Unfortunately (?) I am a girl haha. Does that hurt me?? And yes I know that I should consider the geography surrounding Chicago and am planning to do that too but I would rather stay in a city as I have done undergrad and Med school in a large city and like the feel of being in a city not a suburb
it doesn't hurt merely doesn't help like it would if you were a dude
if you're worried your step score isn't up to snuff, and it might not be, I think of ERAS as the best opportunity you'll ever have to suck it up and swallow your pride
city vs suburb is gonna be the least of your problems if you're "lucky" enough to match to ob/gyn
priorities:
1) matching to your specialty of choice, even if it's literally in Hell or Alaska
2) the program and the people in it, itself
3) location
Location matters very little because you are gonna be in the hospital 90% of your waking hours. I even found a super cool jazz bar to pass the weekend in Oklahoma City.
Even if I send you to a suburb for ob/gyn, there will be something enjoyable to do for 3 hrs that can almost make you forget it's a suburb for that short a time you are free of the hospital.
Plus, I think it's better to go somewhere cheap and boring than go somewhere to spend a ton of money to live and watch all the fun stuff pass you by weekend after weekend.
I preferred Madison and Milwaukee to Chicago, FWIW, and the commute to Chicago for special events/weekend isn't bad.