Posted by alexandra_k on July 1, 2014, at 18:36:22
In reply to Re: aargh!!, posted by alexandra_k on June 28, 2014, at 2:03:21
going a little bit nutso with the break. not entirely sure what to do with myself. things will come right... probably just before i need to transition back to things starting back. adaptable... i am not, really. meh. i don't know if that's true, or if i'm repeating something back that i once heard a man say... i'm okay. just feel... idle. like i'm idling.
next semester will be better. i'm telling myself. trying to get into the spirit of things. i am doing a good job of transitioning into next year... and beyond... think of it that way... i am doing a good job of it, i am. and a huge part of it is the fact that things take time to set up... it takes people time to get to know me etc. and there is no fast tracking it (since whatever i got from reputation is mostly gone). so... all that stuff is ticking away behind the scenes and i don't need to work on it with conscious effort or anything. i can feel happier about it here, now, because i see it as an investment. it was a waste before... a year here, a year there... takes people time to get to know me time to get to know me time to see i don't fit in time enough for them to get attached so they don't want to let me go / don't know where i can go for a better fit...
i'm feeling... ambivalent about chemistry. i need to sort it out in my mind so there won't be a repeat. basically... i f*ck*d things up, really rather badly. so... i need to make sure it doesn't happen again. i think one of the things i need to think about is how i can get some help with the math. part of it is that i don't know how to set things up / follow the procedures. looking at the calculations that i got right in my first test... i had a big mess of something that looked a bit like a... reaction summary with arrows here and there... lots of calculations... the model answers were all neatly set out on one single line. far less steps. how? in the exam... it turned into a math test for me. procedure fell out. just trying to... free associate a little here and a little there... f*ck*ng mess.
i thought... i thought i would need to ask for help for math, but i didn't think i'd need to ask for help with labs. so... i kinda need to pick my battles, huh. otherwise... there really does get to be a fine line where you need to face up to things... not working out. time to go do something else. i feel... scared. on the one hand i don't want to persist in something that i'm bad at / something that there is no future in for me... on the other hand... i don't want to end up missing out on something great that could have been just because that last remark strikes people as my being 'wishy washy' or 'not really wanting it' or whatever. i... don't know.
i don't see how anybody is supposed to know what they want to do, or whatever. i mean... you don't know the reality until you are there. reading through the lab manual... we do dissections in the labs. worm in the first one. i feel... distinctly squeemish. i... think worms are really rather gross... bugs... the last one we get a whole rat... i feel like... this is really important. it is important that i get to... take some time. feel relaxed. feel... appropriately reverent for the life, or something. not be amongst a giggle group of 'ew gross' 'what does your picture look like?' people... actually take time to... do it properly. i don't see... how all that can be done in three hours... unless it is mechanised... do this then do that then do the next thing then copy the picture down... just being mindfull to do what the herd is doing as the herd is doing... i guess ability to actually do it... emerges... over the years. instead of... taking longer... then things getting faster... what do i think people dissection or surgery is going to be like? do i really want to do something like that? a huge part of the answer to that is... whether i enjoy things. i can learn motor skills for the gym... i can work really quickly indeed on some things... focus well... i guess i'm hoping that... once i've got a few of the basic motor skills down i can follow along with the herd better. also as the herd... well... as there is a selection process on them... as i come to trust them more... maybe i'll be better able to follow... maybe as they get to know me... maybe things can work.
i found this thing... aspergers guy training to be a doc at cambridge... killed himself because they wouldn't let him qualify (he needed to take pediatrics test for a third time). that would have been what my doc was thinking when she said pediatrics might be harder... all of the screaming babies wanting to be held... i just saw a brief article on it... apparently... he was given accommodations but they weren't enough. i guess that is the concern... where do you draw that line on 'you just aren't any good at this'. pediatrics seems weird place to draw it... lots of areas of medicine don't involve your having to have anything to do with babies... honestly... i'd anticipate having a harder time of things like cervical smears... but maybe you get desensitised to it after a couple birthings...
i suspect... things i think might be hard probably won't be. and things that i don't know anything about... things i've not even dreamed of... will turn out to be hard.
i... for someone who does go on, i don't really know what to say. i see the virtue in equations. all the association... to get to a simple, linear, thing. it is quite beautiful. but my brain... needs to be cajoled... it is good for me, i think.
