Road to Veterinary Medicine - AS Level

I'm going to update what I did today when I do tomorrow's update as I'm just so frustrated, knackered and fed up. My chemistry test went so bad today which has then led onto a series of events with maths and further maths that I just can't handle. I have maths and further maths homework for tomorrow and I feel so useless as I can't do it and I have come to the realisation that I hate maths and I have no idea if it's just this week that I'm feeling like this or if I've always felt like this but have just been suppressing it all through GCSEs. The only subjects I actually enjoy are biology and chemistry and I hate all other subjects that I've taken through GCSE but I'm starting to think I should have picked English literature and art instead of maths and further maths as I got A*s in both of those so I must be good at them. I have also realised that my best science result was bio, then chem, and then physics which I think is due to little maths in bio, more in chem and a lot in physics so maybe I just can't do maths at all?!?! I just don't know what to do with my subject choices anymore 😭.

Sorry to hear you feel like this! Don't worry about the update I do it all the time I'm sure your chemistry test wasn't that bad, but even if it was, one test this early on in the course is not important apart from the fact you should learn from it so you can improve for next time. I think most people go through a stage of thinking they picked the wrong subjects (I know I have and sort of still am...). I just wanted to let you know that almost everyone is struggling with further maths at this stage. I walked through GCSE with no extreme effort and I find some of it extremely confusing (sorry I know that's not necessarily helpful, but it just goes to show how difficult it is). You can get through it
I would suspect that the hatred of maths is temporary, but if it isn't then I would suggest thinking about what made you enjoy maths in the first place. No person would choose maths and further maths if they really hated it before they started, so there must have been something that interested you about it. Try to find what that was and use it to enthuse you about maths again! You are obviously capable of maths, however if you feel it would make you happier then perhaps dropping further maths for one of those subjects could be a good option. I wouldn't advise dropping maths this early as I think you'd regret it later (but obviously it's 100% your decision if you went down this route).
tbh the exact ums of your sciences I would say are more down to grade boundaries than any particular maths (or lack of) in the subject. You got A* in them all so you clearly are very capable within them, and therefore must understand all the topics to at least a great extent, if not all. If you take my results (sorry more examples from my life) then by ums I scored greatest in bio, then physics then chemistry. But by raw marks my physics were weakest by miles, which was due to grade boundaries reflecting how the paper was found nationally.
To get an A* in all the sciences, and a 7 in maths clearly shows you are extremely capable of maths. While it's difficult, I think this point in term is the point many feel like it's impossible to continue with their subjects, but changing now would probably be even more difficult with catching up etc.
You are capable. You can do it!

Thanks, I had a pretty good day yesterday for further maths and maths so I think it must have just been me feeling a bit depressed about my choices that day and that it was a one off. We ended up doing topics that I understood yesterday as well which I think helped me get back to good terms with maths and further maths but I'm going to keep monitoring how I feel about maths etc.

Hello, ever since I was a little boy I have always wanted to become a veterinarian so I have been working hard to hopefully achieve my dream. I have just finished my GCSEs and I am pretty pleased (to say the least) with my results.
GCSEs
Biology - A*
Chemistry - A*
Art - A*
English Literature - 8
RE - A (1 ums away from A* so may get a remark) - Got a remark and stayed an A
Maths - 7
English Language - 7
Physics - A
ICT - A
Geography - A
Further Maths - B
French - C

4A*s, 6As, 1B and 1C

For A-levels I have decided to pick 4 and possibly drop one within the first year or first few months.

AS levels
Biology
Chemistry
Maths
Further Maths

So far I have been doing quite a bit of work experience which I'm quite happy with as well.

Work Experience
2.5 years at a mixed vet practice (11-12 weeks roughly)
1 week at a dairy farm
1 week at a mixed vet practice
just started helping at Blue Cross
Booked 1 week placement at another vet practice

I plan on booking more placements to hopefully get about 30 weeks experience.

I've been looking at universities and I meet the minimum GCSE requirements for them all but I think I would like to apply to:
Surrey
Glasgow
Nottingham
Liverpool

This is my journey so far

The amount of we you’ve done is great but be careful with the dates, just applied and couldn’t include a lot of mine as it was completed too early and can only put 5 days max for each on Liverpool which is a shame. Liverpool also like to see a lot of farm and kennel work, good luck!!

Hi, hope everything’s going good so far...
I also want to be a vet but the amount of work experience you have at a vets makes me want to cry😂 I’m guessing you have veterinary connections? It’s pretty hard to get work experience in a vets near where I live.
How are you finding your A levels? I could never do maths but you seem to be holding out okay...
😊

Life's going pretty good at the minute although I've got a test in chemistry today and another in biology on Friday so I may not be saying the same at the end of the week 😂. I don't actually have any connections within veterinary but I've being pretty persistent with some practices about work experience. I'm finding A-levels okay but maths and chem are a bit of a whirlwind sometimes as I can't seem to do well in the class tests 😌.

Glad to hear it😊 that’s some impressive determination!😂 I’m finding that with chem too, even if I do well in lessons I still do badly in tests, I have one tomorrow so I’m hoping that will go better

Good luck in your test tomorrow I'm just curious but how did you do in your GCSEs?

Thank you😊 I was in hospital for a lot of year 10 so I didn’t do as well as I was originally predicted or as high as I was hoping for but I’m still proud, I got 4As, 3Bs and 2Cs, you?

Well done on your GCSE results as being in hospital during these critical years can really ruin someone's future but it looks like you tried hard and got the grades you needed. I got 4A*s, 6As, 1B and 1C but had never got grades like that in mocks so I don't know how I did it in my real exams.