Insecurities

It’s Sunday afternoon. I have been slowly whiling away time. I do have some work to catch up on but I can’t seem to get on with it. So I have decided to wait until I go back to lectures and get stuck into a routine again before I tackle the work that I need to catch up on.

I start second semester tomorrow and am eager to just get on with it now. My course is made up mostly of small group tutorials and skills teaching. Last term we were with a group of people who we have slowly gotten comfortable and familiar with and this coming term they are swapping round the groups so we are back to square one. We will be with new people. The nerves I felt at the beginning of the year are back. I struggle with making friends and so for me it’s daunting to get to know new people and establish working relationships with group members. Last semester was 12 weeks long so eventually after the weeks passed we slowly became more confident and became comfortable working together as a group. Now we have to start again with new people. I guess that it’s a good thing that I will be constantly put in new unfamiliar situations. It will help me develop my confidence and get over my fear of the unknown. Yesterday my flatmate asked me if I was willing to come out for drinks with her and her friend. Usually I would say no because it would put me in unfamiliar territory and I hate that. But I said yes. I thought about it. I would have had a lonely evening and gone to bed early. So instead I decided to face this fear of the unknown and just see what happened. What was the worst that could happen right? I ended up having a nice evening. We went to a few bars and pubs and listened to some live bands and danced a little. It was nice. It was a relaxed evening and I didn’t feel uncomfortable or out of place as I usually do in these situations.

We have a community placement this semester. We have the opportunity to meet a family with a young child as our next few modules are about child development. I am really excited for this. It’s the first time we get to meet real patients and go out into the community. I am not as nervous about this. I am more excited than nervous. Although this too is the unknown, meeting patients and learning about them for me is interesting. It’s not as scary for me as making friends and getting to know people. I guess with patients it’s about them and helping them and trying to get the best out of them but in friendships and relationships it goes two ways. My insecurities come to light and there is the fear that I am not good enough or interesting enough.