College, stress, and diabetes - easy to balance or just the opposite?

[blue_eyes51988]

My name is Elizabeth; I've had diabetes for 9 yrs. and have been on the pump for 4 yrs. Last fall, I started my first semester of college and, boy, was that a handful! I was tried to take 17 credit hrs., which 12 to 18 is considered to be a full load, but I ended up only taking 14 hrs. During that time, my personal, academic, & family life was pretty hard to balance. For example, my sister/my friends would either be calling me on the phone or online while I was trying to do homework; sometimes, I'd go out & spend time w/ my b/f but then my parents wanted me to spend more time w/ them. W/ all of this happening @ the same time, I couldn't do anything for myself w/out something happening. On top of all of this, my blood sugar levels were out of control!
I felt like my life was falling apart. One morning before my final exams, my mom came in to wake me up; I'm not sure how long she tried to get me out of bed. She told me that she tried to check my sugar levels but I was getting combative & wouldn't let her take my sugar levels at all. I didn't know what was going on & every1 was worried. I reassured them that I was fine. I was just so stressed out from everything; I had to watched as my b/f had a seizure, was carried out of the classroom to the back off an ambulance, & while he was in the hospital, I held him in my arms while he was crying 'cause he didn't want me to see him like that and I was in tears along with him.
So you tell me - how hard is it to balance college, the stresses we all face, and the challenge of diabetes?

[JDRF-Team-LRS]

Hello Elizabeth,
We are volunteers, not medical folks, and all have considerable experience with diabetes and life.  You've described a first semester in college that many folks endure (with or without a chronic disease like diabetes).  Further, your own "diagnosis" of YIKES!! I'm not finding a good balance among competing demands, is an insight that could benefit a LOT of college students.

I happen to be a college professor now, and was dx'd when I was about 15.  I still coach my students to quietly figure out their priorities & then find the courage to stick to them. For many of my students, they say the want to finish college quickly -- I *wish* they'd say, they want to learn a lot so they can get a great job or go to grad school ;-) .  If the goal is to finish quickly, however, they still must find a pace that allows progress without burnout like you describe, because burnout prevents progress!  

Some students feel trapped because they've chosen friends who aren't in college, don't care about education, might be jealous of the time they're spending on their studies -- and might be worried the friendship will fail because of the different paths they are pursuing. Some students are the first in their families to go to college, so they have the added burden of blazing a new path for themselves while staying respectful of the family nest that has given them the chance.

Some college students are too demanding of themselves, and have a mistaken idea that they should well even without good sleep, without regular physical activity, and without some amount of saying "no" to invitations from family & friends.  This issue is particularly difficult for students whose parents haven't gone to college, so they don't fully grasp the need for work outside the class meeting times.  Some students are so busy trying to please other folks, they neglect their own needs.  That strategy always fails miserably.

A good rough calculator for "time needed to earn good grades and learn the material" is that a student should spend about 3 hours outside of class for each hour in the classroom.  For a typical 3-cr class, then, we professors expect that the student will attend the class (3 hours) plus spend an additional 9 hours *on this one class* each week.  That would be 12 hours per class.  

Four 3-credit classes then would demand about 48 hours of a student's time each week (12 hours per class) -- about the same as a full-time job.  You took 14 hours of classes, requiring about 56 hours *each week* of your attention.  No surprise you discovered your limits with this schedule ;-)

Many students don't plan for that, imagining that their only "real" demand is showing up for the classroom.  You might consider building a schedule for the spring term.  You know when your classes will meet, & you can then schedule regular family time, so that you & your parents can look forward to & enjoy your special time together.  Help them understand that you have less social time during the semester.  Do the same with friends & your boyfriend.  Good friends will also be on their own paths to success and need their own time for study/work.  Good friends encourage us to do what it takes to succeed on our paths.  In college, we often learn to distinguish between good friends & old habits ;-)

Finally, managing diabetes thru life is a skill we must develop and it takes the same discipline that college does... except that we don't get "vacations."  When you commit to finding a balance in your college work, you will ENJOY better diabetes results because you will be doing the right things:  focusing on your work at school, getting exercise, eating reasonably, testing often, and feeling quite good about your maturing attitudes toward doing all that.  Will there be lousy days?  Youu betcha!  And for our whole lives, even when we're 120 years old, there'll be stresses ...

I hope this helps you have a great spring semester -- from a diabetes, academic, and personal perspective.