Serious talk about the bar though— it is heinous that we do this to people. It’s especially heinous this year, but it’s important not to lose sight of the fact that it is always heinous. 1/

If you’ve been around a minute you know I’ve had my share of scary/difficult life experiences. I think I have earned my gritty* card.

*it’s a card you earn for having grit. But if you want to picture it as a card bearing the image of Gritty, beloved NHL mascot, please do. 2/

I say that not as a humble brag, but because every time someone talks about how painful this process is, someone wants to speculate that maybe that person isn’t mentally tough enough. Maybe they don’t have the grit for our profession. Practice is gonna kick them in the teeth. /3

But I know none of those things are true about me. I think if you know me, you know that, too.

And yet: this summer and now the waiting feel like one of the most difficult things I’ve ever been asked to do. 4/

My emotional health has been really poor. I’ve cried more this summer than I have in the last five years combined. I have had panic attacks, which, before the bar, had grown more and more rare for me over the last several years, too. 5/

I’ve lost SO MUCH sleep. I’ve gained weight, which I wish is something I was comfortable enough with myself to accept with grace, but I’m not there yet. So that has impacted my mental health, too. 6/

I’ve become weird and obsessive about things that don’t matter because they are the only things I feel like I have control over. 7/

I think there is a non-zero portion of all of this that is unique to this summer's experience. It didn't help that I was studying for a test I thought might be canceled up to the day before. It didn't help that I was worried I might get sick taking the exam. 8/

It doesn't help that my financial situation isn't what it might be in a different year. It doesn't help that unemployment is what it is, and I'm worried that failing might mean unemployment at a time when it's impossible to get another job. 9/

But I think a disturbing portion of this is probably just normal. Or at least, every time I've talked to someone about it, that's what I've been told. That what I'm feeling is, for the most part, something people go through with each exam date. 10/

If that's true, it's unacceptable. There's no upside to making people suffer in this way for something we aren't sure actually achieves the stated goal of ensuring minimum competence. 11/

Failing the bar would suck for all of the obvious reasons, but really the thing that scares me most about the possibility of failing is that I just don't know if I have it in me to do this again. I HATE saying that, because I back down from No fight. But I'm really not sure.

(I've always had incredible respect for retakers, but knowing what I know now, that respect is...... unspeakable.)

I say all of this and think it's important to contextualize that as I'm feeling this, and I am a person of IMMENSE privilege. I have someone who can support me financially. I don't have many other obligations. I had good study resources. I can only imagine it's harder for others.

Anyway, all of that said: we don't have to do things this way. We shouldn't do things this way. We owe it to one another and to people who want to become part of this profession in the future to find and insist on better ways.