The turning wheel blog - Sab3rr

So a Christmas holiday and the longest quarter in my life just zipped by looking at when last I updated this piece of the internet. Still, it feels that time is speeding up. Not sure if it's because of age, or just the pace of life. Anyway, things are definitely not same old same old, far from it. Things are changing quite fast in my life, hopefully for the better, but it has taken its toll. Depression, emotional confusion, more studies and... love. Let the wheel turn.

I was hoping after a brutal 3rd year at university a long Christmas holiday would help me recover. Things turned out much worse in the end. Starting the vacation exhausted was actually the better part of the holiday. Instead of recuperating, my mental and physical state deteriorated even more. I've never had to deal with subconscious built up stress, and in this case, it took me completely by surprise. My body just said, enough was enough and it took my mind with it. I fell into depression during the holiday, my appetite disappeared and I was sleeping most of the day. Thinking that this was just my normal post year existential crises I thought I'd give it a week or two. Elite Dangerous (see previous blog) was not the answer to lifting my mood, and I think even if I had the perfect game and friends to play with it would not have helped. My mind cracked, a full on mental breakdown due to stress. I started having anxiety issues. This was a first for me and because it of this, it took a month to eliminate a physical condition as a cause for my deterioration. So after a terrible, exhausting and worrying holiday near the end, after self research and seeing the right people, I accepted that my mental health was in trouble. Putting the pieces together it started making sense. My body could not keep the pace, I need more sleep that the average person. A medical condition was found that that causes me to tire out quickly if stressed. My mental health is more susceptible to a stress overload due to genes from my mother's side and a lot of other littler things that made up the cause of my depression that holiday. Pills were prescribed and I had to work hard to bring my appetite back. So with only a week before class was due to start again, I hit the road to recovery. Luckily I recovered enough by the time class started to cope again. But I was not the same after that. I had to take better care of my body and mind to avoid this happening again. Unfortunately after this, I'm kinda more susceptible to anxiety and stress.

I'm ok though, I coped handling the first quarter the same way I did the last brutal year, with close friends and looking after myself more. I'll know now when I'm burned out and what to do about it. I was not the only one affected however, my friends all felt the blow from 3rd year. Starting out the quarter having survived this ordeal, I kept my faith and believed the wheel will turn. That wheel of time that brings to those what they deserve. I was holding onto that wheel. I was still struggling to find a video game that brought me the fix I got from my Battlefield career. I've accepted that the gaming itch is part of me and I won't be able to get rid of it anytime soon.

So with the FPS gaming scene in crisis mode, I got into Eve online. Never thought I'd be that type of person. But friends have gotten me into a lot of things. Spent about a month playing reading simulator 2015 and another getting to grips with the game's scope and depth. I could see there was potential. But my busy schedule studying put brakes on this effort and I was finding it hard to get my fix. I've also been playing more and more Dota 2 due to my close friend being a veteran and playing it together was the closest I got to playing games the way I used to, with teamwork and on coms having fun together, even though I sucked at the game. If you do it with a friend virtually next to you, it's always fun. I then bough Homeworld remastered, never having played the originals. And wow... was I surprised. It is glorious, proving to me once again it's not me, but that modern games just do suck and old games stay good. No carrot on a stick unlocks and holding hands. If Star Wars Empire at War had a predecessor, this was it. With my faith in my gaming tastes renewed the quarter at university grinded on.

Then something unexpected happened. I was wrestling with strange unknown feelings ever since last year. Having worse things to deal with, I kinda put it to the back of my head. It kept bugging me. I thought it was due to my gaming itch bothering me but turns out it was not that. Turns out I was falling in love. I'd gotten close to a friend online that helped me cope through this tough time. A person that allowed me to open up and vent. Knowing them online and myself not really believing in long distance relationships, I left it at that, being good friends, the confused feeling still tugging at me. I could not stop thinking about them. Events transpired and we ended up confessing our feelings and decided to give a relationship a shot. The feeling of immense relief, knowing someone reflects your love towards them back is indescribable. My dad always told me love just hits you and you can't do much about it, turns out he was right. I finally felt at that stage that the wheel has indeed turned and I was so thankful.

After this I was invited to a prize giving event at our engineering faculty for us EnE students. Turns out I'm in the top ten (there about, 7thish, my two friends being #1 and #2) of the whole EnE class for 3rd year (90ish strong), my hard work commended with a piece of paper (and a cash payout tba).
Picture album of the event:
Imgur.com

As for studies in general, things aren't getting easier, but things are coming together. You don't notice it consciously, but subconsciously the course has changed my thought process to that of a technical problem solver. We've learned almost enough theory to say we've covered the basics. We're getting the big picture, which is a good feeling. Next is our final year project to see if we got the stuff for real and then we're looking at master's degree. The opportunities seems to be there with our department having good ties with EU universities. The country's situation over here is only looking worse by the week so the sooner I can get an opportunity internationally, the better.

So that's that. Things are looking up, I've got some experiences waiting for me to catch up on to say the least. Let the wheel turn...

Sab3rr out o7