier. 

I've had quite a number of this, it took me sometime to finally pick one. That was when my immediate sister, Lolade had over 300 in her UTME, I knew with that score, she was going to get into medschool. I can still remember the euphoria I had that time. That's one of my best days.

One of the very challenging moment I had was when I got into medschool,  that was 2018 and having to balance reading. I remember my first test, the score wasn't as encouraging as I thought it would be, it was very frustrating. One thing that really helped me then was my personal relationship with God, it got me closer to God, it made me know that I can depend more on Him. I got more interested in things that were related to my faith and that was the way I overcame it.

Woah! When you say it that way 'elope', that makes it look like one is not nice, let's not see it as elope. I think I'll really want to leave the country. I'm not sure if I want to come back to spend the latter part of my life here. I plan on leaving the country for better exposure and lifestyle.

I really do hope that the situation of this country improves.

It's a question everybody is asking. In my opinion, the current Vice president will be a very good shot, not because he'll do anything drastic or something special. I feel that him being in such an office as an intellectual, and also someone who has some understanding about economics is a big plus. I don't expect him to do anything magical but it'll at least stabilize things, and then I expect him to call in newer people who are technocrats into government, those who truly understands the part of government.

To be honest, I can't really say, let's see how life takes us, but I really want better governance and leadership in my country, Nigeria. No matter where you go, home will always be home, Nigeria will always be  home. I don't think I have it in my plans, but as you know God is the one that orders man's steps. Let's see how it goes.

Thank you very much for this session, the questions were well built, I had to reflect before giving answers to quite a number of them.

It's amazing to know that some people look up to me. Just keep on pushing, whatever you engage in, don't leave God behind, God can always be involved. Don't try to make up an idol from anybody, nobody has it all figured out. We're all pencils in the hand of the creator as a popular Tv show would say.

Thank you very much Cephas Insights, it's been a nice time here.

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