Writing An Essay In College Is Very Different From Writing An Essay In High School. Personally, I Write

hey I'm a rising junior and I really want to go to grad school right after I graduate. I wanna do research but I'm not sure of the exact field yet. I know I like molecular biology and genetics and the current lab I'm in works on developmental biology and that's pretty interesting to me too. Anyway I just wanted some advice. When do you think would be a good time to take the GRE? Also how did you choose a program?

Hi there! Aahhh I’m so glad to hear you have a plan for grad school! one of us! one of us!

That’s ok that you don’t know exactly what you want to study. Many schools offer degrees in just biology, with more specific tracks depending on your interests and research (for example, Boston University has a PhD in Biology with tracks in Cell & Molecular Biology; Neurobiology; and Ecology, Behavior, Evolution, & Marine Biology). You can often determine your tracks or research focus after being accepted and going through a few lab rotations. Also keep in mind that it is absolutely ok to have undergrad research experience in a different focus than your graduate school dissertation project. No one expects you to find your calling in the first lab you work in. The research experiences garnered before grad school are more so to show you know what you’re getting yourself into (ie. the specific physical, mental, and emotional demands of laboratory research). 

If you’re going for a PhD, you’ll have a chance to rotate through 3 or 4 labs before deciding on a specific research focus. Like you can be in a Biology PhD program, but your research could be on developmental biology. If you’re going for a Masters however, oftentimes you will have to pick a lab from the get-go (or even before the university accepts you). 

Lots of PhD programs are doing “umbrella acceptance programs”. You apply to and get accepted into an umbrella biology program, which is comprised of multiple departments that specialize in different tracks (eg. Mol & Cell Bio, Pharmacology, Cancer Biology, etc), and after your lab rotations and first round of classes, you choose a home department (and dissertation lab) in the Spring. Here’s an example of the umbrella biology program from the University of Arizona that I applied for because I was undecided between choosing Immunobiology and Cancer Biology (the latter being what I ultimately chose after rotations and the first semester of classes). 

As for the general concept of choosing a program (aside from these umbrella programs, which are fantastic imo), it’s going to take a lot of research (online and in-person) to see what’s out there and what ultimately piques your interest. It may sometimes boil down to a single lab you are absolutely enamored by. I ultimately settled on Cancer Biology at my university because a) it’s super fascinating, b) good job prospects in industry companies like Roche (I do not plan on staying in academia), and c) I absolutely loved the program–the research, the people and culture, the resources, and the funding (philanthropists looooove donating to cancer research, which the fairness of is a discussion for another day). 

Lastly, keep in mind that science is extremely interdisciplinary. Just because you choose to study developmental biology during grad school doesn’t mean you’ll never get another chance to do research in molecular biology, or genetics, or even dabble in some bioinformatics through a future collaborator. No field exists in its own bubble; we’re all giant blobby venn-diagrams upon venn-diagrams constantly learning about and participating in other fields. And it’s great!! So don’t feel like you’re pigeon-holing yourself permanently into anything because of what your degree says. 

So now, for the GRE! When to take it depends on your study schedule and how confident you are in whether you may need to retake the test or not. It think a good general timeline to follow will be to give yourself at least 6 months to study for the 1st test, and then give yourself another 2-3 months to study for a retake if necessary. The Princeton Review has a fabulous grad app timeline (including when to take the GRE) here. 

I have a Applying to Grad School Masterpost with lots of info culled from mine and others’ posts, including GRE tips and a link to a link to a GRE Study Plan. 

Hope that helped! Let me know if there’s anything else you’ll like to learn more about. Good luck, awesome scientist!

a while back • thank god i finished biochem already 🍃

Notetaking

Sound Note - take notes while you record audio

Evernote - notetaking that syncs across platforms

Paper 53 - minimal notetaking that syncs

Microsoft OneNote - collaboration and syncing, best for Office users

Google Keep - jot things down, best for Google suite users

Notability - take notes and annotate PDFs

Mindly - create mind maps

Day One - a digital journal

Flash Cards

Quizlet - the quintessential flash card app

StudyBlue - another commonly used app

Cram - best for its “cram mode”

