Slothly does it for a wannabe scientist...Uni 1st year GYG.

Auntie_Autie2019

Hi!!

So I'm Auntie Autie or Autie for short. I can't think of any other pseudoname at the moment so will settle with this for the time being. This is my first GYG blog as I have only just discovered it here on TSR. I think it's a great idea and I'm starting one to try and make myself accountable, track my progress and share any challenges and little wins.

About Me

I am a mature student and a mum (also a wife too) and have spent many years feeling unfulfilled with the sense that something is missing. Fairly recently I was diagnosed as autistic. This seemed to provide answers to a lot of questions, in particular why I couldn't seem to make my life work properly and be truly happy. Since the diagnosis I have been working on trying to fully discover myself and what I am meant to be doing. While preparing for my ASD assessment, my family filled me in on a few things and one thing that really struck me was the old school reports that always highlighted my keen interest and enthusiasm in anything science. I did originally attempt to pursue this area but when I first attended university at 18, I was nowhere near ready or prepared. Back then it was 'the done thing' and I felt like I had no other choice. Even when it was obvious that it wasn't working out, the pressure of not failing resulted in me try to kid myself (and others) that if I kept trying then it would work out. *Spoiler alert* It didn't. The only thing I successfully did was to waste a lot of time and money. :sadnod:

Now that I finally know I'm autistic things are changing. I no longer pressure myself in the same way to do things and having learned about the potential support now available to me, I finally feel ready to tap into my special interests in science and achieve my full potential. :woo:

Qualifications
(I won't go into any old details with regards to qualifications as I don't feel they are particularly relevant anymore).

Spoiler

Days to Induction: 6
Days to Freshers Fair: 7
Days to first Lecture: 12

(edited 2 years ago)

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Reply 1

flaurie

Volunteer Team

Ooh wishing you all the best :yep:

Good luck!

Volunteer Team, Clearing and Applications Advisor

Good luck! :yy:

Reply 4

Auntie_Autie2019

Thank you. Let me know know if any of you want to be tagged in updates.

Reply 5

5hyl33n

Volunteer Team, Clearing and Applications Advisor

Original post by Auntie_Autie2019

Thank you. Let me know know if any of you want to be tagged in updates.

Tag me, please! :smile:

Reply 6

joanneg76

Original post by Auntie_Autie2019

Hi!!

Qualifications
(I won't go into any old details with regards to qualifications as I don't feel they are particularly relevant anymore).

Spoiler

Days to Induction: 6
Days to Freshers Fair: 7
Days to first Lecture: 12

Nice to hear about your background and how you got to this point. Best of luck and tag me in so I can keep up with your journey 🙂

Reply 7

Cote1

Delighted to be tagged.

Reply 8

Auntie_Autie2019

*Update 1*

So I'm doing my first update since my introductory post to start my blog and I can't believe almost a week has passed already. Where is the time going?? I'll be working on essays and portfolios before I know it!! :woo:

So not a massive amount has really happened. :no:

I've been very lazy and boring. On Friday I had an initial meeting with the people who will arrange my specialist mentoring, I finally discovered my Needs Assessment Report had actually been sent but my copy somehow found its way into my 'Junk' folder. Actually quite annoying as I did have that organisation saved under my contacts so really it should have come straight to my inbox. Anyway, when I tried following it up with Student Finance they couldn't tell me if it had arrived safely with them or not. Not helpful at all!! I think I will try and chase it again with them tomorrow. I really want it sorted asap.

Today was the first day of induction on campus and tomorrow is basically an outdoors freshers fair. :clap2:

Let's hope for some good (and sunny) British weather. It all seems to be going ok so far, despite the nerves, and my course size is pretty small. The plus side to that is fewer overwhelming lectures with any luck and more likely to remain within various Covid guidelines. Induction will continue on Thursday online and another on campus session on Friday. So it's turning into a pretty busy week. Will probably update again on the weekend.

Days to Freshers Fair: 1
Days to first Lecture: 6

Tags

Spoiler

Reply 9

flaurie

Volunteer Team

Hope you enjoy the freshers fair!

Reply 10

Cote1

Was the induction today online?
Do you have far to go to travel to the outdoor freshers fair?
Annoying that it went in your junk folder.

Reply 11

Auntie_Autie2019

Original post by flaurie

Hope you enjoy the freshers fair!

Thank you!! :smile:

Reply 12

Auntie_Autie2019

Original post by Cote1

Was the induction today online?
Do you have far to go to travel to the outdoor freshers fair?
Annoying that it went in your junk folder.

No I went onto campus yesterday. It should only take about 25 minutes to drive over to uni for Freshers today. Yeah it was frustrating that such an important email and document went to my junk folder. At least I found it though.

Reply 13

Golden Crow

Well done on getting back in education and finding your path. I know it's not always easy, and can take quite a lot of time before figuring out what the best choice is for you, but I'm glad you've made that possible. It's a huge achievement. :congrats:

Hope you have fun in the freshers fair, and keep us updated!

Reply 14

Auntie_Autie2019

Original post by Golden Crow

Hope you have fun in the freshers fair, and keep us updated!

Hi, thank you so much for your reply. Sorry it's taken me so long to respond. I'm about to write an update now in order to explain everything that's been happening. :smile:

Reply 15

Auntie_Autie2019

*Update 2*

Hi everyone!! Apologies for being MIA for so long. Yes so last time I was here was several weeks ago during induction/freshers week. Well absolutely loads has happened since then and it's been pretty exhausting at times. So lectures for me started at the end of September which was Week 13 in the University calendar. Tomorrow is the start of Week 16 so are about to go into the 4th week of teaching. I can't believe how fast it's going already. I will now give a brief overview of Weeks 13, 14 and 15 so you can have an idea of what I've been up to.

