How university has had an impact on my mental health

How university has had an impact on my mental health

“These will help” the doctor prescribed me anti depressants.

Who ever wants to hold out their hand and accept they have to take those? My inner soul sighed. Where had the ‘old me’ gone?

Those days of black cloud moments were becoming increasingly worrying.  Trying to describe the feeling was crazy.  It’s an empty void rather than total despair, although those moments had been flitting in and out too.  Feeling thankful for my inner support network, I knew I wasn’t in overly terrible danger. Yet this wasn’t something I could take for granted.

If the pills helped and saw me finish my degree then when not give them a shot?

How had I reached this point? So blue.  Not in control of crazy emotions.  I was always the strong one.  I had dealt with massive life challenges like single parenthood and breezed through it. So why was I struggling so much with the science I was hoping to learn? Why had it tipped me over the edge?

I reached out but the help I asked for mostly fell into a vortex of nothingness.  Until the University got involved and put me forward for counselling.  Oh Goodness.  Did this bring up some crazy stuff? Oh yes. 

Not realizing those thoughts I had always had were not normal but in fact was anxiety.  Really?  People don’t see all these worrying things turn into disaster?  Then we ended up knowing I was ruminating, which was a word I had to Google. A posh word for over-thinking.

Yes that is me.  We ended up bringing up a lot of my childhood stuff and how I had been parented.  Which is something I still struggle with but I know I can’t change what happened.  Only how I now try and tackle it.  They were wrong, my parents. They should have told me they loved me and are proud of me, and encouraged my dreams.

Things could have been worse.

University might not have caused my mental health issues but brought them to the surface.  Which was a painful experience but now I know this was totally necessary to move forward.

Excited to finish my undergrad, I was super ready to step into a less stressful situation with my MA which was a total life long dream of becoming a full time writer. 

Yet that very first day, familiar feelings came up.  Shocked to the core I had to acknowledge the university had been nothing less than perfect and these feelings were totally mine to own.  So now it was about ‘learning to dance in the rain’, knowing there were going to be good times and bad times. 

Riding this wave of life.  Rollercoaster riding with white knuckles.  When I’m up, I’m up.  I need to soak those images creating the good memories into a photographic brain to store away and hopefully use as my rocking chair memories. 

Knowing that without those down times, life would be flat and unrecognizable in the up times.  After a few years of down moments, I write with joy in saying today is an up day.  I smile needlessly with a thought and a stomach flip and these are thoughts I will cherish.

Exam time! Hooray!!!

Can I please bottle that feeling?

Not the feeling you have pre-exam but that feeling where you could happily punch the air with joy.
Knowing you've worked hard, put in the hours, remembered everything and generally been overly a cool geek in order to answer the questions.

Sitting at the desk, reading the paper in front of you.  Knowing you have seen these questions posted before.  Yes!  You know some answers.


This may just be enough to pass.

Year 1 and this is what I need to do.  To pass.   This is the advice I have had from those who know such things.  After a difficult year so far,  I am so proud of myself that I haven't given up and thrown in the proverbial towel.  Imagine.  Being so super disappointed with myself.

So what have I learnt by sticking with it this year?  I have learnt that university is not for the feint hearted.  There is plenty of study to be done outside of the lectures.  In fact I have learnt more by myself in the library than in those lectures.  Perhaps because my hearing has let me down after my previous surgery on it.  

Year 2 will see me working more efficiently in my paid work and spending longer hours in the library.  Hoping to get my twins through their driving tests and on the road as soon as I can so I can stop playing at taxi driver.  This is such a pleasure for me. I love being there for my children yet everything is too much.  I am the first to admit this as I type faster and faster across these keyboard letters in preparation for getting myself back behind the wheel and onto another school run.  

Still, I am left wondering what the future will hold. I am definitely sure I would love to work self employed and preferably online.  Although at times, people seem super keen on what I have to show in the way of photographs which is the strangest thing.  Perhaps as this is just something to look at without too much thought.  Should I do something with that?  I'm undecided.  Perhaps with this also in tow, it could be a paid hobby.

