Self-Censorship (Part 2)

Part 1 is over there. It may make this post less confusing if you haven't read it yet.

Anyways, there is a reason why I gave the story of me backing up into someone's car. We can acknowledge that it's a bad situation but in the end, everything is good. No one is hurt, my parents aren't sticking my head on a pole, and my Dad even managed to repair the rear bumper to the point where it's barely noticeable.

And look how worried and stressed Theresa got. Imagine how she'd react to something really bad.

Which leads us to the story how I was accused of plagiarism. And why I waited so long to make a post about it.

Suspicious...

This event took place back in April, slightly after all my papers were due. Anyone else remember what fun I had during that month? The sleepless nights, the constant work, the threat of final exams looming after the papers were handed in.

Anyways, one of those papers apparently resembled the paper of another student. We both helped each other a great deal because there was one section where I had great difficulty in, but she found easy and vice versa. We helped one another out, she finished before I did and so I helped out a bit more by editing her paper.

But our papers resembled each other too much. And thus our prof had an appointment with us to discuss this strange occurance. This happened in around mid-May.

And before I continue, I want to mention, no, I did not plagiarize.

Nope.

Plagiarism is not to be taken lightly. Anything from getting zero on the assignment, to failing to course, to being suspending from the University or even being expelled from the University is possible. None of these options were acceptable to me because I was convinced I was innocent.

And I made sure to share these thoughts with my professor and I thought I did a fairly good job of it.

And then a few weeks later, I get an email from the Associate Dean. He wanted to have an appointment with me as well.

Guess I didn't do a good enough job convincing my Prof.

Finally, my appointment arrives, early June. I had made a mental checklist of everything I had said, and tried to make it more compelling. The Dean would get the final say in whether I was found guilty or not and I needed to prove my innocence.

However, during the meeting, it felt as if the Dean thought I was already guilty of plagiarism. You guys know what I'm talking about, that feeling you get when you're trying to argue with someone but you can tell that their mind is already set. The Dean also showed me a letter that my prof. had sent. Apparently she felt I deserved a zero on the essay.

Yeah, I guess I did a really crappy job of convincing her of my innocence. And the way things were looking, I failed to convince the Dean as well.

Pretty accurate as to how I felt.

As I left his office, I was told that I would be informed of his decision in another few weeks. And if I was found guilty, my last hope would be to file for an appeal. This was not looking good for me. And so I did the last thing I thought I could possibly do.

I wrote.

Well, more accurately, I typed up an email with all my old arguments, additional arguments, rebuttals to his arguments and sent it to him a few days after the appointment. We're talking over 700 words in less than an hour in one sitting. It's another one of the few talents that I possess, being able to write immense and articulate amounts in a short period of time.

Years of training (I thank my English and History teachers) have taught me how to write a lot with little time and prompt. To be honest, that's how most of blog posts get done. An idea pops into my head and boom, I have it all mentally written. All that needs to be done is to type it.

Within less than 24 hours, the dean replies to my email. I had been acquitted of all charges. This happened last week.

WHOO.

And now you can see why I didn't share this Theresa back in April or discuss it on my blog. 2 months of panicking and anxiety attacks. She would have been worrying during her exams, during her Pharmacy rotation, during her trip to China and everything in-between. I'm not saying I didn't worry but I hide my concerns well enough that no one caught on. Calm while under fire.

Some of you like Fang wondered why I'm sharing this now. It's simple, the issue was resolved, everything is good now, Theresa has no reason to panic and if she does, it's going to be greatly reduced.

And on that note, that means any major problem I encounter is not going to be shared until I've personally resolved it or it kills me. This can range medical to academic to personal problems. I simply can't afford to have Theresa going through any more anxiety attacks caused by me. I've caused enough over the time we've dated.

Oh and on that note, Darling, remember how you were concerned about me getting ticketed for parking in that spot? I did get a parking ticket, but I successfully talked my way out of it. Everything is good now. :)

(And yes this post is late. My internet died and I had to resort to stealing my neighbor's...)

