Hello! My name is Georgia,
(@georgiadoeslaw on Instagram), and I’m currently in my second year of my law degree at the University of Greenwich in South East London. Since September last year, my studies have been online, and I’m eagerly anticipating its end. When my university announced the first term would be online, my initial thought was, “it’s going to be okay.” Looking back, I couldn’t have been more wrong.
I tried to maintain a schedule similar to when I was physically living and studying in London, which included going to the library every weekend. As you can probably tell, I’m not originally from London (though I like to think I am). With the library in my city being close by, I hoped I could make online studying work, or at least that’s what I wished would happen. Unfortunately, this plan fell apart when the library quickly closed due to lockdown.
Online Studying
I never imagined I’d be studying online for an entire year of my degree, yet here we are. I don’t particularly enjoy using technology at the best of times, so spending all day, every day on my laptop for work has been one of my worst nightmares come true. In October, I started missing some seminars for certain modules because I didn’t see the point. Most of the time, I try to leave my bedroom every few hours to reassure my family I’m still around.
However, this changed in January when my EU law coursework grade was due to be published. Many people don’t know this about me, but whenever coursework grades are pending, I spend most of my time worrying. Imagine uploading coursework for one of your favorite modules, knowing it doesn’t reflect your academic writing abilities. As soon as it’s uploaded, you start crying because you feel like you’ve failed. Imagine spending several hours each day worrying about this, isolated in your bedroom, crying and having panic attacks. This worry prevented me from fully enjoying Christmas or New Year’s with my family; I spent the days preoccupied. My mood would swing from “happy” one day to sad the next.
Anyway, back to January. When the coursework grades were released, my EU tutor emailed us to announce they were available. I sat on my bed and opened the email. In one paragraph, she mentioned that some students should be ashamed of their work, describing it as some of the worst assignments she had seen in her career as a university lecturer. Immediately, I felt like I was one of those students. I spent most of the day on my bed, not wanting to speak to anyone, feeling like a failure. That night, I tried to distract myself by organizing my folders, but I eventually cried myself to sleep. I also announced on Instagram that I would be taking a break from social media because I was so upset by my tutor’s email.
Before I left social media, however, I heard from several people from my university who told me it would get better. One girl in my year said that even if I had failed, it wasn’t the end of the world and she was sure I hadn’t done as badly as I thought. She had more faith in me than I did. @saradoeslaw was particularly comforting. I can’t express how much it helped to speak to her on the phone. What I thought would be a half-hour chat turned into over three hours of talking about anything and everything.
Over the following week, I sent several emails to my personal tutor, trying to arrange a meeting. The number of times I actually considered dropping out was ridiculous. Instead of leaving my bedroom every few hours, I would only leave at night to eat when my mother was asleep. During this time, I would skip meals because, in my head, I didn’t have time to eat; I had to worry about my grades.
The week after my EU grade was released, I finally had a meeting with my personal tutor. As soon as I saw her on video, I broke down in tears, telling her how difficult things had been and how much I disliked online learning. She advised me that whenever things felt overwhelming, I should go for a walk without taking anything with me and to always have a tall glass of water nearby. During the call, she brought up my EU coursework and asked if I wanted her to be on camera with me when I saw my grade. I declined. So, she suggested emailing my EU tutor to find out the grade and then emailing me.
As soon as the video call ended, I felt a sense of dread, knowing I would find out that day. After constantly checking my emails for about an hour, there it was: an email with the subject “EU: GOOD NEWS!!” Opening it, I was elated to discover my grade. I couldn’t believe I had been so worried about 61% (a 2:1). I immediately emailed my tutor, profusely thanking her. Because of my anxiety, I now try to have a video call with my personal tutor whenever I open my grades. I also try to video call her every Thursday for a chat and to update her on how I’m feeling.
Seminars
In September, I made sure to attend all my seminars. However, sometime in October, I started skipping them. If you were in my public law seminars during my first year, you’d know I answered pretty much most of the questions my tutor asked. From being someone seen as confident about law, even during my A Levels, I’ve become the one thing I never wanted to be again: quiet.
