I've been following this forum for about 4 months. I think all of us wants a good score(meaning 90's) but not all of us can do it or be capable of doing it....well, one of those guys it's me....here is my story: I am a gratuade who came in 2005 in US only for a summer job to save some money so I could have a down payment for my future apartment in my home country. While working here I found out about this posibility of passing USMLE steps and be able to practice medicine in US. I started to study at the begining of 2009 for about 4-5 months then took step 1(I wanted badly to take step 1 before my wife's due date)....on may 2009 took the exam and about 4 weeks later got the score: 72/174...I failed! I was so dissapointed but with a lot of suport from my wife an family I was going to do it again...in the mean time I became father and my time dedicated to study got shorter and shorter....after another 4-5 months of studying I took the exam(february 2010)...this time I thought I did pretty good....4 weekes later results came: 66/173....I failed again! I was in shock and said that this is not for me because I am not capable of doing it....I even focus on trying to get something else(research, lab or nursing)....one day my wife sends me this link(uworld.com) and says: take a look on it...it may help you; I've been reading what they have to offer plus a bunch of posts from you guys...I had a lots of reserves plus this fear that I will failed again but with my wife's suport I said I will give it a try one more time....I didn't read any more from the books(at this moment I was sick and tired of them) and did only the Uworld Qbank for 2 months....right after those 2 months(I had 2 days break) I took the exam....when I got out I thought I will fail again....Just like many of me I had to wait almost 8 weeks for the results. Target date(july 14th) came and got my score: 79/195; I know is not much, I know is not that pretty but I can say one thing: I pass it, now I'm on the other side of the line. For me it's a big time relief. Now that it's over I have only 1 regret: I didn't get Uworld sooner....there are so many things which I learned by only doing those questions which no other book 'teach' me....I have an advice for those guys who are now getting ready for step 1(especially if you are an international and you have no ideea where to start from): study all Kaplan books(ideal with the video dvd's), after that read First Aid and then go again with the books+get Uworld qbank. In my opinion it will be a 5-6 months process but it will pay you big time later.I wish all of you good luck!

Hey anatomie ! congratulations ! you did a great job ! for some others might not feel it such a great job you did but since i have kids i completely understand what you,ve been through especially since my story is
pretty much similar ( failed step2 twice & didnt know about uw till a year agobut im still waiting for my step1 result), so hopefully i ,ll be back with good news like you ! so wish you & your family the best , now that you know what you should do i think you are not that far from 99 on step2 ! keep up on the great job & let us know your success story again!

Congrats....Am happy for you. now that you are done with this you can score better in the next step.Now yoou know what to do n how to do it.Goodluck for youe future endevours.

Its so easy to loose sight of what all of this studying and Step exams are all about... Are these board exams truly a measurement of each of our capabilities as a complete physician or is it more about how many times we can force ourselves to read First Aid.

So to first guy who told that lovely story- awesome! Most of the credit, though, goes not so much UWORLD as much as it does your wife. Thanks for sharing a nice story after a long day of studying.

Which brings me to my final point-- for the girl who asked about crunch time... i'm takin my exam in 2 wks, and I too an freaking out. Its normal; just make sure you keep that sanity of yourself

First of all I wanna say thank you for the nice words to Mahla, DrD9999, Cbear10 and to Samz.....it feel so good to see that I'm not the only one who feels that this exam is so though. Mahla I wish all the best to you and hope you will pass step 1. I also wish good luck to Samz and Cbear10 on your exam....listen guys: don't panic, don't freak out.....I know it's so hard to keep yourself calm but trust me it's the best think what you can do....if you are going to freak out you gonna have to lose....don't get fooled about what everybody says....you study so much so you have a chance of passing this exam.
To answer Cbear10 question: first two times when I failed I didn't use at all Uworld or NBME....the only questions which I got were from Kaplan books(of course it was not enough); on my 3rd attempt I only did Uworld qbank and on my last day of allowed time I did Uworld self assesment#1....I got 221/510; At that time I post some questions about the equivalent of this score with the real one....somebody reply and gave me a site(http://www.clinicalreview.com/solutions/resources/usmle-score-calculator.html) where my Uworld 3 digit score had an equivalent of 97/232!!! I knew it was unreal....It could not be that good. In my opinion: you still have couple more weeks....look at the graph from your self assesement....where you score bad, review it....and another thing: before exam: take at least 1 day off(ideal will be 2-3 days)-it will clear your mind and I hope you will not miss those simple questions which you know them. Again all the best to you guys and I hope to hear good news from you!

Congratulations, I am in the same trying to finish this before my wife due date, jajajajajajaja,,,,,But if you made it I think I can do it too, I came from D.R.,,, graduate with honors but at the time I start study it was so hard because I did not find connections with nothing that I learned in my school, after UW my mind got clear and them I understand how things are. this is the best question bank in the world....nothing like UW....congratulations again and all the people behind you that make your dreams come true.....