Gloating….

So. I’m not exactly a competitive person. I don’t have a need, necessarily, to do better than others. I mean, I’d like to do as good possible, but not at the expense of others.

That being said, one of the things I’ve picked up in nursing school is the need to know I rank compared to everyone else. (Seriously, in no other classes/program have people turned to me and said “What did you get?” I mean. Not even “Did you do ok?” or “did you pass?” No. What was your score…that’s what they want to know. *shrugs* Whatever. (Thankfully, the classmates that I associate the most with seem genuinely sympathetic when I’ve done worse or failed or whatever. Some of the others aren’t so nice about it.

But. So. Yeah, I like doing well, and I like to know how I rank. And, I like when my numbers are above the average. It’s not a common occurance, especially in nursing. But. I’ve found that in psychology, it tends to be a trend….heh. So far, my scores for Social Psych are as follows (first column is my score, second column is total points possible, third column is class average)…

Appl Paper #1 18 20…..16.33
Appl Paper #2 18 20…..15.66
Appl Paper #3 20 20…..15.95
Appl Paper #4 19 20…..16
Appl Paper #5 18 20…..16.11
Appl Paper #6 20 20…..16.43
Exam #1 41 50…..34.97
Exam #2 49 50…..36.5

We’ve two more papers yet (well, one is being graded, the other is due tomorrow. But she drops our lowest score on the paper, so I’m considering not doing the one that’s due tomorrow.) And one more exam.

I do feel bad, tho. Cuz the other ppl at my table don’t do very well on their papers. And the one girl is like “Well, it’s because I write mine the nite before they’re due!” And I’m thinking to myself….so do I…. But. I do sometimes work better under pressure, especially when papers are concerned! And. I actually do believe that I’m a very good writer. heh. I’m great at bullshitting my way thru things….(I get that from my mum). So. That coupled with the fact that I really love psychology prolly accounts for the higher-than-average scores.

Heh. Speaking of mum. I was telling her a few weeks ago- Thanksgiving- how well I was doing in my psych class, how I was doing better than the avg on everything. Her responses? “Yes, but the nursing is the important part. How are you doing with nursing? Passing psych classes doesn’t really matter, you need to focus on the nursing, so you can graduate and make money.”

Ok. Granted, my major is nursing and not psychology. But STILL. It woulda been nice to just get a “well that’s good”. Even if it was still followed up with “Just make sure you’re keeping up with nsg too…” (DUH)…..

And they wonder why I seem closer to M than to them, or why I can talk to other people and not them. Gee, let’s think about that. Thinking back to M’s responses to such things? Falls more along the lines of That’s wonderful!!! We should celebrate!!

I mean. Geesum. When your professors think for an entire semester that you’re a psych major and then find out you’re not and say things like “You need to change your major!” ….when they introduce you to someone by saying “Ah, and this is [Echo]. She’s a nursing major. But she SHOULD be a psychology major!!”…when your own freakin’ therapist, who is a licensed psychologist, who is a psychology professor, who is just in general an intelligent person….comments that you’d prolly do decently as a psychology major/psychologist person…..I dunno, I consider those kinds of things really HUGE compliments. And genuine. I don’t think they deserve a “well, your professors don’t have to pay your rent” or “they probably just want to keep you in the program to keep their numbers up”. I mean fuck, once she even said “well. it’s nice that they think highly of you. but you can’t trust a psychologist as far as you can throw them….”

…..what does that say to ME? What does that say ABOUT me??

For ONCE I’d just like a “hey that’s great” or “i’m proud of you!” for something that I love. Yes. I like nursing. Yes, I want to be a nurse. But I can’t honestly say that I’m passionate about it. I find it interesting. Certainly challenging. But it doesn’t intrigue me at the level psychology stuff does. I don’t think that I’d sit in the hall and listen in on nursing lectures the way I always did when I was in the psych department building. I mean. I might do that for nursing, to learn something in order to be more competant at it. But not cuz I happened to be walking by and heard just a clip or phrase and was tractor-beamed to what the discussion was about.

And maybe what all of this means is that I’m in the wrong major. But, no. Psychology requires a different kind of initiative than nursing does. I mean, to be a professional and to make a career out of it. I don’t have that. Nursing has more of a concreteness to it, so it seems somewhat safer. Plus, nursing is more mobile, my options are much clearer, much more defined. I adore psychology, but I don’t think I’d be as good at it, exclusively. Tho, I know that as far as nursing goes, I’ll prolly always be better at the “people” part of it than the “book” parts. So.

So I’m babbling. *shrugs* I guess I just get disappointed that mum and such don’t…..understand.