During primary and high school, I was usually seen as someone without a voice, always quiet and shy, especially in class discussions. My school reports would typically start with, “Georgia is a quiet and shy child.” That’s not how I wanted to be known, even now as a 21-year-old adult. I’m struggling to go back to the person I was in my first year and to show my tutors that I know the answers. Whenever I do answer a question in my “seminars,” I feel like screaming with happiness because I contributed to the discussion.
When my seminars finish for the day, my mother usually asks how my lesson was and assumes I speak all the time and answer all the questions. If only she knew the truth about this year. With my mental health issues, I feel like I can’t talk to any of my family about it, especially my mother. Even though my brother has OCD, and she sees him spend two hours showering because he can’t help it, I feel she doesn’t understand my struggles. When I have something going on, I spend hours, even days, in my bedroom. I find it easier to talk to people online, especially in the studygram community, as it’s comforting to know I’m not the only one struggling, even though it often feels like I am.
In January, I had an EU seminar with a different tutor for four weeks to prepare for my assignment on that topic. During the second seminar, many people weren’t speaking. He asked one boy if what happened in the scenario was compatible with Article 45 TFEU. He said no. Immediately after, he started calling my name. I knew the answers to every other question but this one. I tried to avoid answering, and then he asked if I was there or having a heart attack. I thought, “why would you ask a student that?” He then said that if I didn’t know the answer, just say so. As soon as he said that, I turned on my microphone and admitted I didn’t know. Afterward, I felt incredibly embarrassed that I had made a tutor wait because I didn’t know how to tell him I didn’t know the answer. Like I said, I never want to be seen as someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about and always want to appear knowledgeable. Soon after this, for my last seminar with him, I made sure I was the one mainly answering questions to show him I understood the content he had taught us over the past four weeks.
When I was 14, I remember being in the playground with a couple of friends, and one of them was talking to another friend. I said something, and she exclaimed, “OMG, you spoke!” It bothered me then, and almost eight years later, it still bothers me.
Motivation
My motivation and productivity have plummeted since the first term. During my first year, I would study every day and go to the university library most days, staying as late as possible on weekends to work. Whenever my mother called me in the evening and I was at the library, she would tell me off for staying so late. However, since March last year, I spent the last few months of my first year at my mother’s house and have spent most of my second year here as well.
It might sound strange, but I think I was more motivated to study when I was in London because I was in London. I have never felt so happy in my life to say that I am finally in the one city I consider home. I left Cardiff for university in September 2019, hoping not to return for a while. Now that I’ve been back here for almost a year to study, it feels like a nightmare. During my A Levels and resit GCSEs, I studied so much with the intention of going to London and not coming back for a while. I was only able to stay in London for six months. Since lockdown and online learning began, every day feels like groundhog day.
I could tell myself, “Georgia, tomorrow is going to be better,” and have a plan for what I want to achieve, but most of the time, I can barely get past the first task. Sometimes, I don’t get anything done at all because I feel like I’m having yet another panic attack. As I’m writing this, I have the urge to cry, but I’m holding back because I don’t want to tell my mother what’s going on, as she usually says, “I wish I had your worries.” Due to my poor motivation, I’ve had to force myself to sit at my desk and work for hours. I think this has been the most unproductive I’ve been in years. I can’t wait to one day go back to who I used to be. It just seems like a lifetime away.
Going Forward
If you follow me, you’ll know I usually post monthly mental health updates. I was amazed by the number of people who reached out in January, saying they were in the exact same position as me. I always intend to do live study sessions, but they rarely happen because I never feel like doing them when I plan to. On Friday, I intended to do a live study session, but I just felt like crying after my land law seminar and didn’t want to go on Instagram live and cry throughout the stream. However, a friend told me to do it to show the effects of online studying and how they’ve affected mental health. The other day, there was a teenager on the news who had attempted suicide a couple of times since lockdown began last year and was told it wasn’t serious enough to get help.
If you’ve made it this far, I can’t thank you enough for reading! I just wanted to thank The Notier Club for this amazing opportunity, especially Ammarah! Also, thank you so much to my friends Sara and Sophie; I don’t think I would have coped this much without you – Georgia (@georgiadoeslaw).