I remember standing on the same field where I spent most of the past unnerving months. Listening to the same three accords throughout a song reminded me of time passing, of the feeling of spending time with people while doing something special together. Studying for an exam, rehearsing a song, going on a trip – and I felt terribly broken.
This was a moment in June 2020, when I thought my life was over. I was so heartbroken about people I had not seen in months, I even started missing those I had not seen in years. Everything seemed lost and I never thought I’d find the strength to do something again. Something real!
… just like writing a master’s thesis. Hanging out with friends at the library, meeting for coffee to cope with the pressure. Having study-sleepovers, taking these big steps together.
I am doing that right now, and I think it’s a moment to reflect on how I got there.
When the pandemic hit, I was in therapy, but it was not helping. I grew evermore fearful of everything, stopped reading E-Mails or opening letters, survived on weird remote-teaching jobs, and missed the people I drank with years ago, or family members that had been long dead. It ripped open all my wounds.
Back then, I thought I could never find the strength to finish my bachelor’s degree and move on with my life. In therapy, I often asked how I was supposed to do that. How do I find the strength to do things again? We ended up discussing my trauma, and honestly, that was not helping!
Then, in summer 2022, I met a friend for a post-pandemic waffle we had promised each other throughout lockdown. I mean, he had promised it to me in the hope it would motivate me to survive. It was a hot and sunny day in Roermond, in the Netherlands, and he suddenly said: “You’re scared of taking the next step all on your own.” And those words hit me so hard!
Maybe from the outside it had always been kind of obvious, but for me it was not. I was scared of taking this important step of my life because so many people I had needed had left too early. I barely had any old friends left, and my new ones to study with had disappeared in the plague years, while my last family members had died.
Realizing what made me scared made it possible to move on. I studied for six months and passed my last exam as a science teacher in chemistry and engineering. Now, I have studied the master’s program “History and Philosophy of Science”, and am about to write my master’s thesis soon.
At first, I thought I had to do it an my own. I was always friendly and polite, but I did not really make much contact to other students. This was easy, since it’s a small program and very interdisciplinary, so I also barely met my fellow students, but a lot of other people I never saw twice.
After a while, though, I could not avoid getting in touch anymore, and now I have people who are my colleagues and my friends who let me sleep on their couch when I have early appointments (they live closer to campus than me).
I often catch myself fearing all of this to end. Soon, we will all have our degrees and move on. As it is with our careers, we don’t even know where we will live next year. Sometimes I want to hold on to it all, as if I could stop it from ending.
But then I remember that it was this feeling that prevented me from moving on before, and I realize that I have to let go, but take everything with me that I can. Every feeling, every memory that I can get. Because they will give me the strength to take the next steps.
I hope that I can keep the memories, and keep the friends and connection that I have made. To remember together. I think that is something I understood. I cannot prevent things from ending, I can try to keep connections, to make my life feel whole.
Keeping the connection to feel able to move on. That is what I understood by now!
This in general was a time of overcoming fears for me. When hopping around between office job, library, and lunch meetings in a 13-floor-building, I learned to take the lift without a panic attack for the first time in my life! I still sometimes take lift-selfies to remind myself of me overcoming claustrophobia. With the help of my colleagues and friends.
My next step?
Writing my master’s thesis, which I wish to be a historical work. I could have written a more philosophical one, structured around an argument, or a concept. But you know me. I love understanding our world through its history, especially the history of science. I, however, did not end up in the magical 17th century. No medieval medicine, no early modern astronomy. In the end, I chose the 20th century (yes, really), and am at the moment looking for a topic in the Eugenics movement. I often teach evolutionary biology at the museum, so I thought Eugenics is something I need to understand and argue against. Plus, in times where fascism is on the rise, we need to have our arguments ready there as well.
Honestly, I am terrified by writing this thesis. It seems to grow over my head so easily. There is always something I did not know, or did not read. Also, I told my Professor for two years now that I wanted to do archival research for my thesis. Now I can do that, but I have no idea what that actually means.
So, I’ll focus on the things I finally learned, and that is meal prepping. I have become really good at it. Here are two examples!
I did not choose an easy subject, but I am passionate about it. And I have my friends with me. At the moment, that is all that matters.
Mistress witch writes 