Eidetic - uses spaced repetition for effective memorization

Planner 

My Study Life - schedules, tasks, reminders, and more

StudyCal - keeps track of tasks, exams, and grades

24me - automated reminders and event planning

iStudiez - schedule and prioritized task list

Google Calendar - a calendar, best for Google users

Glass Planner - a calendar and to do list with incredible functionality

To Do List

Clear - organized to-do and reminders

MinimaList - simple to-do and focus timer

Trello - collaborative project organizer

Todoist - clean and functional task manager

Default notes app on your phone

Time Management

Forest - plant trees by staying focused

Pomotodo - pomodoro timer with to-do list

Timeglass - custom timers

Tide - pomodoro with white noise

Alarmy - forces you out of bed 

Pillow - smart alarm that tracks sleep cycles

Productivity

Workflow - automate tasks

Habitica - turn your habits into an RPG

Continuo - simple, colorful activity tracking

Freedom - block distracting apps

Free Learning

Coursera - free MOOCs

TED - listen to Ted Talks

Duolingo - language learning

Memrise - spaced repetition language vocabulary

Khan Academy - free video lessons

Ambient Noise

8tracks - curated playlists

Spotify - online music streaming

Coffitivity - cafe ambience

Noisli - background sound generator

Rain Rain - rain sounds

Binaural - binaural beats

Health

Rockin Ramen - recipes based on ramen

MealBoard - meal planning

Lifesum - healthy eating

Stop Breath And Think - mindfulness meditation

Pacifica - mental health management

Sworkit - personalized video workouts

Waterlogged - hydration tracker

Reference

WolframAlpha - Google on steroids

Oxford Dictionary - all of English at your fingertips

RefMe - citation generator

PhotoMath - solve math problems by taking a photo

Mathway - step by step math help

Desmos - free graphing calculator

Wikipedia - not the best source, but it’s handy

Miscellaneous 

Companion - stay safe when walking alone

Mint - money management

Toshl - finance manager

Tiny Scanner - scan documents

‘eat the frog' method

Hi all, it’s werelivingarts. I just stumbled across this method called ‘eat the frog’, which means you get the most difficult or important task out of your way first. I actually have been using this method for a long time, hope this post gives you a new way of managing your time and productivity! 😜 ❤️

“If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And if it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.” – Mark Twain 

Don’t Let Calculus D(e)rive You Mad

I was always one of those people who thought some people were naturally good at math and if I wasn’t one of those people then there was nothing I could do about it. I thought I wasn’t “a math person” and would use that description as an excuse. Is math one of my weaker subjects? Sure but that’s mostly because I let years of bad habits get in the way of my current work. This caught up to me in my first semester of calculus (calc I) at university, where calculus was my worst class. Here’s the thing: if you’re not “a math person” make yourself one. In my second semester of calculus (calc II) I improved my mark by an entire letter grade (something I never thought possible). How? Through hard work and by understanding that I would have to work harder than some people because of my past study habits.

Know your pre-calculus well! You will struggle so much if you forget the basics. My prof said not having a good grasp of the basics is the number one reason why students will struggle with calculus. Invest time before/at the beginning of the semester to really review the stuff you learned in high school. (Khan Academy is the best way to review, in my opinion. They have challenge questions you can do for each section. Try a couple of questions for each section. If you can’t answer the question easily, watch the accompanying videos for that section first. Do this for sections you forget or know you struggle with.) Be confident in your basic mental math too, especially under pressure. I wasn’t allowed a calculator on any of my midterms or finals for calc and you don’t want to waste time on easy math that you should know lightning fast anyway.

Attend every lecture, especially if you’re even slightly confused. If you’re behind, try not to get even more behind by skipping class (obviously use your own judgement, but don’t skip unless it’s totally necessary). Don’t sit near the back of the class if you know you won’t pay attention.

Don’t just sit there and copy down notes. Be attentive in class and follow along with examples the best you can. If you get lost at a certain step in a problem put a star beside it. After class, study and attempt the problem on your own. If you still don’t understand, go to a TA or prof for help. They will be able to provide better help if they can see exactly where you got lost.

Keep your notes simple. I would use either blue or black pen for the majority of my notes and use one other colour to emphasize parts of my notes (indicate where I got lost, circle important follows, highlight which section of the textbook the class was at, etc.) Keep your notes neat and leave a gap, if you fall behind during a lecture (just remember to get the notes from someone else later). I also recommend using a grid paper notebook, for when you need to draw graphs.

Get a mini notebook! I bought a tiny notebook for cheap and filled it with a (very) condensed version of my notes, throughout the semester. I wrote down common derivatives and integrals, shapes of common graphs, important theorems and formulas, etc. This is especially helpful for calc II, because you’ll have all the necessities from calc I handy.

