Getting up, and getting on

I wrote this piece a week or two before my admission to hospital. I just thought I’d upload it around the same time, to keep to some semblance of a schedule, and also to address something:

I’ve found that a lot of people have become interested in making contact with me after I upload my posts, a wave of messages asking how I’m holding up from people who haven’t spoken to me in months or even years. I am really bad at responding to messages from my friends, my boyfriend and my family as it is, so these messages add to a big pile of people I have inevitably forgotten to get back to.

My next post is an open letter to my friends, as I’ve very much isolated myself in the past year. It’ll address this sort of thing in more detail, but I just want to say: please don’t worry about me.

If I was struggling or embarrassed, I wouldn’t be uploading a blogpost for the whole internet, employers and people from uni to find and read. I feel good knowing that these feelings are out on the internet, regardless of my privacy, because people can and do relate to it.

Yesterday’s post, although very intimate, is a step towards addressing the stigma of Crohn’s disease and pushing the realities of the illness under the carpet. It’s embarrassing to talk about stool samples and cardboard hats, but talking about these things, even if it’s just me shouting about them into the void, creates solidarity for that teen just being diagnosed with crohn’s, doing their first sample, red faced and with nobody to talk to.

Thank you for reading, and reaching out, I really really appreciate it.

My support and solidarity to my friends with IBD. 

Leanne x

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How do you pick yourself up after months of suffering, physically and mentally?

I am still not sure how I’m meant to go about getting on with my life. Sure, I’m going into third year of university, after by some miracle passing second year. I’ve gone home, worked some shifts. Headed on holiday to Blackpool. But I still don’t feel confident about the next however-long period of my life. I’m not yet in remission. I’m doing a lot better than I used to, haven’t ended up in hospital recently, but maybe I’m just getting used to it. I still have severe inflammation, in fact I’ve been dealing with a bowel obstruction. I am not healthy, yet. But I am better than I was.

I keep having these mad dreams about going back to uni. I’m struggling to sleep through the night, actually. Many of them revolve around my accommodation: with my job as a Student Support Assistant, I get to stay on campus. I’m staying in the same flat as I was last year, the flat I spent many days lying flat out in bed, unable to move. I wouldn’t say it’s a traumatic flat- I love it, actually, and I’m excited to get back to it, I even requested it, but last year was traumatic for me. My dreams are silly: the idea that the accommodation people have painted the kitchen bright yellow, or that I walk into my old room (room three) instead of my new room (room one) and my new flatmate shouts at me. I wish I could analyse this: I’m dreaming of change because I’ve changed, kind of thing. But I can’t. As silly as these dreams about my flat are, I’m terrified of starting third year.

Third year is the first year that counts towards my degree classification, and I really have no faith in myself. I have had pretty average grades up until this point, with my grade average a 2:2. This means that to employers, it looks like I’m on track for a 2:2. I probably won’t be getting any high flying summer internships, as most of them require you to be on track for a 2:1 or higher. While this isn’t the end of the world, it is still heartbreaking. 

First year was riddled with homesickness and loneliness, I wanted to drop out and go back home, to my normal. My course was hard and I struggled to get out of bed. But then I got help: I went to therapy over summer and created a home for myself, got an exciting new job placing me at the heart of the student community. I was ready and excited to make second year my year, to absolutely shine.

And then it wasn’t. The first month was. I was absolutely nailing it, but then events beyond my control happened, and my health spiralled out of control, and then I isolated myself (again). My grades that I had gotten up to a 2:1 average slacked to 3rds. I was in hospital days before my winter exams, and then back in hospital again before my summer ones. It seemed hopeless, my anxiety came back full force, and I couldn’t bring myself to study. The night before my Family Law exam, I was in tears because I knew that this is what I want to do with my degree, and something got in the way. It seemed to always get in the way. It wasn’t fair.

But then I passed those exams. Not to the grades I ‘should have’ gotten, they were C’s. a 2:2. ‘Good’ standard. They were more than satisfactory answers, but it still doesn’t feel good enough.

This neck and neck law student rivalry thing keeps going on. The people who get As seem to be bragging, even if they aren’t. They’re the ones who’ll get the big firm jobs. It’s a competition, even when it actually isn’t a competition. And I just don’t feel good enough, even with my good standard answers. ‘We all get bad grades’, older students will say. Students who come out with their firsts.

That’s my dream. And it seems impossible.

I know it isn’t: every student is capable of achieving a first class degree. We all went in with the same entry grades.  Even if you don’t get a first, you get a degree, which is a huge accomplishment. But I want to do so well: it seems if I come out with anything less than a 2:1 that my degree is useless and a waste of time. I won’t be considered by the big firms. No point in doing a law degree then. Even though this isn’t true. I don’t even know if I want to work for a big firm, or if I want to do something else with my degree. But it’s the pressure everyone else is feeling, as law students in an oversaturated market.

And it’s a pressure I’m putting on myself. A pressure we all are, at this stage, to get our grades up and make our degree a good one.

But it’s a pressure I’m putting on myself that makes me reluctant to go back. It makes me want to spend my summer reading the textbooks so I don’t fall behind like I did this year.

It’s a pressure I don’t need, when I’m not even in remission yet. When I’m not even back at university yet.

Because yes. Now is the time to knuckle down, and get my work done, and get good grades. But when I couldn’t really control the effect on my grades in my previous years, why am I pushing myself so hard already?

I want to sprint before I can run. I am excited about my honours modules, and getting back into the swing of things in Dundee, but not at the expense of my health. And honestly? This needless pressure is affecting my mental health. I should be able to sleep without tossing and turning about the colour of my kitchen walls.

I got ill last year. Very ill. I spent nearly a month in total in the hospital, and not a week went by without me spending at least a couple of hours in the GP surgery. That was traumatic, and I don’t really know how to get over that without pushing myself too hard. And yes, careful planning and good time management will mean that I have more ‘wiggle room’ if I get sick again. But stressing out now isn’t changing anything about next year. It definitely isn’t going to result in a magic circle traineeship. I just know that with a month and a half before I even step foot back in Dundee, now isn’t the time to be stressing about timetables, work routines and what type of thermos cup would be the best to go to the library with.

Let yourself sleep, Leanne. Worry about everything when you get back. You're getting there.  

Leanne-Sydonie x