Mother of Nine Graduates Medical School At Age 41

After graduating from medical school, the mother of nine hopes to pursue a career as a neurosurgeon.

A woman of nine who began medical school while her youngest kid was four years old has completed her studies and hopes to pursue a career as a neurosurgeon. Sarah Merrill graduated from the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine in Phoenix, Arizona last month. She was accompanied by her husband and nine children, ranging in age from 20 to 8. Merrill and her family have relocated to Indiana, where she will start her neurosurgery residency at Indiana University this month.

It’s going to be a new challenge, a new experience Merrill said of her future residence on Good Morning America.

Merrill, currently 41, said her path to medical school started when she was 17 years old and enrolled at Dartmouth College. But by the time she finished Dartmouth, she had met her husband, married, and also had a 5-month-old baby. Merrill claimed she took the (MCAT) when expecting her child and planned to go straight to med school after graduation, but she changed her mind and opted to stay at home with her daughter while she was still little. Merrill went on to say both she and her spouse then began to expand their family. “We weren’t planning for a huge family in particular, but that’s what we ended up with,” she explained. “We had 4 daughters and 5 sons in the end, so we had all 9 of them in 12 years.”

Merrill said she sought to retain one foot in healthcare while raising her children by working part-time in medical research. Merrill chose to return to school when her youngest kid was two years old. She said she considered attending school part-time to acquire a master’s, but she ultimately opted to pursue her initial goal of entering medical school.

Read the rest of this inspirational story on the Good Morning America website here: