This Was Never a Detour

Once Upon A Time in Secondary School

After SPM, I applied to nursing school in USM and was accepted.

I remember that moment clearly. It felt right. It felt certain. But my mother said NO, and that was the end of that path, at least for then.

So I stayed. I did my STPM. I continued studying pure science subjects. It wasn't easy. Life wasn't exactly great at home, but that's another story to tell.

Graduated from University of Malaya (UM)

I entered University of Malaya and graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Education (Honours) with Distinction, majoring in Biology with a minor in Chemistry. I was very proud that I did well.

My Career Path Throughout the Years

Somewhere along the way, my career took me into marketing.

To an outsider, it might look like a sharp turn. To me, it felt more like translation. I learned how to communicate, influence, build systems, and tell stories. These are skills that later found their way back into healthcare in unexpected forms. I worked closely with medical institutions, health services, and patient-facing platforms. For a long time, that felt like home.

Before enrolling in my Master of Marketing, I almost chose a Master of Public Health instead. I remember hesitating. Not because I lacked interest, but because I questioned legitimacy. I wasn't a doctor. My professional experience lived elsewhere. So I chose the path that aligned most neatly with my resume.

That choice made sense. And yet, the question never fully went away.

My Recent Outlook

More recently, I noticed myself looking again. This time at micro-credentials, short courses, certification programmes, anything that would allow me to re-enter the healthcare landscape without uprooting my life. Not to start over, but to reconnect.

That was how I found myself enrolling in a chaperone and companionship course focused on ageing and caregiving. And later, being accepted into a formal programme on ageing and geriatric rehabilitation, a course I will take in a later season, when timing allows.

Am I Complicating Things?

For a while, I wondered if I was complicating things.

But then I realised something important:

This was never a detour.

From nursing school to science education, from public health curiosity to healthcare work, from caregiving to geriatric learning: the thread has always been there. What changed were the forms, shaped by family, feasibility, responsibility, and season of life.

I am no longer trying to become who I wanted to be at eighteen.

I am becoming who I can be now, with clarity, maturity, and intention.