I'm not going to lie; the first two months of my sophomore year at Temple were horrible.

I barely ate. I barely slept. I had no time for a social life. All of my time was spent either working, drinking excessive amounts of coffee, or sleeping. Why? I overloaded myself and set myself up for failure.

Taking 17 credits is hard enough for a college student. I signed up for 17 credits of intense science courses. I thought I could handle it.

Boy, I was wrong.

Organic chemistry was harder and more fast-paced than I expected. I had no idea that this course would take so much time out of my day.

I didn't have the time I desperately needed to study. I had so many other classes and so many other commitments. Before I knew it, I got behind in organic chemistry very quickly and could not catch up.

My first exam grade came back. I got a 47. I cried that day and felt absolutely hopeless.

I thought I was just stupid or that I just needed to work harder. So, I worked harder. I bought two review books, and they helped me understand the material. This only helped for a little while.

At this point, my understanding of the material didn't matter because I was still learning material from two chapters ago. We were way past those chapters. No matter what I did, I would still be behind. No amount of review books could save me; I was already drowning.

To make things worse, my schedule didn't allow me to study as much as I needed to. I was taking so many difficult classes. I couldn't really devote quality time to any of them.

My grades in easier courses started to tank. That's when I truly considered withdrawing. Was staying in organic chemistry worth failing my other classes?

I still had so many fears. What would withdrawing from organic chemistry mean for my application to medical school? Would they think I was a bad student because of the "W" on my transcript?

Then I realized something important: Withdrawing from a class is so much better than risking a bad grade.

A "D" in organic chemistry would hurt my GPA immensely. Admissions officers care more about my GPA than a "W" on my transcript.

Withdrawing from organic chemistry means that I will have to retake it. I also won't graduate a year early like I wanted.

Guess what? I'm okay with that. In fact, I'm going to retake it when I'm taking easier courses (like Gen Eds). I can't set myself up for failure. I have to set myself up for success. In the future, I'm going to do that.

I'm going to succeed. A "W" on my transcript says nothing about my tenacity. Don't let that one hiccup in your academics hurt your pride.