Chapter 88

I own a 2018 Honda Civic. This I talked about briefly just a few chapters ago and honestly, having a car and not having a car on campus is pretty life changing. Things just feel better when you have wheels. You can grocery shop, you can travel and you can even earn a little bit of money if you’re a student in Waterloo. 

We did a financing option even though we had the funds to buy a car straight out because it gave a discount. This was great because around this time, a new store would open up in Waterloo. Our first T&T Asian Supermarket. It was slightly too annoying of a trek by bus but by car? It was just a good 5 minutes away. I offered tons of rides to my friends when I got the car and of course I didn’t charge them anything. During this period of time, gas money was still really cheap. 

If I was ever short on gas money, I would just hop on Facebook. In Waterloo, there was also a rideshare facebook group where you can carpool students between Waterloo and Toronto at around $15 a seat (in 2018-2019). Essentially, if I drove a full car of carpoolers from Waterloo to Toronto and back, I could make a good $60 in the span of around 2 hours. This more than makes up for the gas costs and often covers me for my gas needs for the month too. 

I was always grateful for my mom and dad helping me with the car. It was a need. I’m honestly still really surprised that he was able to give me the money he did when he did. I honestly wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d forgotten about me completely at this point. I mean, our last physical interaction was almost half a decade ago. 

Having an absentee father, you sometimes get a slew of mixed emotions. Do I forgive him just because he gave me some money? Because he’s tried and made an effort? Or do I just take this as an olive branch at face value. I mean, if we’re doing cold hard math, he still has stolen more from me than just the amount he chipped in for the car. In my head, I figured I’ll not antagonize him but won’t just up and forgive him either. It’s not like I needed a dad in my life now, it’s too late for that. Though I do imagine quite a lot of benefit from having a partner for mom. 

Speaking of mom, after that epiphany I had from journaling in the last chapter, I had just enough insight to move on with my life and get on with the supplementary test. I passed. It honestly wasn’t that hard. It was difficult the first time around mainly because I was just burnt out from my poor time management skills. While I wasn’t completely through with my soul search, at the very least now I could do my soul searching while continuing on with my academic career. 

There was one particular thing I had decided on after the supplementary test however. It was to delay my board exams. 

Most Canadian Optometry students do their board exams in their last year of school in the middle of their internships and in fact, since we were in the term right after my last term of lectures, most of my classmates have begun cramming for the board exams. 

I wasn’t really ready for that yet. I had just finished exam season and found that I needed to do more testing. Furthermore, I wasn’t done soul searching. My plan was simple. I needed to take a year off after graduating. Then I would get to work and pass my board exams then. I needed to work through more of my own issues and also, I just didn’t want to just right back into cramming yet.

I wasn’t necessarily burnt out anymore. I was doing better than I was just a few weeks ago. Mentally, I was solid. Though I had come pretty close to being okay after I came to the realization that I resented the one parent who stayed with me. I mean, it wasn’t healthy but finding out my issues and putting a pen to paper was kinda the first step. It identified the problem. Mentally, knowing this issue was already a lot of weight off my shoulders. Everything else seemed a bit easier to take in as well. I mean, I wasn’t without fault. I had managed myself poorly and the excuse of “my hobbies were a way of filling in a void that had been left from not truly having a stable family to turn to” only goes so far when you’re no longer a teenager.

Speaking of faults. You know what happens when I screw up like this don’t you? Our good old friend imposter syndrome was back. I would be lying if I didn’t mention the fact that another reason to take a year off was that I was a bit afraid of failing once again. I mean, it’s happened more than once and every time it happens I feel like I get more traumatized by it. So how’s the next one going to ruin me? I had no idea but I felt anxious to the core from the mere idea of it. 

Now, that seems like a lot of baggage still on my shoulders. I still don’t really have the whole family situation figured out and though I was back on track with schooling, I was facing imposter syndrome again. Is this really the best time to go on to the internship? That was the next step of my schooling and as I mentioned, if I could, I would’ve loved to work through all my family stuff first before even considering going into the real life clinics I was supposed to work at. Unfortunately, there wasn’t time for this. Though it was a little bit frightening, I had to make it work nonetheless. 

But you can’t really put off the mental stuff forever. 

I was still journaling and was writing the occasional passage about my day to day mental state but it sometimes still wasn’t enough. Journaling had led me to a small epiphany but I think I would be asking too much for journaling to fulfill my every need. I mean, how can I ask that of journaling, it was just an act of writing to myself. 

But here’s the thing. The act of journaling as a means to work through some of my problems for which I now admitted to having brings into view the need for self help. This was the first step to working on your own mental health. Sure, going to a psychologist, no matter for how brief, may have contributed a bit but regardless of how I got here. I was now actively seeking ways to improve my mental game. 

With that said, I decided to tackle imposter syndrome head on. After the supplementary test, I reached out to some of my closest friends in my class and decided to talk to them about my situation. This was a big decision. I was ashamed and frightened about people finding out. However, I figured that the fear didn’t accomplish anything. I wouldn’t change the past and nor does ignoring it help with the future. All it brings is a lie to myself and others. Worse of all, that fear may even take up mental space and make it harder for me to be an eye doctor. Taking a page straight of any Saturday morning cartoon that I grew up with, I told myself, the only way to conquer your fears is to confront them. 

With that, I reached out to my friends. And also wIth that, I also came to realize how important it was to have friends and connections to other people. The journaling I did was just confronting things by yourself. But that only gets you so far. We are social creatures and our biology has interactions with other people built into it. I honestly didn’t know how much I needed this until after I spoke to my colleagues about it. 

When I spoke about it with friends, the problem became tangible. It was now something I can see and tackle head on. Furthermore, my classmates didn’t even see me as lesser for what I had gone through. If anything, all talking about it did was make my life easier. I felt like I wasn’t hiding from my friends anymore. 

The more I talked about these things with my colleagues, the less power I gave to imposter syndrome. It was only scary when there was a lot of shame and fear involved. When you take that part out and really talk about it in the open, it’s just lighter. There’s a lot of positives with talking that I really discovered after I made the decision to be better at self care and honestly, it was a good decision. 

When it finally came time for me to walk into my internship and perform eye exams in a real life setting. I was ready. I knew that I had the mental capacity to handle it. Even if there were things I didn’t know or couldn’t do, I knew I had the mental fortitude to put off all the mental vitriol and simply focus on what needs to be done and what I need to work on. 

Luckily for me though, as I got into my first clinical rotation, I found out that all the times I’ve spent overseas working as a humanitarian had made me more than prepared to handle Canadian eye exams with proper tools, equipment and medication. I was flying by. 

I had done eye exams in school during my time there but most students at Waterloo will probably tell you that the eye exams done at the UW Optometry school are VERY different from the eye exams done in real life and in a clinic that operates functionally. 

What’s more is that I got a proper sense of what Optometry really was. I was here for other people’s eyes. This was true in Moldova and this was true in Mexico. The procedures, equipment and testing done at those locations were nowhere near the caliber I was doing in an actual Canadian clinic and even then, I made due. Now that I was in a real life clinic, I didn’t have to make due, I could go above and beyond. 

Real life Canadian clinics were fine to me. Sure there were things I needed to learn but I was by no means bad at what I was doing. I found my place and knew that I had what it took to be there in an occupational capacity. 

With that, in my first term as an intern. My imposter syndrome subsided. Only then, when you’ve looked back on imposter syndrome and see it at face value, do you realize just how useless it is.