Advice for using Maple for math labs (if this applies to you): Pay attention to tutorials and ask questions. Complete as many assignment questions as you can in the lab/when a TA is present. If you have any other assignment questions to finish up make sure you work on them at least a few days before they’re due, so you have time to ask for help if you need it. Also, Maple can be a stupid program. You could be missing just one number, letter, or symbol and it won’t work. Or you could have it exactly right and it still won’t work (retyping your input in a new worksheet usually helps). To remedy these issues, I would work on assignments with friends and compare what our worksheets looked like. Oh and TAs love if you give your variables funny names or change the colours of your graph, because they’re all nerds (and so are you, so embrace it).

Do as many practice problems as you can. Calculus is a class where you learn by doing. Do questions till you understand the concept. If problems are recommended, treat them as if they’re actually due (otherwise you’ll just tell yourself you didn’t have enough time to do any practice problems). My number one mistake was not doing enough practice problems and just assuming I knew how to answer the problem (if you can’t answer the entire question from start to finish, then you don’t actually understand the concept).

Please don’t fall behind. Stay on top of things and prioritize what needs to be done (i.e. treat practice problems from the chapter you just learned on equal footing with the lab report you have due – if you treat it as a priority, you will get it done). But, if you do fall really behind, don’t wait until it’s too late to ask for help. Just remember, there’s always something you can do (even if you feel like you don’t know anything and there’s not enough time for any practice problems before your midterm). Identify what you need to learn before you can do anything else (i.e. work on understanding basic integration before you try to do something more complicated like trigonometric substitution) and fit in as many practice questions as you can.

Don’t give up! If you don’t understand a concept right away you just have to keep trying! For practice problems, try to find an answer without looking at your notes. If you can’t figure it out from there, look in your lecture notes and textbook for any relevant formulas, examples, or similar questions. Try to answer the problem again. If you get it, be sure to fully complete another practice problem without any outside references. If you can’t figure out an answer then you should seek help from another person!

Don’t forget everything you learned at the beginning of the semester – review, review, review! Check out this explanation on the curve of forgetting. If you continually review what you learned, for only short periods of time, you will remember so much more and save yourself time in the end!

Utilize the resources available to you. I have a list of online resources at the end of this post, but don’t overlook what’s right in front of you. Go to your prof’s office hours, ask a TA for help, and take advantage of any tutoring or study groups. My uni has a math and science centre where upper year students are always available to help other students with practice problems. If you join a course union, they sometimes offer free tutoring.

Study in a productive environment. This varies by person but personally I need a quiet environment, with ideally no noise or only instrumental music, bright/natural lighting, and nothing to distract me (I hide my phone and only have one pen or pencil out). If you like to listen to music when you study, math is one of those subjects where you can listen to music with words.

Improve your test-taking skills. (1) On an exam, understanding a concept is no use if it takes you forever answer the question. Do lots of practice problems till you immediately know how to answer any kind of question. Speed can be key on exams. (2) My strategy is to flip through the exam booklet as I get it. I answer the questions I can do easily, first, and leave the really difficult ones till the end. (3) Show all of your work! Don’t lose marks because you didn’t show all of your work. (4) Expect your exams to be challenging and prepare accordingly. Overlearn the material. Prepare specifically for the exam by completing past exams/practice exams in an environment that mimics the test-taking environment.

Get every mark you can, because the little marks make a big difference. If you don’t know how to answer a question on an exam, write down any formula or theorem that could relevant. If you try to figure out a solution and know that it’s most likely incorrect, but don’t have enough time/knowledge to find the correct answer, just leave your work there (don’t erase it). There’s always a chance you could be on the right track or nice markers will give you a point or two for trying. Something is always better than nothing.

Focus on the applications of calculus (it’ll make the semester a whole lot more interesting)! A physics major won’t necessarily use calculus the same way a bio or chem major might, but that doesn’t mean some calculus isn’t useful for all of those majors to know. I’ve always planned to major in biology and looking ahead at classes I will need calculus for biostatistics and genetics classes. Never tell yourself something isn’t useful because then you’ll never treat it like it’s useful. Also, my prof taught a whole lecture about how calculus could be used to account for all the variables that could affect population if a zombie apocalypse ever happened, so obviously calculus has at least one really important use :)

Resources

A bit of advice: These are called resources for a reason. It’s okay once in a while to use some of the resources to find a full solution for a practice problem, but don’t abuse it. It is so so easy to just look up the answer but you’re only hurting yourself in the end.

Desmos (Online graphing calculator - I’ve made it through so far without actually buying a graphing calculator)

Khan Academy (Step by step videos and practice questions! You can go your own speed with the videos! My top recommendation!!!)

Paul’s Online Math Notes (If your prof doesn’t provide you with decent lecture notes, these ones are great!)

