Going into my last semester at Hamline has me feeling a lot of mixed emotions. I am feeling scared, excited, nervous, sad, happy, depressed and the list goes on. It has been a short but also long three years I have been at Hamline. Yes, I am graduating a year early. I graduated high school with 27 college credits. I am graduating from Hamline early because I worked hard in high school and because I need to save money. I am also sick of college—in general.

I have this somewhat irrational fear that I some how won’t graduate. That I won’t be able to pass my classes this semester. Or that when I do succeed in passing my classes and graduating that I won’t be able to find a job that I will be happy at—even though I have already gotten a job offer and I know I would be happy there for a while. So, yeah, I guess you could say that it is a little irrational.

People keep telling me that since I have made it this far that I can graduate. They tell me that I am smart and tough—even though it really doesn’t feel like that at all. They say that I can kick this semesters butt. They say that I can make it and that I can do it! They say these things with a lot of hope and with a lot of enthusiasm that I just don’t have anymore. Not lately.

Last semester I was terrified that I was not going to pass my classes but when I saw my grades I was genuinely shocked. I felt like I didn’t deserve those grades. Even though I had worked sort of hard with everything that I had going on in my life at the time and still now. I think that is what I fear. I dread what is going to interrupt me from me being my best. I don’t think I have ever been my best while attending Hamline. I even have told a professor that my illness makes me a terrible student. Which isn’t that great of an excuse and I hate using it—but it does affect my ability to show up to class and get assignments done.

I can’t control what is going to come up this semester. I have no control over the things that are going to prevent me from being my best. I mean I can try to take better care of myself but that seems to fail. It fails when I have a flare-up for completely no reason even when I have taken care of myself.

I keep trying to be positive about this but for some reason I never pictured myself graduating from college. Thinking that the apocalypse would happen and prevent it from happening. Or that I would perish in an accident of some sort. Or that I would be murdered while walking down the city street. None of those things have happened yet but they sure still can.

This is me trying to stay optimistic too. That is why I needed to write about it. Here, this is my crazy thoughts and feelings about my last semester. I will continue to try to be more optimistic with the help of friends and family. I hope they can help me get to graduation day like they have helped me get through these last semesters.

Thanks and see you all on my graduation day—hopefully.