I don’t have a lot of recurring nightmares…

They’re more recurring themes of nightmares. But there’s one that I keep having that really messes with my head.

It’s the nightmare that I don’t have enough credits to graduate college.

I think it stems from the fact I was terrified while I was in college that I wouldn’t graduate on time. THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT!! If you need an extra semester or year, that’s fine. But for me it was the idea that I wouldn’t graduate on time due to ONE credit.

My college required a certain number of credits of language. I don’t have a strong affinity for learning another language so this was very difficult for me.

I took French in High School, but I barely passed that so I thought I’d start over with a different language and one that I already knew a few words of (thanks to band).

ITALIAN!

The first professor I had……was AWFUL. He was Italian, but his class was just a lot of memorization. I literally had a final that was memorizing the Little Mermaid in Italian and saying it back to him. And no, I don’t mean translating the Little Mermaid and then saying it to him. He gave us the story in Italian and we had to memorize it.

I learned NOTHING in that class. I learned more when I worked an opera in Italy and lived there for a month.

BUT THAT DIDN’T COUNT TOWARDS MY CREDIT!!!! I lived in Italy for a MONTH and my college wouldn’t let that count for ANYTHING towards my language credit.

But luckily I earned all but 1 credit towards the language requirement from that AWFUL class which meant I still had to take one MORE semester of Italian, but I refused to take the class with that teacher.

Luckily I wasn’t the only one who thought this and he was fired before my senior year. So I got to take the remaining class I needed with a different professor who ACTUALLY taught it. He was also, VERY understanding. I explained to him I was a theater major and how I lived in Italy for a month. This was the last credit I needed to graduate and he was a little more lenient on me grading-wise.

I passed and graduated on time.

BUT BACK TO MY NIGHTMARE!!! The reason I said this nightmare messes with my head is even when I’m awake I feel like I didn’t earn that credit. I didn’t really earn the credit and shouldn’t have graduated.

And even though it’s been 8 (almost 9) years since I graduated I still feel like that. I still think I’m going to wake up and realize I’m still in college, struggling to earn that last Italian credit.

It’s also a bit of my Imposter Syndrome mixing with my nightmare…….feeding on the anxiety and stress to become a powerful Nightmare WIZARD!!