Hi, I'm just ranting right now. I've had a cold since Monday night, which I think I got partly because I was stressed over an issue involving my academic future. As I posted recently in the School subforum, I've done poorly in graduate school twice. I've realized there are things I need to work on socially, and am very reluctant to jump into another graduate program without a support network of people who are roughly the same mental/emotional age as me.
This has been slow going, particularly because of the lack of groups for people in my general age range. But my parents feel like I've put my career on hold too long and so they've been pushing me to apply. I've resisted the whole time because I haven't felt ready, and it looked like they were OK with it--but then just this week (the week before they would be due) they're pushing.
So I was sick and had a stuffy nose, which was making me fall asleep less well. I had the (in hindsight very unwise) idea to try some decongestant, at a low dose because I know the normal dose gives me a headache. Well, I did't feel anything odd, except I couldn't sleep at all, even though I felt relaxed. I took some other OTC meds to help me sleep, but they haven't done much except now give me a headache. I know eventually I will fall asleep, and normally I wouldn't care about feeling tired the next day (since there's nothing scheduled), but now I will have to face the whole thing with the applications the next day.
I hope my mom will understand--she has much worse sleep issues and cannot tolerate almost anything, including caffeine and alcohol which I tolerate no problem. And in my time awake I had a chance to jot down some quick and easy things that didn't require that I strain my brain, and that will save me time writing the first application (due in three days) But there's still the whole issue of the applications as a whole. I'm almost in the position where most of me hopes I don't get in, so I can have more than a year to sort out things before re-applying. But I also don't want to burn bridges with these schools now.
Oh, and my dad said the other day, when I said that the applications were long, that "Oooh, is there any reason you can't spend 20 hours a day on them". I can't believe he would say something that insensitive.
So I'm feeling like sometime tomorrow I could have a meltdown. And I'm coming to realize that may be what has been happening all along--I have refused to adapt to a less than ideal situation in graduate school before because I didn't even want to get close to that point (and I haven't really blown up in a long, long time, i.e. many years). But life can't be lived without stress and setbacks, hence I haven't actually been living life since I graduated college.
29 Nov 2012, 8:47 am
