Speaking Out My Insanity: Plot twist

Beware: Heavy emotional and despairing content ahead. If you aren't interested in anything less than funny, skip this post. I'm documenting this for my future self. Dear future Kron, don't give up. It takes time to acquire a skill.

If you guys didn't know, I have been struggling with the practical part of being a speech pathologist this semester.
My confidence was basically reduced to zero after having Clinics.

Let me explain what do I mean by a clinic session (clinics):
We have a tutor whom we refer to as our Clinical Educator (CE) and six students attend each clinical group. We basically sit in a room with a small table fit for seven and discuss clinical stuff. Notice how many times I've mentioned clinic.
Yeah, because that's the main reason for Clinics.
It's our preparation for professional work.
They teach us how to write reports by UQ standards, how to complete a case history interview and how to give assessment results back to patients as well as planning therapy and conducting assessments for patients.

I'm merely a humble second year who hasn't got a good grip on every single theory we've learned so yes, I struggled greatly during clinics.
Mainly it's about taking these theories and throwing them out as a suggestion and causal factors for what we think is happening to our "imaginary" clients.
That's one thing I'm not good at - pulling things out of my ass without confirming on it first.
I like to read up on stuff, make sure it's accurate before I give it out as a suggestion during clinics. Other students in my group though are fairly comfortable putting out suggestions regardless of how useless it is... and that makes me look horrible in comparison.
The impression that I left was getting worse as the weeks progresses because my confidence kept getting lower and lower after witnessing how good my groupmates were at talking.

One of our tasks was to conduct a case history interview with a standardized patient (real actor/actress). You know when you meet a specialist for the first time, or maybe a doctor (your gp, perhaps) and they ask about what do you think caused your sickness, what's the symptoms blahblah how long has it been blahblah. That, in a nutshell, is a case history interview. So we had to do it but instead, collect information that is relevant for speech pathologists (SP).
I sucked so badly in my first interview practise.
I stutter. I froze. I blanked out.
The first clinic session left me reeling.

For the first time in the history of me studying speech pathology, I felt incompetent and I considered quitting. I was crying my heart out regularly, thinking that it wasn't easy as I expected it to be.
I thought a lot about myself then. My choices. My weaknesses. My strengths.
I've never felt so incapable in my life.
The worse part is that there's no bad student to compare myself to. All my groupmates were excellent during their respective interviews so it hurt my pride.
Tuesdays started to be the most dreaded day of my every week. That's how bad clinic was for me.
I felt so low, dragging myself through the weeks, just praying that I make it through.

Suddenly written exams were easy in comparison to being a clinician.
Tuesdays left me feeling blue and quite bruised. I gained confidence in my ability to memorize information because that's the only thing I felt I could be proud about as weeks passed.

I guess I was wearing my heart on my sleeve because my CE started calling out my name regularly, asking for my input. I know that trick. Who doesn't know it?
Get the quietest person in the group to be more involved in the tutorial discussion - that's in every teacher's handbook. Some days I wish I wasn't as educated as I am so that I couldn't pick up on the clues that indicated that my CE was worried about me - about my capability.
She never says anything negative - constantly building me up with positive comments which is another rudimentary rule in a teacher's handbook when dealing with less-than-bright students. I hated myself for knowing all the teacher's tricks because it had an opposite effect on me. I felt sorry for myself.

Then we had our mid-sem evaluation.
A one-to-one session with our CE, discussing our progress.
She told me her concerns but never once did she put me down or offend me even though at that point, I was open to suggestions of improvements and criticism. I deserved to be offended even if she didn't want to do it. I would have accepted a kick to my ass if she needed to do it for my sake.
So she got to talking.
And it felt personal.
That's when I realized that clinicians weren't born - they're made.
My CE wasn't as good as she is now compared to before and it took time before she turned out as an amazing SP.
Trial and error.
The fundamental rule of growth.
She had hope in me and I think that made a world of difference. Yes, she called me out often and yes, she used all those tips in the handbooks on me but why do I have to be so sensitive about it? She's only trying to help. I was being more arrogant than I should be.

So clinics went on and every week, it felt as if I was a brick wall being crushed over and in result, I have to constantly reconstruct my walls to build something much more stronger in its place. I don't leave the broken bricks on the floor this time.

Yesterday was another interview I had with my standardized patient.

For the first time ever since my clinic sessions started, I walked out of my clinic session as a completely new woman with my head up.
I walked out as a student who had the ability to make it as a speech pathologist and is more than capable of becoming a clinician.
My patient had nothing but praises for me and my partner and we got an applause from our group AND my CE was so proud you couldn't wipe the smile off her face even if you tried to with a chainsaw (pfft).

I needed to vent this out after weeks of struggling with my confidence.
Guys, guess what?
I found it! It's still a little bud right now, but I'll tend to it so it grows bigger and better.
I admit that this is one of the newest and hardest challenges I've had to ever face (because the solution wasn't that simple) and I learned so much from it.
A fresh start. That's what it feels like.
So here goes to struggle: the basis for all learning - it's a requirement.