Week 13

A fairly light week as I prepared (mostly mentally) for an incredibly busy week to follow. I had a lecture first thing Monday morning for 1 hour followed by nothing until the Thursday. I had to go straight home after my lecture as we were picking up a new car. In the middle of the petrol crisis. Stressful was an understatement!!! Luckily for us there was a big tanker delivery of fuel at the supermarket right next to the car dealer at the same time we arrived. Good thing too as the new car only had a few miles worth of fuel in it when we drove away. Anyway new car is lovely and we are very happy with it.

Another huge stress to deal with was all the emails from my child's school to inform us that Covid was basically ripping through the classes. This was really not good as none of us could afford to catch Covid and/or self isolate for 10 days. Anyway it was a very nervy time as I did my twice weekly lateral flow tests plus waiting on PCR test results for my child taken on advice from the school. Thankfully all negative and we carried on as normal.

Thursday's lectures were pretty awesome although the weather at this point was bad. Soooooo much rain!!! We all had to dash in wet conditions from Lower to Upper campus between lectures. I also got to take the new car to uni that day which was nice.

Sunday was a day of seeing family I'd not seen since at least 2019, plus a nervous wait for a negative LFT followed by a very stressful afternoon and evening of packing to go away. Yeah I waited until the last minute to do everything because I was convinced that stupid Covid was going to spoil everything. :cry2:

Week 14

So Monday morning arrived after very little sleep after horrendous levels of anxiety. The time had finally come to go on a residential field trip to Pembrokeshire for my uni course. Talk about throwing us all in at the deep end straight off. :woo:

So I made my way to the campus by taxi and everyone seemed to succeed in all becoming drowned rats before we even left!!! Yeah the rain that morning was BAAAAAAADDDD!!! Anyway apart from all being damp, we got away on the coach on time (9am) and all went well. In the afternoon we went for a walk in our new surroundings for the week and had a practical lesson on identifying plants and an introduction to binocular use. The evening was spent settling in and then an evening lecture on animal tracking and camera trapping etc. The first night there I was really struggling and hardly slept. Tuesday, we followed some live-streamed lectures that were happening back at uni and we also went out to the woods to set down a number of (humane) animal traps. All animals that come across them are able to come and go as they please but they do get some peanuts as a treat unless the squirrels have eaten them all. :lol:

In the evening we had a lecture on bats and then we went out at dusk to find some. :animal:

Wednesday we went for a exploratory walk through some woods, followed by sand dunes and the beach. That was a really interesting field day and the weather was really nice too. On Thursday we had a lesson on seals and then we went on a coach trip to the coast to observe and count some grey seals and their pups. This was good but it was SO windy on the cliff edge. :shock:

Thursday evening we went out to listen for bats again. I also did most of my packing to return home on the Friday. So the last day was spent cleaning and vacating the accommodation. I also did a LFT that morning as I started to feel very unwell. I was very congested and had a sore throat and ears. It was negative so I was satisfied it was a cold. Before we departed, we went back to the woods to collect our traps and equipment that we had set up earlier in the week. This did not take long and we departed for our return to uni on time (1pm). Although I had a good field trip away, I couldn't wait to get home, see my family (I hadn't been away from daughter for more than 1 night before this) and fur babies, sleep in my own bed and run things more to my own schedule again. So I did absolutely NOTHING that weekend as I had come home with a stinking head cold, although I did go to a drive through site for a PCR test on the Sunday morning. I had to try and rest up and recover as much as possible. Sunday evening my PCR result came back and it was negative thank goodness.

Week 15

Monday I was still feeling pretty rubbish so I stayed home and missed my first lectures of the week sadly. :sadnod:

I basically slept all day and then decided that missing uni meant falling behind very quickly so I was determined not to miss any more. I went in early Tuesday morning on the bus and train, grabbed a coffee on campus and then went to my first lecture of the day. All was good (the sun was shining too although it was cold at 7.30am :snow:

) and I went out for lunch inbetween my lectures. All went great until the afternoon lecture, as it turned out we were being assessed for this practical. We have to work with the raw data we collected during the 2 hours (which was nowhere near long enough) to do more calculations and graphs etc. That's due to be submitted the week after next and I'm going to try and look at that later this evening. Wednesday, I had another mentoring session so I went through some of my stresses and concerns which was helpful. Thursday morning I was back on campus for lectures in Biogeosciences and Natural History and they both went well. I then went to the library and selected my first books to borrow for an essay.

Anyway that's pretty much it from me for the time being. This was a very long update so I will try and update more frequently in future. :clap2:

Spoiler

(edited 2 years ago)

Reply 16

Cote1

Your update illustrates the stress Covid adds to life. Do you feel that you are slowly settling in?
Has the Access course prepared you well for this?

(edited 2 years ago)

Reply 17

Auntie_Autie2019

Original post by Cote1

Your update illustrates the stress Covid adds to life. Do you feel that you are slowly settling in?
Has the Access course prepared you well for this?

Yes definitely and I am so fed up of testing but willing to do it to continue face to face on campus lectures and also travel. I have however had my first proper cold in about 2 years which is impressive as I usually have one at least annually. I was unwell last September but I think it was viral tonsillitis because I tested negative for Covid.

I am kind of settling in but it has been super overwhelming at times. The Access course was good but it hasn't prepared me very well for 'in person' lectures and commuting etc. I've going from travelling once a week maximum to at least 3 times a week nkw whoch is a fair jump. Sometimes I travel in on public transport and other times I take the car. It's great to be on campus and have proper face to face lectures but I'm not really used to it so it's pretty draining.