I know this seems counterintuitive, but my general advice is stop desperately looking for the one and then you'll find them when you least expect it. I feel like prospective partners can smell 'neeeeed companionship' a mile away and from experience, nothing makes me hightail it faster than that. I feel like that's why dating apps can feel so forced; much less pressure when you meet a friend through a mutual interest and it moves to romance from there. You will have to make some time for it; get involved with groups you're interested in, take opportunities to go out with friends and be social, be open to meeting new people, but do the emotional growth you need to be happy by yourself. If you take the time to do that, it will be easier to balance a relationship with two independent people when you're busy. I can't comment if it's bad to date classmates- it might be nice to have someone who understands what you're going through, but just recognize if you'll be competitive with each other and know you won't be able to get away from them easily if you break up haha. My fiancee is in an opposite career to medicine, but still is super busy so he understands the career commitment. Finding someone who gets that and is also super self-motivated is helpful in sustaining your relationship when things get tough, I feel like. So keep that in mind when you're looking!

Not sure if this is the right place to post this, but felt i needed to vent. I'm a 22yo male incoming m1 in a couple weeks. been single my entire life. Living at home since march has made me feel pretty sad and recently my mom asked me 'how come you've never had a girlfriend, that's not normal'. I didn't really think much of it during hs and college since my mentality was always 'just study hard now, figure out all that relationship stuff later.' Now I've made it into a really good med school in a big city, but I'm worried that I have no relationship experience and that I'm going to get old and be alone forever. I'm pretty introverted and shy when talking to girls, and I've tried dating apps/went on a few dates but never really vibed with anyone and it always felt so forced. Does it get easier in med school? I've heard it's generally a bad idea to date people within your class, so I want to avoid that. I want to do a competitive specialty like ortho/neurosurg (which apparently has high divorce rates), and I'm worried that med school will just be a repeat of undergrad where I'm buried in the books and will continue to stay single. I hope my frustration makes sense and I'm posting here since I don't really have anyone I'm comfortable talking with about my feelings.