Retaking a year at university

Before I begin, I just quickly wanted to mention that I was surprised that people are actually interested in reading my blog, especially because it's focusing on my life rather than my interests. Although, my goal is not to have followers or lots of views on my blog, it is still satisfying to know that there are people who want to read my blog, so thank you.

Anyway.. today I just want to blog about some of my university experiences/struggles and come clean about something that I have been quite ashamed to admit.

I started university in 2014 and this should be my last academic year before I graduate. I am currently trying to earn a degree in Fashion Marketing and Business Management.
My first year of university was pretty amazing. I actually loved it. It wasn't too much work, it was more about getting to know the university and the people, at least that's how I saw it. I lived in student halls. It was my first time ever living without parents. I went to tons of parties in my student halls and my university's club. I went to lots of clubs around London, including a strip club which was possibly one of the most fun nights I've ever had. I met so many people. I went on tons of dates. I met the love of my life who is my husband now. I really enjoyed myself and because I was happy outside of university walls, I also didn't mind being inside them and doing the work. I had to do 4 core subjects which were: Principles and Practise of Marketing, Fashion Concepts and Systems, The Corporate Environment (15 weeks of Economics and 15 weeks of Law) and Fundamentals of Management. I really enjoyed these modules, because I actually had nice lecturers. I think the Law lecturer was the only one I didn't like, but I didn't let that bother me, because I was happy about everything else. I was getting good grades and passed the year with no problems. I did have to do 1 retake, but that was only to boost my grade, I would've passed anyway.
Last year (2015), I started year 2 and I was extremely motivated and excited to get back to university. I went to South Africa for 3 weeks just before the academic year started and my trip there really inspired me to try my hardest. I was studying everyday, however I also took 'healthy lifestyle' on my plate. I needed to cook and plan healthy meals and go to the gym at least 3 times a week with a personal trainer. It was all good. I was losing weight like crazy and I was so happy about it. I lost like 10cm off my waist in 2 weeks. Few weeks into university it was time to start doing the assignments which were group presentations. As I mentioned earlier I wanted to try my hardest and I wanted to get the best grades, so I took all the group work on my shoulders. Basically, I did all the work, wrote scripts for the other members and only asked them to memorise the script. I pushed the gym aside, because I needed to do the assignments and I noticed that I couldn't do the workouts effectively anyway. Due to the stress of the assignments I wasn't eating enough, I was eating healthy, but not enough to give me energy to do the workouts. I noticed that I couldn't perform certain arm exercises as well as I did before and usually when you exercise you get better and stronger, not weaker. Therefore, I kept cancelling my personal training sessions with the excuse that I have to do my assignments. I had 3 presentations and all of them were on the same week. I thought that after doing all the work for the other group members would mean that they would actually appreciate it and memorise the scripts and know them by heart, but nope. The worst part is that they actually came to the presentations reading from the sheets I printed out for them or from their phone. Big chunks of information was not even presented. Furthermore, I also really couldn't stand one of my lecturers. This really got me down, because I ended up getting unsatisfying grades. I pushed my other goals aside to end up with grades worse than I had in the first year when I wasn't even trying, I completely lost interest in University. I didn't even want to attend, so I didn't. I basically didn't attend half of the academic year. I did do my assignments, but they were always done last minute and I didn't even go through what was talked about in the lectures before I attempted them. Funnily, I passed. However, before the academic year was finished, I looked at my grades and I thought to myself 'this is not right'. I don't want to have a shit degree, so I decided to retake the year. Yes. I won't be graduating this academic year, because I'm currently redoing year 2. I still have the shitty lecturer that I didn't like before, but I'm trying to not let it bother me. I learnt from my past mistakes and I'm trying to take a different approach this year and so far I'm doing well.
I was ashamed that I have to retake, therefore I haven't really told anyone. Only my mum and husband knew when I was thinking about what to do. Now, that I'm 2 months into year 2 AGAIN, I realised that I made the right choice and telling people who are in my classes that I'm retaking made me a little more confident in knowing that it is okay to not always succeed in your goals in the time frame you've given yourself, as long as you never give that goal up, learn from your mistakes and always try to improve.

I guess this is more of an introduction to this topic, because I will be talking about it in more detail throughout my other posts with reflections of my progress.

-A