Kelly's World

Credit: scui3asteveo

After a 6 month hiatus, I’m finally going back to uni.

Last year I had what I would think was a minor breakdown. I was crying a lot, I was unhappy and I was stressed. REALLY stressed. In the end I decided the best option for me was to pull out of uni for the term and give myself a break. As soon as I pressed the button to withdraw from the class, a huge weight lifted off me. It was a tough decision, yet I don’t regret it.

I finally feel like I’m back on top of everything again, and ready to conquer the world. 2012 is going to be my year, and I’m going to rock it.

I know I’m putting a bit of pressure on myself again – uni and a 52 in 52 list that includes a photo every day. But I think I have the support network around me to pick me up when I’m down. I feel strong and motivated again. I don’t feel like I’m going into this because I have to. I’m going into this because I want to.

Feb 28th is the start of classes again, and frankly, I can’t wait.

If you happen to live near me and you heard a big pop and a fizz tonight, that was my brain exploding. Sorry about that, I hope I didn’t get any brain matter on your windows.

There’s something about chemistry that just completely bewilders me. I read it, it seems to make sense but when I try to apply it and answer a single question I’m stumped. I could totally tell you that butane means there’s 4 carbons in the chain (just checked to make sure and I was right – yippee) but if you ask me to draw you a picture of 2-methyl-2-butene I’m just going to give you a blank stare. After a minute or two, I’ll probably mumble something about there must be a substituent on the second carbon in the chain, and maybe it has something to do with methyl. Other than that you’re not getting much out of me.

It’s such a hard subject to really have any passion for. It doesn’t consume me and I certainly don’t have a thirst to learn more. While I had my moments of procrastinating when I was doing my forensics topic over the Christmas period last year, I loved researching it and learning the details. It was just the deadlines I hated. Chemistry is in a league of its own.

The scary part is just how much chemistry I’ll be doing over the course of this degree. Let me tell you the full degree I’m doing. Bachelor of Science (Industrial Chemistry). That’s right – it’s in the freaking title! At the moment I’m still doing first year topics, so it means that everything is a mandatory topic. Come second year where I choose all the individual subjects, at last count there was about 3 or 4 different types of second year chemistry listed. Oh dear god.

I know I complain a lot on here about chemistry, especially during last term when I was lucky to pass. I also understand this degree is required in order to get my dream job (I saw it advertised this week, and yep, Bach of Science was listed). But hey, just like the definition of my blog – I just can’t keep the thoughts inside my head!

I guess I’ll suck it up and get back to it then hey?

In the last week I’ve managed to let my study drop a little bit, but I was back to it tonight. I managed to finish the next chapter of my study, and most of it made sense too, hooray! Trust me, when it comes to chemistry that’s a pretty big achievement. Tomorrow night I’ll watch two lectures just to make sure I’ve really cemented the topic in my mind before I move onto the next chapter.

I’m also going to have to make myself some little flash cards to help with my memory, and maybe even stick up some print outs in the wall in my bedroom. I have four a4 pages of common functional groups for organic compounds to remember, and there’s no way I’m going to be able to that without constant exposure! If anyone has any tips on how to remember copious amounts of information I’d love to hear it!

The main thing is to make sure I don’t end drop everything until the last second again, where I end up looking this sexy when I try to cram it all into my brain before the exam:

She's totally rocking the glasses/pencil in mouth look

Not to mention I have a good friend (no names, ahem…Jo) who can’t wait to say “I told you so” when it comes to the first assessment piece and I’m struggling to catch up. Being able to prove Jo wrong is all the motivation I need to keep up with the study load…thanks Jo!

If you’re new to my blog, you should know that I work full time and study part time via flex at home at night. It can be incredibly draining. Also, this year I became newly single and began to discover myself at the same time. As a result my studies took a back seat and were neglected in a major way. At the end of the term and over the course of 3 days I attempted to learn an entire semester’s worth of content in preparation for an exam worth 60% of my overall marks.

It was a big ask.

Back at the start of June and at the conclusion of my exam I blogged about how thankful I was the term was over, and that even if I failed I really didn’t care. I had accepted that I had completely and utterly pushed my luck this time, and that cramming wasn’t going to pay off. I decided that I was destined to fail, and that it was payback for letting myself lose sight of my long term prospects. It’s quite possible that reaching this level of understanding and accepting responsibility for my actions saved me…if you believe in karma and that sort of thing.

I passed.

Just barely, but I passed. I got a grade of “P”, and after spending some time googling grading levels I discovered that P was indeed a pass. Initially I thought “p” for “pass” was a bit too obvious and therefore couldn’t be right. But alas, it proved to be the case, and I immediately celebrated my results on twitter.

Since then, after chatting with a fellow classmate I found out that the subject has a fail rate of 40%, which makes my achievement even more formidable in my mind. I know wholeheartedly the reason I didn’t do better in this subject is not because I found the content beyond me. It’s purely a case that I left everything to the last minute, I didn’t apply myself, and I was incredibly lazy. In my mind, learning a semester’s worth of knowledge over the course of a long weekend combined with passing a topic with a high failure rate proves that my mind isn’t too shabby at all! In a sick and twisted way, I’m almost proud of myself.

Let it be said though – this is the scare I needed. I’m not ever going to put myself under that same amount of pressure ever again. I didn’t enjoy it, and I reached breaking point.

Never again.

Today I sat down for my end of term chemistry exam, worth 60% of my overall grade for the term. I’m pretty sure I failed.

I should care, but I don’t.

This term has been bloody hard on me. Chemistry at the best of times is a tough subject, and has an incredibly steep learning curve. It demands time and dedication to simply grasp the concepts before you even begin to expand upon them, otherwise your brain will explode. I’m sure of it. No doubt there’s some way to explain that the covalent bonds in your brain would be severed due to the excitement of other atoms that then cause the entire thing to simultaneously combust.

That’s probably why I failed. I just tend to make it up and hope for the best.

I have probably gone through my biggest life change in the last few months, all while attempting the most difficult subject of my uni degree thus far. As a person I have grown tremendously, and I have learned a heck of a lot about myself. Unfortunately, the other side of it was that I had no motivation or desire to dedicate the time to chemistry that it deserved. Not to mention the fact that I work on computers for 8 hours a day for a full time job, coming home to sit in front of a computer again is often the last thing I want to do.

At this stage I’m not sure what I’m doing next term. I’m seriously contemplating giving myself a term off and just taking a break. I know I’m not good at the “break” thing, I”ll be bored within weeks, but that might be exactly what I need right now in order to build up the motivation and desire again to sacrifice so much of my time towards uni again. It’s definitely something I hope to achieve at some point, but personal development could quite possibly be more important right now. After all, I’m not going to succeed if I’m not happy and settled, am I? I don’t want to find that in 6 months time I’m in the exact same position again and I haven’t learned anything. I’m not a fan of the whole “failure” thing, it doesn’t look good on me.

Plus it doesn’t match my eyes.

Tonight I’m seeing a friend who I haven’t seen in a LONG, long time, and I’m totally excited. We’re simultaneously toasting the combination of seeing each other for the first time in years along with the conclusion of my uni term. Needless to say, there will be plenty of drinks consumed tonight. After spending almost 24 hours studying chemistry in front of the computer over the last 72 hours instead of having a weekend, I definitely need to let my hair down.

I think now is a good time to turn on the stereo and open my first drink. Why wait?