class at 9 m,t,t,f and class at 4 m,t,w,t. one three hour lab every fortnight (6 of them). have some grading, too. not much. just one class lot (around 30) which is... very minimal, honestly. it would be usual to do 2x that for a normal part time job (2 tut groups). but it is a step up from only having one class this semester... i remember... when i moved from 2 classes per semester to 4 classes per semester being really surprised at how it wasn't all that much more work. when you have more time you spend more time doing things that aren't particularly efficient... because you can tell yourself you have got the time. whatever you do expands to fill, to become everything there is. it will be nice to have more than one thing going on. some diversification. if one thing is getting to be too much and i need a bread from it... i have something else to be getting on with. i feel... like i'll be better equipped for physics... focus on the equations. i've never had to do equations before... i had no idea how to study for that... now i know... setting them up on paper and doing them over and over until it's automatic... the animal biology... labs will be the main thing... evolutionary biology, mostly... will be a chunk to remember... some of the comparative stuff will be interesting... some of the slightly technical stuff on the demands of swimming vs land for respiration... and then locomotion... comparative neuroanatomy... kinda... weirdly interesting. alien life forms... alien forms of life... i think that was partly why i was getting excited about plants. know a lot has come from thinking of plants as having... immune systems... and in philosophy... plants help push the limits on our understanding of evolution (e.g., plants have interesting stuff that push our understanding of survival vs reproduction)... alien life forms, indeed... but animals will be fine... even if rather gross... i hope... i get over that...
i worry that these accommodations will turn out to be... nothing. people can be good at being all 'oh, why didn't you ask for help?' (putting things back on me - my fault, if only i had have asked). and then when i'm like 'i did. remember all that stuff about having powerpoint notes prior to lecture'...
i think... i'm thinking... it really hasn't been very good. i have asked for help on various bits... and with the powerpoint notes... the lecturers had completed them prior so it really wasn't creating extra work for them or anything like that... i have pointed out what i needed. then the consequences of my not getting it (my starting to fall behind) and then the consequences of that (drop from an A+ to a C+ grade from test 1 to test 2). they think that having the lecture notes prior to class wouldn't help me... and they get their way because they have the power to make it so. would having them in advance have helped me? i guess we'll never know. the middle (maths part) lecturer was... sh*t. honestly... the sh*tt**st lecturer i've ever had. an accent which took a good week of lectures to get the hang of... while she sets things up all alien because she thinks the maths looks pretty that way or what the f*ck ever... to teach us stuff that 'isn't in your textbooks you can only get the content on it if you come to class!' with exercises with answers full of typos (same ones she'd given out over a number of years)... sh*t. then when i complained at her that several days after the lecture her lecture notes still weren't available she bitched and moaned about how busy she was and how it was her weekend... they should make her teach high school ffs. wherever the f*ck she came from. actually... that isn't fair... she didn't seem interested in actually teaching... magical... either they can do it all already or else... ?
i forget that... the people factor. which was how i got coaxed into before... until i... found... i didn't have any people. there weren't any people doing anything i was capable of doing. math... yeah... no help carving out a manageable project...
lab accommodations... what are they thinking? they might be thinking to give me an hour alone with a microscope... or have someone talk at me for 5 minutes on how to use it... i... don't think that will be enough. i have to... undo chemistry lab aversion...
i feel... disposable. dispensable. i think that is... science. because of the sheer number of students doing it. they herd them through and... see who they have left. i know already... i don't do well like that.
and so it might just be... that there it is. and the thing is... that's what everyone wants me to believe. it is just so much easier for everyone if i curl up and die - right? either put on a brave face of 'i know exactly what i'm doing get the f*ck out of my way' or be trampled... because that's what we want... teams of gregarious people having you feel good about the fact that they are killing / hurting you with their incompetence. f*ck yeah.
oxford model... thinking... thinking... the summer scholarship where i worked well... oxford model. small group teaching... interaction... questioning... grading... personal development, even. i don't know if it is like that still... or what... but that view of teaching... i was lucky to get stuff invested in me... and i gave it back (worked my *ss off and produced as best i could and was told it was good). which was... the best i've ever got from anyone / anything, really. 'as good as anything that's been done here'. which i didn't know how to take at the time, but whatever...
i'm afraid that i'm going to hate labs. in which case... it's all over. i feel... the weight of most of the world being all like 'well that would be for the best. there are heaps of 18 year olds who say they want it with every fibre of their being so why should the opportunity be given to wishy washy you who doesn't even know what she wants'.
as usual... those who don't think much... get... while those who do... get passed over... i worry it might be a case of that...
i have a better understanding... seems they mostly do want everyone to have a degree. they do save a certain number of places for entry from that first year... they do tend to go to the kids whose parents are doctors. mostly because... i guess the idea is that they really do have some understanding of the reality of the situation. they have parental support (including people they can appropriately talk to etc) - or are more likely to, at any rate. so... if they want to do it... they also have... good influence parents who... decided to stay in NZ rather than bailing for better working conditions and better pay. so... those kids... snap them up, yeah. it does make sense.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1058481
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20140621/msgs/1067727.html