I feel as if I'm losing the plot...

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I'm starting to become really worried that this year (I'm in Year 13, in 6th form) that I'm going to burn out and not do very well in my exams at all. This is because A-levels have proved a real challenge for me, and whilst I got good results last year, I'm really not sure if I'm going to meet my university offers. My offers range from ABB to AAA but I'm actually quite worried I'm going to get 2 C's in two of my A-levels (I'm doing 4, and one of those is a whole A-level being done this year). In Year 12 I put in LOTS of work and tried to rise above everyone else by doing 20 hours a week of study in my own time, but now I'm doing about 10 (which is only a bit more than is required and not a lot more than is required. I've been finding Year 13 a major emotional challenge as well, and this is because my overly panicking and worrying about not getting an A grade in something has clouded and fogged my rational ability to actually get that grade. For example, I'm really upset about my Physics coursework because I got a B in it last year (I got 29 out of 40) even though I feel I worked very hard towards it, and now I've got another piece that needs to be finished tomorrow and something's telling me that regardless of how much effort I'll put into it, I will never get the A grade I wanted. And my teacher told me "that's life" but I don't want to think this, because I want life to go just the way I want it to, and just because people often say life isn't easy should not be an automatic reason for obstacles to make it any more difficult.

People are always saying to me "you can only do your best", but I always find that hard to believe, because for some reason I have a proverbial authority in my head that automatically says to me "I'm very disappointed with you" if I don't get the result I want. How can I rid myself of this? It isn't helping me in any way and all it's doing is making me beat myself up over not getting the result I would rather have preferred. It's even making me think that if I don't get 4 A's at A-level then I am a failure, because at GCSE I got exceptional results (my lowest grade was an A!) and people have known me for getting really high marks.

Does anyone else on here have problems with thinking rationally in academia? I would like to hear your contribution to this thread if you have had similar experiences.

I frequently worry over what grades I will get in exams. I have mocks coming up next week and even though I have revised a bit I know I won't be comfortable in them unless I revise for hours over the weekend. I wouldn't get stressed about it though. As long as you try your hardest and don't panic then you should be fine. At least that's what I tell myself. I remember you posting last year about your AS-levels. Anyways maybe it isn't such a good idea to focus on your GCSE results, no matter how good they were. After all A-levels are in a whole different league. I certainly don't focus on mine.
Good luck with your coursework btw.

Yup, I burnt out last year, in my first year at university. The first semester was intensely competitive, with around 550 people at each others' throats for 75 places in the vet school. We were made to feel like it wasn't about doing our personal best, or getting an A, it was about doing better than everyone else - which I didn't cope too well with (I know now that that's because I have AS). Basically, I pushed myself too hard - and to top it all off, I was struggling socially, and starting to become aware that I had AS - which was also a big stress because I knew that there'd never been anyone on the spectrum accepted into vet school before, and I was hearing rumours that they were a bit picky about people having the right level of social skills and whatnot. By the end of the year, I was psychotic, purely from the stress of it all.

Looking back, I can definitely see where I went wrong. I won't bother being modest (because that's a silly social convention, and who needs them?! ) when I say that I know my academic ability was probably more than enough, and I probably would have gotten even better marks if I'd just let myself relax a bit. By the sounds of it, you're probably in the same boat - that is, perfectly capable of achieving academically.

Most of my fears turned out to be unfounded. I got into vet school, they didn't assess our social skills or anything horrible, the actual course was everything I'd hoped for and more, and now I get to spend the next 4 years focusing on my special interest at a high level!

So I guess all I can say is, for GOODNESS SAKE, relax! You can still work hard and push yourself, but if you can do it in as stress-free a frame of mind as possible, it'll be a whole lot better for everyone, especially you! Don't worry about how you're going to do in the next assessment all the time, just focus on the here-and-now and what you're doing at the present moment, and do that to the best of your ability. One of the mistakes I made was finding myself coming out of an exam and not even letting myself breathe a sigh of relief that it was over before starting to stress about the next one.

Don't let other people get to you either. I now suspect, looking back, that the impression I'd been given about vet school potentially being iffy about Aspies was from other people who picked up that I had a bit of a deficit in the area of social skills and was a little sensitive about it, and decided to exploit it and destroy my self-confidence. That first semester was like a pit of snakes...snakes with razor blades on their tails... I don't know what your working environment is like, but I hope you can stand back and take an objective look at it if it's getting to you. Whatever you do, do NOT compare yourself to other people!

Give yourself breaks when you need them - even an iPhone needs to recharge its batteries! (w00t! Geek metaphor! )

And good luck!

Exactly.

It's just that I set the bar so high for myself with my results (which were 10 A* and 4 A grades, I wasn't expecting them to be THAT good!). For some reason I don't feel that the qualifications are getting harder (they are, but I would consider myself as intelligent and can adjust to the new needs of getting a certain grade in a new qualification) but I'm just getting worse. I know that this is the wrong 'relative' approach but I don't know how to click my fingers and just get rid of that mentality. I'm soon going to start having cognitive behavioural therapy so that might help a lot.