Food wise, my passion still lies with helping those with issues in the gut department.  Allergies are becoming huge.  What can I do with that?
My VLOGs in other countries are very popular.  Is there a way in which I can tap into UK holiday companies?  Go and review the facilities for gluten free and dairy free ranges?

The world is at my feet.  Meanwhile, I will continue to try and discover the central dogma of molecular biology while I write an essay and prepare for Biochemistry exam on Friday.  Already I have a 41.5% mark (a pass) but would like to aim higher than this.  Let's crack out a nice 60-70%.  Come on.  You can do this!

Poster Presentations

Part of  science degree is learning how to create a poster presentation.

This sounds so crazy, like a kid creating something amusing that mum and dad must put on the Fridge with a capital F and likely with an exclamation mark too!

However, yesterday saw the beginning of a love of poster presentations and me.  Actually the jury is still out on that one.  The subject was not my best love.  We were studying PCR (polymerase chain reaction) in Biochemistry.  Many students took part.  All of us with different backgrounds.  Hence my fellow nutritionists and I chose to speak about gelatin.

I won't mention what the poster presentation was about as that is a lengthy process but what I will say (in case you are a student looking for tips on how to create a poster) we were given feedback which said make it PUNCHY!

Not too much text, plenty of visual aids.  In other words, when you are presenting a poster, the reader shouldn't have to stand and read for ten minutes. They should be able to see by quickly looking if they want to know more or not from that one quick look at the poster.

If you would like to see an example, I am happy to email you so do ask me here but as it was a group project, I can't publish this here without the permission of the others. I'm totally sure they wouldn't mind but it gets complicated.

Our presentation was after research on a primary paper.  Still not 100% clear what a primary paper is. All I know is it is NOTHING like reading a blog.  It's paragraph after paragraph.  Long sentences and words I might not understand for another year or two!

So, quick learning curve ahead for me.

Make sure you subscribe to this blog for more tips in the coming weeks.  Plus a little news from me which I hope may prove exciting.  However, you need to watch this space as it's all top secret for now!

I will let you know how we got on with our marks on the poster presentation.

Happily I can report that I'm glad there were no fallings out on this group project.  Last year, we had one total bitch head which is where I'm sure my anxiety began.  Bringing up issues from the past with me.  Memories of school bullies which is more than ridiculous that we hang onto these memories and can't just leave them where they belong; in the past.  Yet it seems pretty much impossible.  Even at my age!

Week 2 getting to know you

Week 2 of University - Getting to know you.

The campus is not difficult to negotiate.

Parallel corridors engulfed with beautiful dark wood just seem to make sense.  The buildings begin with a P (for Pembroke) or A (for Anson) then the floor numbers correspond with room numbers.  Easy!

This week while there were no lab practical sessions, we found we were off for the day on Tuesday.  Dr Lauren Pecorino provided me with my time filling activity as I began to read her book "Why millions survive cancer."  An excellent book.  Quietly showing me just how much I have to learn about cells.  I aspire to write so confidently as her.

Fellow students in their minority are finding it easy to complain about our insecurities.  We all are trying hard to gather our way into finding answers to things.   Self development plan number 1 - be more tolerant or space yourself further from the negativity.  I must not engage with difficult conversations.   My plan at University is to enjoy my time,  to learn everything I can to facilitate my brilliance as a nutritionist and to keep smiling all the way through,  becoming just lovely!

Chemistry was a difficult subject for me last year.  Worried that this year may prove the same,  I focused hard on the lecture.  A new tutor nervously took the lecture.  Last year, i found I was mostly repeating memorised sentances regarding atomic bonding.  Just enough to pass.  Yet this lecture saw the proverbial 'penny drop' as I realised that a covelant bond was in fact a sharing of electrons.  Aha,  a sharing of electrons.  Now I see clearly!

Writing myself notes,  I reference into Youtube to go and look up Pauli exclusion principle and Hands rules.  These are currently another language to me.