Personally, I had five midterms before reading week. Five! Two in one week, and three in the next week. This was the very first time I had such a crammed schedule before reading week and it made me worried.. Of course, I had told myself at the beginning of the semester,when I saw my syllabi, that I would plan ahead and study early. But,instead, I waited until the last minute because I like doing all of my notes at once, rather than adding new notes after every class.
So, there I was making my notes, obviously procrastinating while I am working on them. My first week of midterms was pretty easy, Because of the snow day, one of my exams was moved. I had a steady plan of going home and using my weekend effectively to start making notes for my other three midterms. But again, life happened and rather than doing that, I worked and and my boyfriend visited from out of town. So did I do my homework? No.
The next week was the week I had been dreading the most. I had three midterms and one computer lab, for a class I already knew I was not the brightest in. I started doing my readings, and did them all day. I had never done that, and by the end of the day, my eyes and my hand were hurting from reading and writing so much. The next day, it continued.
The following day, I had my computer lab, but because of the big storm, I was stuck in Mississauga. I had gone home on Monday, since I didn’t have any classes and was surprising my mom for her birthday. The snow was so bad that I could not even get to the bus station to go back to school. Did I use that day off to study? Only the last couple of hours, as the rest of the day was spent shovelling, playing with my dog and, when the snow cleared, running errands for my mom.
Then finally came was the dreaded day, the day I had two midterms.. My day was scheduled to a tee from the night before, I would go straight to school when I got dropped off in Brantford, I would write one midterm at 1:00pm and finish it by 2:30pm, go to Tim Hortons to get some food, study on campus, do my online midterm at the library, and then go home.
At first, my day was going well, I had gotten through my first midterm without any major meltdowns and continued on my schedule to go study. Right away, I started studying for my next exam. But, the hours started to go by and I watched other students come and go while I was stuck, not being able to leave until my exam was finished.
Finally at 6:30pm I couldn’t take it any longer. I needed to get everything done with and just write my exam. So I wrote it, finished at 7:15pm and headed home. By that time, I could feel the my head aching, and I needed to rest so I could focus on my next midterm. When I got home, I ate dinner, talked to my roommates, relaxed and started studying again at midnight. That was the worst part, having such a long day and still having to do more.
The next morning, I slept through my alarms but was thankfully woken up by my mom calling me. I rushed out of the house to my last midterm. That midterm felt the longest, even though we were allotted the same time as my other exams..
After writing my midterm, I realised I still needed to do my computer lab, which I had missed earlier in the week because of the snow storm. I went to the library to use a school computer. Of course, there was another problem: I don’t actually use computer software and was already a bit iffy about being alone with no professor or anyone to help me. I psyched myself out at the beginning and started thinking that I couldn’t do it. Once I took a deep breath, and figured it out, it was simply a tedious but easy task. I finally finished and was able to submit it to the dropbox.
I called my mom right after I left the building, which was the most relieving feeling I had felt in a while.
After all that chaos, I began my reading week with nothing to do. I could sleep all day, watch Grey’s Anatomy as much as I wanted, it felt great! Although the past two weeks were the most stressful I have had in awhile, I would not change this feeling for anything.