Stress levels during your Leaving Cert

is mise spartacus

Hi all, just like to know the amount stress/pressure everyone was under during their leaving cert, silly question I know but kind of important to me so I can manage my anxiety better.

Big Cheese

Stress and some levels of anxiety are normal. But if you feel you cannot function or manage then seek some proper advice. Try not to think of the big picture, I mean you need to make a plan that is very realistic and work on each part as it comes up. Ask as many ppl for advice as you can. Don't be afraid to admit you are under pressure....it helps

Badwulf

I had no stress over the entirety of my exams.


For the last three weeks, WAITING for my results my stress levels have been through the roof :pac:

linguist

Hi! I'm a teacher actually so my answer might go a slightly different direction that what you might expect. For what it's worth, a sibling of mine is a psychiatrist and I've talked about anxiety with him before. Everyone suffers from it to a greater or lesser degree.

With regard to the general phenomenon of anxiety, the advice a professional will often give is that keeping active and distracting yourself in general is sufficient for most people. Hence the need to keep seeing your circle of friends and to keep up a reasonable amount of social and recreational activity, even when the going's getting tough.

To get back to my proper job, as opposed to masquerading as a psychiatrist, what I always say to my sixth years is to keep in touch with me. What do I mean? I tell them that I want to know when they're getting bogged down, that I won't judge them for it and that the sooner they admit that they're in difficulty, the sooner I can sit down with them and try to help them out. One of the biggest mistakes you can make when you're down or feel it's all getting too much is to retreat into yourself. And yet we all do it so as not to lose face. So the message I give to my students is that they need to talk to me as soon as possible and I also tend to strike up conversations with them on the corridor anyway.

You will face some anxiety in sixth year but remember that it's a nice year in many ways too. Most year groups bond as the end of school nears and the excitement builds around graduation and the Debs. So keep active, keep in touch with your friends and don't forget about your family. Please focus on healthy activity as much as possible - alcohol etc is not a durable solution. Communicate don't ruminate! And remember that it will be over sooner than you think and it will ultimately be ok.

is mise spartacus

Badwulf wrote: »

I had no stress over the entirety of my exams.


For the last three weeks, WAITING for my results my stress levels have been through the roof :pac:

The waiting must be atrocious, it's my turn to wait in a year though. Time flies

is mise spartacus

linguist wrote: »

Hi! I'm a teacher actually so my answer might go a slightly different direction that what you might expect. For what it's worth, a sibling of mine is a psychiatrist and I've talked about anxiety with him before. Everyone suffers from it to a greater or lesser degree.

With regard to the general phenomenon of anxiety, the advice a professional will often give is that keeping active and distracting yourself in general is sufficient for most people. Hence the need to keep seeing your circle of friends and to keep up a reasonable amount of social and recreational activity, even when the going's getting tough.

To get back to my proper job, as opposed to masquerading as a psychiatrist, what I always say to my sixth years is to keep in touch with me. What do I mean? I tell them that I want to know when they're getting bogged down, that I won't judge them for it and that the sooner they admit that they're in difficulty, the sooner I can sit down with them and try to help them out. One of the biggest mistakes you can make when you're down or feel it's all getting too much is to retreat into yourself. And yet we all do it so as not to lose face. So the message I give to my students is that they need to talk to me as soon as possible and I also tend to strike up conversations with them on the corridor anyway.

You will face some anxiety in sixth year but remember that it's a nice year in many ways too. Most year groups bond as the end of school nears and the excitement builds around graduation and the Debs. So keep active, keep in touch with your friends and don't forget about your family. Please focus on healthy activity as much as possible - alcohol etc is not a durable solution. Communicate don't ruminate! And remember that it will be over sooner than you think and it will ultimately be ok.

Thank you, I definitely will keep my teachers updated as they have helped me a lot.

JackGM

It didn't bother me too much. I'm not a sporty nor a straight A student, so I was expecting questions I could and could not do. Once I accepted that there would be a question or two in every exam I'd struggle with, the stress I felt was lessened greatly. I did study, mind you, but not at the soul-crushing extremity some of my more academic friends were (5+ hours per day). Every now and then thinking about the exam gave me a pang of fear, and every so often I'd be thrown into a funk over how I'd never be a doctor, but I think that's common enough. I only really stressed over Maths and history. My parents sunk a lot of money into grinds for HL maths and so I was anxious about my performance for those papers (I think I did quite well in them.). As for History, it's a subject I really like and so I didn't want to muck it up, as I fear I did. I did OL Irish (How good it feels to say that in the past tense ) and knew I'd do awfully and resigned myself to that. (perhaps a bad outlook, but I've struggled with it since 2nd class so it was too late to pick it up :P) Only time will tell if my reasonable amount of study and laissez-faire attitude to my weaker subjects paid off points wise, but I didn't have any breakdowns or anything.

I assume you're going into 6th year: Don't be nervous. Ask your teachers for extra assistance if you feel the workload is too much. Consider dropping down only if you're spending more time on that subject than you can manage. Brush up on your OK subjects, polish your good ones, try to scrape a pass on your bad ones, and chill. There are ways and means of getting into courses beyond the LC.

On a less academic level:
-Avoid alcohol for this year
-Part time jobs are not recommended, unless you have an understanding boss, (and even then... :S).
-Talk to family when the going gets tough,
-organise your room,
-avoid FaceBook and youtube on breaks,
-Maybe ask the BF/GF for some more time alone.
-DO HAVE FUN THOUGH: You'll wear yourself out if you don't. Have solid plans with friends to go out and do stuff. Try not to talk about exams when doing this, for each other's sake.
-Get a good idea of, and fill out your CAO early. Know what course you're aiming for, and try to reach that. It's a damn nightmare filling out the CAO in the week before the exam. Get it sorted in September. Know what CAO codes are, the requirements for courses, and how you will achieve the points required.

I wish you the very best of luck in the coming year.

is mise spartacus

Thank you to everyone who responded, I really appreciate it.

Macavity.

The morning before the Biology exam I puked in the sink and blocked the plug hole. Apart from that not a huge amount of stress.

is mise spartacus

Macavity. wrote: »

The morning before the Biology exam I puked in the sink and blocked plug hole. Apart from that not a huge amount of stress.

Better out than in

bb1234567

The year is really not that bad up until school ends. The last 2/3 weeks after graduation up until the exams were pure hell, honestly. Cramming as hard as I can from morning til night, 2 weeks straight is bloody awful. And then of course theres the 2+ weeks of exams themselves. It will be extremely tough . But its worth it in the end. You dont have to worry about the year itself really, its not all that stressful though still difficult. Try to work hard fromt he start so you dont have massive amounts to cover in the last 1/2 months!!
Best of luck!