Week one was a series of ups and downs...
Monday went relatively smoothly. Got to the school in good time, parking was smooth, made it to the right classrooms, etc. I was extremely surprised (pleasantly) by the few classes we had that day-I really hate to say this in fear of what may lie ahead-but I was a bit underwhelmed. I left that day feeling like I had missed something. I expected to be nearly in tears, needing to study for 10 hours that evening, and feeling like I'd gotten myself in too deep.
Tuesday was a bit more like it. I felt challenged by some of the topics, but still not overwhelmed. I certainly needed to study, but it was all do-able. And to reflect on my previous post, at this point I STILL had not received any of my financial aid. Rent is due tomorrow. I think that was more stressful than the classes themselves.
Wednesday was bad. I was not happy. I threw myself a pity party. I wasn't to the point of crying just yet, but I definitely shut down. Thank goodness Wednesdays are half-price fajita night at Pappasitos, and you just can't leave Pappasitos without having had a margarita. I might have had no money, but at least the margarita provided some temporary sanity and made it bearable for a short period of time. It was especially nice to do something not school-focused.
Thursday was better. I finally got some of the financial aid money, and the classes didn't seem quite as overwhelming. I was still trying to figure out how I was going to study best and I still needed my routine, but it was at least coming in bits and pieces.
Friday was pretty good. Only 1 class and 1 lab, plus I got to relax and go to lunch with some friends. And I made it through anatomy lab! Yay! The smell was a bit intense, but I did better than I thought I'd do. As far as the smell goes, I changed clothes when I got out of lab before I drove home, changed again when I got home, worked out and ran for 45 minutes, showered with scented shampoo and body wash...and was still catching whiffs of the preservative solution that night. I'm going to have to find some mechanism to deal with that one...
Saturday I met with my study group for the first time. There is just so much material to cover, that if we tried to do it all individually and do it as thoroughly as we'd all like, we wouldn't sleep and we'd be eating apples while we shower like Holly. The point of the study group (as I learned...) is to help sort through the abundance of information and get it into some format that's easier to study, while still making sure you hit all the objectives. Getting it from paper to brain is of course still all on the individual, but this helps immensely. Plus, we're all as type-A as eachother, so it works out pretty well. I left that meeting really feeling like this might all be possible! Holy crap, did I really just have that realization!? That meeting made the weekend (a 3-day weekend thanks to Labor Day, I might add!) much less stressful. I honestly think I was way more productive than I'd have been without that meeting-I'd have simply been overwhelmed.
So the good news is...I made it through week one and I'm fairly optimistic! Yay! I don't really have any bad news about that week, but the ugly news is that it's only week one of fifteen. Oh well, one week at a time. :)
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