There's No Crying in Mass Comm

Just as I thought I was getting out of my funk. I was slapped in the face with a big fat problem. As you know from Monday's post, I finished my paper for my historical methods class. But that just means I have to totally switch gears into mass comm theory and PR cases.

So here's the story:

I had class last night just like always. I turned in a 6-page essay test. I received an 89 percent on the literature review I turned in last week. And the professor started talking about the final paper. She passed out a salmon colored handout with the guidelines for the paper on it. And she begins to explain it.

As she's explaining, my forehead begins to twist into a permenant furrowed brow. I'm not understanding...completely not following the path she's trying to explain. I could feel my face getting hot and the panic setting in. The coversation in my head went a lot like this:

Ok ok. What is she saying? Ok so it's 15 pages, and we have to answer a question. Ok. What question? Ok I have no idea....Why does she keep saying the same thing over again?...Why does she keep looking at me when talking about this?...OMG, she knows that I have no idea what's she is talking about. Don't ask me questions. Don't ask me about it...Please don't ask me....

And then she asks, "Who is doing something with agenda-setting?"

Oh, crap...that's me. What do I say? Don't ask me anything...Just give advice on what I should be doing...Please please clarify.

She says, "What's your question? What are you planning to do?"

.............

And she gets crickets. I am completely blank. She keeps staring at me expecting an answer...And she gets this, "I'm not sure. I have an idea of where this is going, but I don't know where you want it to go."

Basically it was the worst answer ever stated aloud. There I was with no answer to a question I had an entire semester to work on. My insides feel like they are going to explode. I keep thinking that any minute I will throw up in front of 13 people. Great. (BTW I did not throw up.)

So I leave confused, feeling sick, and uber-stressed. I get to the car and the tears roll. And then I get mad because I'm crying. I can't stand that they made me cry again. I had vowed to never let them see my cry and that grad school and I were officially at war. But here I was in my car crying tears of anger.

Once that was over, my "take-charge" attitude kicked into overdrive. I e-mailed some students in the class asking for an explanation and guidance. Then I e-mailed a teacher from UCA to ask for help hashing out where to go next with this paper.

Today I got an e-mail from a classmate and my teacher. They both were super eager to help me out. And I was super willing to accept the help. I'm still a complete wreck mess about where this paper is going and the amount of things that will happen in the next four weeks. But knowing that people will help when you ask puts some pep in my step.

What do you do to relieve stress? Apparently I cry and then pursue taking over the world. I hope your stress reliever is a bit healthier.

Until next time...