Masters in English: Sem 2 Review

Taken from Pinterest

Well, seeing as my second semester of my Master's has officially come to an end with my results coming out earlier this week, I thought I'd do the second part to this two-part blog post. This semester was a game changer.

If any of you follow me on my Instagram, then you'll probably know that I have been having a hard time with my anxiety. This semester, everything seemed to happen all at once, and if I was smoothly juggling a work life and a student life last semester, this time round I certainly was not.

I went back to work before my second semester lectures started to give myself some time to adjust. My essays weren't in yet, but I was in the final stages of writing and editing and submitting. Things went in on time. And I was loving being back at work. After 7 weeks off, being welcomed back by old and new faces was really exciting. My work provides me with one of my major social outlets.

The main issue with the semester was that there was a constant feeling of I can't catch up. Lectures started again before all final submission dates, one submission date was pushed back to April. The beginning was a limbo between finishing the first, and trying to get on top of the reading for the second semester. As for the actual material, perhaps it was my personal choices, but overall we felt that the second semester units didn't fit as easily as the previous semester's had done. There was a sense of disjointedness, even if we now felt more at ease in the course.

So I was trying to get on top of the new semester, while at the same time, my responsibilities at work (and the time I needed to be spending at work) were increasing. It became too hard to juggle.

It's been a massive learning curve, and I lost myself for a long while. What the past few months have taught me is that I am able to maintain two areas of my life, until one area becomes more demanding than the other. At that point, everything goes wrong. My mother always told me, something's got to give. My room is constantly a mess, as much as I try to keep it clean; I'm constantly overtired and sleep deprived; dehydrated; I stop eating correctly. And when I stop training at the gym, then I know I've really failed to manage my time.

BUT, my results came out and despite being disappointed, they were actually really good. I survived the semester and made it to the summer. Now for the next challenge: thesis!