Self-Censorship (Part 1)

I talked about my recent writer's block a few posts ago. Not having the motivation to talk about anything. And while that was true there is another reason why I've been having some difficulty writing posts.

I've been censoring myself, limiting which parts of my life to say. Normally that's not an issue, I don't care about being judged by people, that's not the reason why I refrain from sharing certain details.

It's because Theresa reads my blog, and there are certain things I'd rather not have her know about.

Mmmmph!

No, I'm not having an affair or secretly a serial murderer. The kind of stories I've been holding back on are bad things that happen to me that will cause her to worry. See, Theresa and I are different in the ways we deal with problems.

When "things" hit the fan, Theresa starts to panic, becomes inconsolable, and if it's really bad, she starts crying. It doesn't matter if there's nothing she can do about it, or if everything is fixed and better, just thinking about that problem sends her into an anxiety attack. Even thinking about hypothetical problems can just as easily send her into one of these frenzies. And these worry sessions can go on for days.

And then you have me. Despite all my physical fragility, I am mentally very sound. Calm, collected and able to see clearly despite the world crumbling around me. It's one of the few talents I'm proud of. Some people might call me cold, I call it being efficient. No point worrying over something I have no control over. And in the rare situation where something does shake me up, I only need 24 hours at most to fully recover.

He who panics is dead.

An example of this is an event that happened the other day. We were going on a date and I went to her place to pick her up. Excited to finally be able to travel faster and further now that I could drive we went on our way.

And I backed into the car of her neighbor.

Not my finest moment.

Not as bad as this though.

Fortunately, no one was hurt, everyone was civil, and damages were mild. Within an hour I was over the incident and it was like it never happened. I felt fine to drive again, I realized it was a silly mistake and that accidents happen. Everything was ok now and my parents hadn't even banned me from driving.

Theresa on the other hand is still unable to get in a car with me 1 week later.

She has a mini-anxiety attack everytime I mention a car, and blames her "over-imaginative" thoughts.

So I've refrained from sharing stories that would cause her to worry about me. Because once she starts worrying, she can't and won't stop. As in, it will ruin everything for her because she feels terrible when she enters her state of worrying.

Stories like when I was almost found guilty of plagiarism on a paper 2 months ago. If I told Theresa this at the beginning, she would have worried non-stop until the issue was resolved.

But, I'll share that story on Tuesday.

Internship Update

Welp, it's time about time I gave an update on my current status on the internship. After weeks and weeks of hassle, trying and hoping, the internship coordinator finally took at a look at my application to see if I'd be able to join the program.

I've been through a lot, such as nearly being kicked out of my degree and the constant stressing out. And so:

What's the final verdict?

Come on...

Rejection.

Rejection because I was over the course limit by about 3 courses.

I tried to discuss this with the coordinator and from what I can understand the reasoning behind this is that if a student didn't like their internship by having enough courses they could still potentially adjust things in the future and change their degree.

I'll be honest, I don't care if I get the worst internship ever, I just want the experience and the money. I'm pretty sure most people are like that at this stage in life. But this didn't matter to her, decision is final, and that's that.

So where does that leave me?

Sigh...

Well right now I'm trying to find other internships and job opportunities within my city. See, the nice about the Internship Program that I was vying for was that there would be the contact information for several dozen employers just sitting there, waiting for me to contact, no searching for me to do. Everything is nicely labelled and organized.

Right now, I've found barely a handful of potential jobs. Not surprising that Psychology Internships are hard to find, that's why that program was created, to help students like me. I've sent a few emails and applications, not holding my breath but what else can I do? I've already been turned down again for a few of them.

At least they were quick about it.

I don't give up easily but I'm starting to reach my breaking point here. I have 1 term left until I graduate, no viable career opportunities, I had no intentions of entering Graduate school until I had something to bolster my chances but right now maybe I should consider writing the GRE and then hoping for a miracle.

But we know how many miracles I've been getting.