Symbolab (They have a calculator for derivatives, integrals, series, etc. and I like the way they split up the steps to solve.)

Slader (find your textbook on here and they’ll give you all the solutions to questions!)

Textbooks: I used the Single Variable Calculus: Early Transcendentals (8th edition, by James Stewart) and it was awesome. The way it was set up and all the examples really helped me (I just wish I had used it more)

This post by @quantumheels is seriously fantastic (and she has lots of good advice for other topics too, one of my favourite blogs)

My Other Posts:

AP lit tips, high school biology, how to ace intro psych, organization tips, physics doesn’t have to suck: how to enjoy and do well in your required physics classes, recommended reads, reminders for myself, using your time wisely on public transport, what i learned from university (first year), what i learned from high school

yeah chem, its not like i have a social status to live up to. 112115.

how i use notion #1: mega assignment list

i promised i would update this from last year, and decided to do a walkthrough for @sleepanon!

i’ve taken my school bujo-ing digital for the past year, so i’m going to create a mini-series of how i’ve tinkered with notion to make it work for me! there’s a fair learning curve to it, so my inbox is open for questions if you have any from my posts (not notion in general. ..i’m not an expert lol).

step 1: start a new page! under database, select table

step 2: rename the labels to assignments and class (leave Files alone) for now. you can also title the page and add icons/covers

step 3: select the files label, then under ‘property type’ change it to ‘date’ (this is for deadlines–i start with my official syllabus dates)

ALSO a part of step 3, but after changing to the deadline property, add another one! click that next label, and follow the same menu as above, but select checkbox to give you an option to ‘complete’ your tasks:

step 4: in the ‘class’ row (the first blank after the label), type in a course name to create a tag. once you do so, you can select the tag to edit it or change colors // you can repeat this step as many times as you need to for your assignments. i like to do my entire semester at once since i work ahead of the syllabus, but it might be good to take it month by month!

step 5: now, let’s add the calendar view. on the lefthand side, ‘add view’, name it, then select calendar (not just highlight like me, but click it!)

step 6: you should now see your assignments on the calendar. on the right side (top) of the calendar, click ‘properties’ and turn everything on!

you can also filter the calendar to only show completed/non completed tasks or by class:

and you can click on any assignment to open it, and add further properties:

again, if you have any questions about this, please let me know! 

study less study smart

I decided to share my notes taken from this amazing 1 hour Youtube lecture by Marty Lobdell. i really liked him and his tips, i think they are super effective and cover a lot of situations! i highly recommend it!!!!! wow

but here are the tips and examples Marty mentions, so if you don’t have the time to go through the full hour, you can just scroll down. hope this helps somebody!

Break your study time in chunks with breaks

most students lose focus at 25 minutes

it’s a mistake to keep going once you do, since you won’t actually learn anything and you’ll hate every minute of it

so when you start losing focus take a 5 minute break

do something nice like talking to someone or listening to music

it’s something you practice so with time you’ll be able to work for more time without losing focus

in the end of the study session have a big reward you look forward to

Create a study area

environment highly affects the way you act. Bedrooms are for sleeping, kitchens for eating: you’ll feel sleepy in your bedroom and hungry in the kitchen. So if you have a study area, it’ll be easier to start studying and staying focused.

study in a specific room like an office or school library if you can

if you have to study in your bedroom use a specific object you only use for studying: a lamp/desk. Make it a no-distraction, away from your bed, blank walls area.

 The more active the learning, the better

80% active learning 20% passive

ask yourself: is it a concept or a fact?

learning a concept: understand/grasp/know it

put it into your own words

really think about the meaning of it

relate it with something you already know

teach somebody else. Recapitulate what you’ve learned. Talk out loud even if you don’t have anyone to teach - talk alone. Or at anyone that listens.

learning a fact: memorize it

use mnemonics

Acronyms (e.g. colours of the rainbow RoyGBiv – red orange yellow green blue indigo violet)

 Coined sayings - anything popular or sayings you’ve heard since you were a child.

Interacting images – work even better if they’re weird. Creative associations make you never forget specific details. (e.g. 1 gram of fat has 9 calories: picture a fat cat – each cat has 9 lives)

any time 2 things are highly similar but not the same you will get maximal interference!! USE mnemonics!! (e.g. afferent vs efferent neurons: SAME - Sensory Afferent Motor Efferent)

Be a part of  study groups

others can help you in ways you never thought before

Recognizing VS remembering

never confuse the two

while reviewing a chapter you may recognize concepts but not actually know them

and when you get to the test you won’t be able to remember any of it

so quiz yourself without looking at it

or stop in a page of your notes/textbook and ask yourself what is the concept immediately after and before it

Get your REM Sleep 

get ~8 hours so you don’t undo your studying

this is how your brain stores permanent memories

without it you’re ability to remember seriously decreases

most people don’t even begin to take the advice but it’s simple: sleep better. Do better.

