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Too Criticizing of Myself

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  • #299781
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    After posting to you yesterday I talked about your situation with a person who manages an education department in a college setting around here, a person with a bachelor degree in vocational training. His response was immediate, best I remember, he said: “tell her to drop the class- if they will let her drop the class, she should do that. An F will stay in her transcripts forever and that is a bad idea”!

    I told him that your aim is to be a genetic engineer and that I suggested to you to be flexible and consider other options , and my source mentioned a lab technician and added that as a lab technician, “they may pay for her transitioning”, some or all of it, I don’t know.

    We talked briefly about transitioning, the medical aspect and cost. He is not an expert on the subject but knows more than I do.

    anita

     

    #299933
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita
    Thank you for your advice. I hope to pass my physics class and although I may not earn a 70, I can try to study well for exam 3 on June 25th. I will work on the bonus questions and also studying so I can get a good score and hopefully pass. The lowest passing grade is a 60 and I currently have a 55, so I need to bring my grade up by five points to pass. I can’t withdraw from the class now because it is almost over (only June 24th and 25th left) and the withdrawal date was June 11th. If I try to withdraw, then I receive no credit for the course and a failing grade. I think my best hope is to study better and pass the class and hopefully not get an F. Since this is my only class that has the lowest grade, I hope it doesn’t affect me much. I like the idea of considering other similar career paths and lab technician sounds good. Lately I’ve been feeling quite anxious about many things and it feels like I’m always jumpy all the time. I think it is stress from physics and the gender dysphoria. I feel like I’m running on adrenaline and that everyone is seeing my mistakes and it makes me jumpy and want to avoid people. After the adrenaline burnout, I feel tired and just feel like sleeping and not waking up. I think my main fear is not being able to support myself and have a good paying career to help me transition because I feel like I wouldn’t want to live if I was stuck in the body I have currently. Since I love science, I know my career path will be in the science field and I am most interested in studying cancer research and DNA. My career path and my goals of transitioning seem to be tied together because I know that I don’t want to live my life feeling anxious all the time about my gender identity. It may be possible to seek a career path that can pay some of the costs for transitioning and when I feel more comfortable with myself, I can have less anxiety and more focus on going for more complex career path of genetic engineering. This is why I like the idea of exploring lab technician career because I think that it would help me establish my research skills and I would enjoy working iin a lab. Thank you for your advice and I hope you have a good week ahead!

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Janus.
    • This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Janus.
    #299939
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    I sure hope you reach a state of calm, best you can, so that you can perform best in this test and otherwise.

    It occurred to me to ask you this  morning, do you remember when you first felt gender dysphoria, was it in high school (I don’t think you shared anything like this on your thread when you were in high school),or in college?

    anita

    #299959
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    Hope you are doing well, thank you for  your encouragement that helps me through the difficult times. I think that the gender dysphoria was most prominent in high school, but I didn’t have the resources to understand what I was feeling. I managed to understand my feelings better in college after meeting the members of Ocean Pride LGBTQ at my college. I became aware that my feelings of discomfort over my body were symptoms of gender dysphoria in college. When I was in high school, I often felt like I didn’t belong in my body, that I wasn’t really female and I didn’t know how to describe this feeling of detachment from my body. The feelings intensified in junior and senior year of high school because I didn’t have many friends that year and had lots of AP classes and exams to prepare for. I felt really uncomfortable with my body and and I tried ways to make my chest flatter. I didn’t have a chest binder at that time, so I used Ace bandages and they were quite tight and at times I couldn’t breathe but they made me feel better about myself. During high school, I thought that the discomfort with myself was mostly due to stresses in school, so I studied long hours and tried to immerse myself in my school work hoping the discomfort would go away. But it seemed to get worse, I became afraid to go out in public places because I didn’t like my body. I would cross my arms over my chest to cover up and I started to not wear tight shirts. I did not like having a female body, my waist made me feel fat and I wanted muscles and I hated my chest. I also longed to cut my hair short, but my parents wouldn’t let me. I became quite depressed and started to become anorexic because I wanted to make my body look skinnier and reduce the curves. When college came around, I was around my parents a lot less and I cut my hair short and it made me feel happy. I also got a chest binder that didn’t bruise my ribs and that helped. Being part of Ocean Pride LGBTQ club, I learned a lot about myself and how I was feeling. The club members encouraged me to explore ways to express myself that made me feel more comfortable. The first semester of college, I was still finding myself and playing around with gender identity. I knew I didn’t feel feminine at all, so I decided to express masculine for a time and although it was difficult I discovered that I liked it a lot. As I began to explore myself and started to use male pronouns in my second semester, I started to feel like I could live as a male and be comfortable. It was during my third semester at Ocean County College that I started understanding myself and things began to fit together. I started going to Pride events and felt happy because I could just be myself and feel accepted. I met other people who were struggling with their gender identity and didn’t like their bodies and I found some of them that shared similar experiences. When I realized that I would prefer to live as a male and that it made me feel more comfortable, it felt like I had found a way to understand the discomfort that I felt towards my body and it made things seem clearer. I thought that understanding my emotions would help lessen the insecurity, but it has been difficult and there are times that understanding though a good thing makes me feel even more dysphoria because it makes me feel like I don’t belong in my body and it gives me a sense that I want it to change now.

