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This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at ECU chapter.

FDOC: Four letters that we all know and understand but have mixed emotions about. Whether you’re excited for new beginnings or dreading every minute, we’ve all had these thoughts at one time or another in the past week.

Sadness Summer is over and we’re all totally in denial that classes start this week. Some of us have been in Greenville all summer and are still basking in the two week break from classes, and some of us are just getting back and are still thinking more about which rush party is next and not what textbook we need to buy. Denial is basically where we are right now, but we are totally running out of time to be in this stage.

Anger So then the realization that its literally this week that summer ends, hits and we’re just mad. Mad that we didn’t spend more time at the beach, mad that you didn’t complete that epic summer wish list that you wrote up back in March, and mad that summer actually disappeared with the blink of an eye. And this week starts the countdown to Christmas break and Christmas Break will start the countdown to summer break and the cycle is never ending.

Disgust Ew. Class. Wait. Learning? Already? Honestly we haven’t done as much as 2+2 all summer, let alone prepped for our first week of nursing school or that crazy statistics class we’ve put off for two semesters. We are all disgusted now that this week starts back our routine of class, sleep, class, sleep, class, sleep and this thing that we’ve all decided to dedicate 4+ years of our life to: college.

Fear Nerves are starting to set in, are our schedules going to be good? Are we gonna have to drop a class? What if a professor automatically hates us, or we get one of those that make their classes a living hell just because they’re bitter they’re teaching? Ugh exams… we aren’t going to think or talk about that right now, because my struggling GPA is already shaking.

Joy Well, it is the first day of class and we might have classes with a bunch of people we know and there are one or two we are actually looking forward to taking. It’ll be nice to casually see everyone we know walking through campus. It’s exciting, we’ll have one less semester of classes down after this one is over. And at least this week will be dedicated to the syllabus.

Pretending You Know What You’re Doing Joy is short lived. The FDOC is not something we can really prepare for. We all float through pretending we know what we are doing, but honestly that’s the secret to adulting. Imagining that everything is going to work out and that we are going to make it through this semester easily, and maybe if our imagination is good enough it will all come true.

Born and raised in Fayetteville, NC, but Ocean Isle Beach is closer to my heart. I'm an East Carolina University sophomore and a passionate English and Creative writing major.