Yeah, if you can't tell, I'm still kind of disheartened. I was better but after I started looking for other jobs and internships I realized how sparse they were. And then I started feeling miserable again.

And then I became even more so when I realized almost everyone around me seems to be advancing their careers just fine.

Hey guys, can I join?

In one of my earlier posts, I voiced my concerns about my peers being successful while I lagged behind. And it has just becomes more apparent with each passing day. The Med students are adjusting just fine to their hectic schedules, people are getting interviews to whatever positions they applied for whether it be medicine or grad school or job interviews. Even my younger sister recently got a job working at a Veterinary clinic which is perfect for her because she's going to Vet school in 2 years.

And then you have me. The guy who got rejected from 10 different places (5 if you only count the interviews), couldn't get into a program designed for students like him and no foreseeable future options. Back in August I was hoping for some answers or reassurance by this point but now I'm even more unsure of the future than when I started this blog.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong, I'm not sure how to proceed, and I feel like crawling into a corner and being depressing for the next 24 hours. And I'm sorry for being so depressing. I'll try and have something more positive for Friday.

And now I play the waiting game

So I finally went for said interview and it went alright I think. It is about an hour, maybe an hour and fifteen minutes away from where I live but there are carpools around and I'd be more than happy to drive half the time or pay for the gas or something.

Preferably pay for the gas, I'm a terrible driver and not just because I'm Asian.

Haha! Stereotypes are funny!

Nah there are other reasons why I hate driving but I'll save that for another post.

Anyways, the Mental Health Hospital (or as I learned, used to be called the "Institution for the Insane" back in 1908) for my interview is in this dinky little town. I swear, this mental hospital is the only reason why this town is even prospering. With less than 7000 people living here there aren't any buses so even if I did move here for a year I'd either have to walk everywhere or own a vehicle.

But the hospital itself is nice, the people there are too. And I think the interview was the best one I've had so far. They mostly asked generic questions you know, "What were you do in situation X" and "What kinds of experiences do you have" etc. etc.. I had this problem in other interviews where when I got a question that stumped me I would freeze for a few seconds before sputtering out an answer.

And I probably sound like this.

But it didn't happen this time. In fact, only one bad thing was said during the entire interview process.

"We're still interviewing other people".

Derp.

Oh boy.

For those of you who read this post you'll remember that I lost all the previous jobs to other people as well. I was hoping that with this job being so far away and so close to the school term that others would not be interested, leaving me the sole applicant. I thought wrong.

I know, it's kind of stupid to get all worked up because they're interviewing other people but I've become paranoid. I mean, I was perfect for two other jobs involving around research because I have had a lot of experience in research and they still chose someone else over me.

Me and my buddy Derrick applied for the same research position and were joking around after our interview. We were saying things like "I'm going to get the job because I took more stats courses" or "No, I'm going to get it because I've done more research work".

He ended up getting the job.

I get a prize now right?

And with only one position left for this job what reason should I have to believe I'm the best candidate for it?

Maybe I'm being too hard on myself.

Maybe it's time to go fix up this horrid schedule while I still have time.

The first post that no one ever reads

They say when you're going through a confusing, troubling or "interesting" time in your life you should write about it. Writing allows you to get things off your chest, relieves you of that stress so you don't end up relieving that stress by stabbing everyone at the local supermarket.

My name is Damian. I've just finished my third year of University and I have no idea where I'm going with my life. I don't know what I'm going to do with this Science degree or what awaits me when I finally graduate. For all I know, I could be on the brink of failure. Eternal joblessness and living in my parent's basement until they kick me out.

I'd rather die in a car accident than become like this.

I know I can't be the only one stuck in this purgatory, there must be other people who have experienced or are currently experiencing the same things I am. Maybe I'm being too pessimistic, but I find it's better to expect the worst only to be proven wrong.

So come with me, as I share my story. And hopefully, it won't end with me going on a rampage at the nearest Superstore.

 It would make for a good blog post though.