    #299975
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    Notice I have been addressing you as an earth angel for a long, long time. An earth angel is neither male nor female. I wish you could view yourself primarily as … non-gender. Secondarily as male, but primarily as no- gender. Your incredible imagination and creativity that you expressed so well over the years, that is neither male nor female. Same with your intelligence, your logic, your love of nature, your hopes and dreams, non-gender.

    Your primary non-gender identity doesn’t need to change, doesn’t need to transition into something else.

    May you find peace in this very real primary identity, relax into it, so that you don’t focus on your secondary gender identity and feel so distressed with it, rushing in your mind to transition.

    Act male, you can do that now, as you have been doing, good. Keep your hair short… wear a binder that doesn’t hurt. These are things you can do now and you have been doing them. Regarding your body otherwise, what you cannot change now, aim at making peace with it, please. Have that aim in mind. The serenity prayer says: “grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”-

    – you cannot change your body at the present and the near future, so accept it, just for the duration of the time change is not possible, or doable.

    Can you do that, aim at serenity toward your body as it is, for now?

    anita

     

    #300495
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    I have been working on meditations to help relieve anxiety and it is quite helpful. I like your suggestions of seeing the whole personality without having a gender that can be distressing. I am currently studying for my physics final exam which consists of chapters 10-14 which is tomorrow. I am thinking of going to the tutoring center to help prepare for the exam because the tutor explains things well. I dislike missing lecture class, but I think that dedicating my time to study for the exam is more important. The exam is 15% of the grade and I hope that I do well on it. I may have to retake physics in the fall semester and I think that it will be okay. I notified Stockton University that I want to enroll in the Spring semester rather than the fall because I want to dedicate more time to prepare for my science studies and for more tutoring to understand the material. I don’t think I will pass physics this summer and I feel a bit disappointed, but I will try my best. People think that an F in a class is bad and I know it is bad, but this class is the only class that I have struggled with so I hope it doesn’t affect me too much. Looking for advice, thank you for your encouragement!

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Janus.
    • This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Janus.
    • This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Janus.
    #300509
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    This class being “the only class that I have struggled with” means that it may very well have to do with an exceptional lack of teaching that characterized this class, the fact that the material was not taught, but “covered” instead. Your attitude reads positive to me, that you take into consideration that you may fail this class and that you may enroll later in Stockton (or one of the other two universities).

    Keep calm, accept the possible setback in your plans and keep at it. I hope to read from you soon, before or after the exam tomorrow.

    anita

    #300525
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    I think that getting an F in physics when it is an important class for my major may have a negative impact when other colleges see it. If I retake the class again in the fall and get a better grade, I may be able to appeal to the colleges and say that I had a bad semester where I struggled a lot. I feel worried that the F will ruin chances of getting into higher education because people have said that it can affect a students application into graduate schools. My GPA is a 3.8 and I think that the F will bring it down a lot but I hope that it won’t be too much. I do feel a bit anxious that this physics class is going to create a struggle for me in my scientific pursuits and career path. I feel a bit strained, but I am going to hope for the best. I will meditate and work on calming myself down. Physics is making me doubt myself and wonder about my life’s goals and I think that meditation has helped me bring some clarity. I don’t think things are going well now, but I can take steps to make them turn out okay.

     

    #300529
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    Do your best and that is all that you can do. Relax best you can, be willing to relax and adjust your life goals over time, willing to change those and explore new possibilities. For now, relax and study with a spirit of resignation of sorts, that is, accepting the real possibility of failure in this class.

