India, March 28 -- Shay Taylor-Allen, who started her first job at Yale New Haven Hospital in Connecticut at the age of 18, worked there for ten years as a janitor. She will commence her anesthesiology residency in the same hospital in a few months.

The medical school student, now 32 years old, accepted a cleaning position immediately after graduating from high school, primarily to cover her expenses. At that time, she was far from envisioning her future as a physician. Even after enrolling in college, she continued with her cleaning job.

"I was working full-time as a janitor because around that time also my mom got sick, and she was in and out of hospital," Taylor-Allen told PEOPLE. "They couldn't figure out what was going on with her....