Jcy:
First Jcy I am so sorry I was not alerted that your letter was posted. Something must have gone funk with the forum I use. I apologize as I answer all letters if I get them. If I don’t answer please write me again to find out why. I don’t like to ever leave anyone hangin out there because I am here FOR ALL OF YOU!
OK, Jcy, your problem is an age old one but what you are not doing is coming around like most people do. Yeah the first year we all blew it out and not many people I know got great grades their first year in fact the Uni’s at least in the US take this into consideration and know how kids are going to be their first year. I am sure England is the same way.
See what makes this going away to Uni so difficult is you have to take over parenting yourself and that isn’t easy. I think they should teach a course in self-parenting for all teens their last year in secondary school before they graduate. I know it would cut way down on lots of problems that teens, parents and the law confront because none of us are prepared at 18 to just be cut lose and not be given any guidelines on how to make this transition from being a kid into an adult is supposed to blossom. Maybe I will do that.
You are getting ready to graduate you can still graduate with a 2:2 that much of your system I understand. So you didn’t do yourself in totally. If you get what I write in this letter and make the changes you need to hey a 2:2 will be great because at least you are there to graduate. The most important thing is you need to “get it” together. It is past time and I will tell you the real issue your self esteem. For some reason you need to be “Liked” for all the wrong reasons by all the wrong people. You need to “like” you first. Other people will all go on and do just fine, you are the one who will pay the consequences. Remember that whatever you do even if it involves others, YOU pay for your actions no matter what you may think you will. I am speaking from experience I do that is one guarantee in life I can attest to, we all pay for our actions sometime someway, life never forgets anything. So, let go of that illusion that hey all the other kids are out partying too and making it so I can too. Not true, you will notice they either rotate nights, spend their afternoons studying and getting it all done because they are passing. There is only through two means that the others are able to party and make the grades one cheating and I don’t believe that or they are doing the work. Connect the dots!
So there you are, everybody loves a party animal until it is time to go home and clean up the place. You have to set the limits on you and for your life. IF you don’t learn how to do that now you will never learn. Once again you will pay dearly and everyone else will pass you by. So let’s narrow this all down to the “problem” about you really not caring about yourself. You actually put everyone else before yourself. Hey if you aren’t on your side taking care of business, meeting your needs, doing what is best for you now that you are not a “kid” anymore what are you going to do the rest of your life? You better care about you first because nobody is going to save you and where are all your party animal friends when the time comes to save you?
You are at a crossroad. Take some time out NOW and learn from what I am writing, get help if you think you can’t pull it together yourself whatever it takes but take the time now and figure you out. You have to decide it is time to “grow up” and become responsible? Learn how to do things in moderation, set limits and boundaries on yourself and learn now to tell yourself “NO”. It is now all up to you. Once we leave home there is no “voice” or structure in our lives to remind us that we need to do our homework first, tell us “no” you can’t go out tonight you need to study or go to work. You can’t get drunk because it will mess up your thinking, concentrating and ability to do what is important the next day. See once you leave home the world is no longer your friend or a safe place. The world and everyone in it will let you go down and down until you hit rock bottom. That is a hard thing to learn I know I had to learn it myself and I happened to be hard headed so it took me a few major mess ups to get it. Finally, I figured that out, yeah everybody was my friend when we were partying but nobody was there when I was sweating it out afterwards for what I had done. Most of all nobody was there to help me clean up the mess that I made of my life because I didn’t do what I was supposed to do to make my life work out the way I needed it to, to become a success.
We get out there as young adults and think there is this illusive “somebody” that won’t let us get into too much trouble, will be there if we “go too far” save us if we get ourselves in a real life threatening jam. But once that first major blow comes and you are in a situation that quickly becomes a “reality check” you will find out there is no reality other than the one you are in. NOBODY is there to pick you up and rescue you then is when it will “click” hey it is all up to me now and for some kids that wake up call is too late or too costly. Don’t let yourself be one of the “too late” ones. You are your own person now until you grow old and die. It is “up to you” and you will get the glory or the blame for whatever decisions you make and you will take the consequences all alone. You talk about learning what “hanging out there to dry” means you will learn that the first time you are in a jam that scares the “hell” out of you and there is no authority figure, no parent, no party friends or real friends that can do a thing to help you.
So, my advice to you is, first you are lucky, you may be sweating grades but luckily you are being given a reprieve and I am giving you the knowledge to wake up and straighten up before something really serious happens because you aren’t taking hold and growing up. You are lucky you didn’t die from alcohol poisoning, get raped or worse. So wake up now while you haven’t really made a real wrong turn and aren’t having to pay with the rest of your life.
You know what it takes to discipline yourself, care about yourself and what it takes to make it. Make a plan, set your goals, figure out a schedule and learn how to say “NO”!
OK, I hope you are listening and that you get it now before it is too late. Count your blessing and I will be proud of you with a 2:2 if you grow up and get yourself together. Most of all I will be proud of you if you start to care about yourself and get a positive self worth then you will automatically do what it takes to make sure you put yourself and do what is best for you first. Then you will make it no matter what.
Let me know what happens to you OK? I am here for you and I am on your side you can do it.
Mary-Anne