    Maybe further (and better)  career counseling at your college or elsewhere, after tomorrow, will help you plan better how to proceed.

    anita

    #300945
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    I wonder how your exam went, and how you’ve been feeling afterwards? I will be back to the computer in about 13 hours from now and hope to be able to read from you when I am back.

    anita

    #300947
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    So I received a 12/60 on my final exam. The professor sent me an email saying that he can put in an incomplete grade so I can retake the course and receive a better grade and have that grade on my transcript rather than the F. However I don’t feel confident about the class and I don’t think retaking it will help much. I know the advantage of having the F overwritten by retaking the course because it can help my GPA and it won’t reflect poorly on my transcript, but physics is the only failing class and even though I want a better grade I think that retaking it will be putting me through the same stress again. Stockton University offered me a chance to retake the physics course at their college with a different professor and with tutoring to help and in the meantime I can take another elective course to complete my Associates at Ocean County College. I am wondering about retaking the physics course again and boosting my grade or taking another course and graduating Ocean County College and then transferring to Stockton University. My academic adviser said that an F won’t impact me a lot because my other grades are high and also it is the only class I did bad in. She said that if I chose to retake the course at Ocean County College, I would struggle again with the same professor and since I only need an elective course to graduate it would be better to take an easier course and graduate and take physics at Stockton University. I am wondering if I don’t retake the course, how much my GPA will fall. However, I am taking another summer course that is easier which is Art History 2 and if I do well in that class I might be able to make up the points I lost in failing physics. The Art History 2 class is three credits while the physics course is four credits so I might not be able to replace all the points I lost from my GPA with failing physics but I can replace most of them. Currently I have registered for Art History 2 for the summer second five week from June 26th-August 1st. I think that even though my physics professor is offering the chance for me to retake the course, since I struggle with the material it will be stressful retaking it and I only need one more course to graduate so it may be better to take an easier Art History 2 course and graduate Ocean County College and leave my physics grade at that. Let me know what you think! Thank you and hope to hear from you!

    #301025
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    I think that you should take an elective course so to graduate with an Associate Degree, and take Stockton University’s offer to “retake the physics course at their college with a different professor and with tutoring to help”. I agree with you and with your college advisor to not retake it with the same professor, in your current college.

    Reads like you are in good spirits, on the path to Stockton, how exciting!

    anita

    #301585
    Janus
    Participant

    Dear Anita

    So I have decided to take Art History II and will be taking the class from June 26th-August 1st. I enjoy the class and the professor explains things quite well. She uses videos, writes notes on the board and also posts lecture notes online if a student missed anything in class. She reviews for exams and helps students understand the material. The class is a lot easier than physics. I will likely take physics at Stockton University when I enroll in the Fall semester after completing my Associate’s degree at Ocean County College. I was at the transfer orientation for new students on Thursday June 27th for Stockton University and they explained things quite well and I also registered for classes there. Currently my main focus is to do well in Art History II and graduate Ocean County College. I am also looking for housing options near campus when I head to Stockton University. The student move-in day for Stockton University is August 31st. I am also working on figuring out how to get my preferred name on my identification card for the college and I have submitted an application hoping to hear from them. Stockton University also requires immunization records which I am working on updating and will send to them. It is a bit annoying because the doctors that my health insurance company gave me that I called to schedule appointments to update the immunization records say that they don’t take the insurance even though the doctors were directly provided by the health insurance company and I just called the ones they gave me. So I am going to a clinic to get my immunization records updated so they will be ontime for my enrollment in the fall semester. It’s been quite busy these past few days, but it is exciting. Hope you are doing well and blessings in the week ahead!

    #301615
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    Thank you for your good wishes and I wish you well too. Art History 2 reads like an excellent class because the teacher explains the material well and  I like it that she provides lecture notes online. The grind of bureaucracy, such as getting immunization records is an undesirable part of life, but there it is, in every step of the way.

    This is exciting, reads like you will soon be a Stockton university student, hopefully with Janus as your official name, and most exciting to me is the idea that you will be living  on campus August 31, two months from now..!!!

    I like your focus (on graduating with your Associate Degree) and proceeding as you  do, in an organized, planned way, good job !

    anita

    #312911
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Janus, Earth Angel:

    Last we communicated was two months and seventeen days ago. How are you??

    anita

Viewing 15 posts - 1,066 through 1,080 (of 1,414 total)

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