There’s 162 hours in a week. There is time.

reflect on what you are doing with your time and what activities you have to prioritize to succed as a student

Taking notes is vital.

right after the class take 5 minutes to expand everything you’ve jotted down, give it depth.

NOT hours later. You won’t remember half the things you wrote down.

Ask your questions to class mates and teachers.

teachers want you to succeed and it’s more than ok to ask your question in the teacher’s office or in the next class

How to use a textbook: SQ3R technique

Survey Question Read Recite Review

Survey: skim through the entire chapter in a couple of minutes.

Raise questions: e.g. what is osmosis? What is this graphic about? What is a prototype?

it causes you to look for answers and you’ll find the information better once you actually study it after. If you intend to find something you learn it better.

Start studying for tests early.

don’t undo yourself. You should only be reviewing the days before the test. don’t leave it till the last minute!

(don’t just scroll through this!!!! really think about these methods and how you can actually implement them so you can benefit from them!!! these actually work but only if you put them into practice boo good luck!)

i’ve gotten a million asks about presentations! and presentation nerves! and presentation prep! so here is a long-ass post about:

ACADEMIC PRESENTATIONS!

every presentation is different and will have a different context. this advice is for seminar/class presentations, not conference panels, and based on my experience as an english lit grad student (and teacher). some classes you feel comfortable joking in; others, the vibe (or the professor’s expectations) will be more formal. read the room!! 

a good presentation is one that communicates clearly. in other words, it’s more important to be legible to your audience than it is to “sound smart.” usually when you’re consciously working to sound smart, you sound like an asshole. as the genie in aladdin once said, bee yourself. 

be generous to your audience. if you conceptualize your presentation as having two parts, let them know that! “i want to do two things with this presentation: talk about this secondary text, and then identify some examples that we can talk about in the primary.” signpost that shit! let your audience know where you’re heading and what you want them to understand.

related: present on something interesting. this does not mean objectively interesting. it means you should find something that really gets you curious or passionate or annoyed! 99% of the time, if you’re invested, your audience will be invested.

K.I.S.S. only use a powerpoint if you have images that support or contribute to your presentation. no distracting backgrounds, special effects, or clip art, it’s not 1998 (unless you are going for a retro vibe, in which case, don’t let me stop you). no big blocks of text. only use prezi if you want to make your audience nauseous. if you’re using a handout for quotations or major points, keep it basic and readable. 

plan your ending. there is nothing worse than a presentation that ends with a “so uh… yeah………………..” suggestions:

stick the landing. in other words, do the oral version of an essay conclusion: why it matters, how your presentation impacts the understanding of the topic, etc.

questions for further discussion, the kind you have some answers for or thoughts about.

legitimate questions that you don’t have answers for! not factual ones, obviously, but questions about a tricky scene in the text, how a particular narrative form is working, moments that you’ve identified that actually work against your conclusions, etc. it’s okay to admit that you don’t have all the answers; in fact, it’s a sign that you’re really engaging with the material. just make sure you use this one on a presentation where you’ve already proven that you did a lot of work and know your shit.

imitate what you like to see. i’ll hazard a guess and say that most people enjoy presentations that allow some personality, or we’d just have siri read our papers out loud. my usual presentation style is on the informal side; after 3 years of small seminars with the same people and professors, i feel comfortable joking around with the folks in my area. if i were to present for my whole department, i would not be that chill.

personalize your notes. you’re the only one who’s gonna see them! make them useful to you. 

don’t be nervous. not helpful, i know, but as someone who actually likes giving presentations but still gets anxious: it’s going to be okay. presentations can be a great chance to talk about something you find interesting, to direct class discussion, and to dig deeper into material that you might skim over otherwise. understand that your classmates will usually be generous and sympathetic (see: seminar personalities). treat it like an opportunity, not a punishment.

okay this is not really general advice, but it’s a plug for a grad school presentation favorite that will make your life way easier: the pdf handout.

it doesn’t have to be hard copy (though you should probably bring a few just in case). if everyone in your seminar has a laptop or tablet, email that thing out the night before! they get a lil preview and a document they can refer to in the future; you get to combine hi-res color images, hyperlinks, and whatever text you need to include.

still keep it minimalist. you can go overboard with your personal notes. the only things that should go on the handout are

things that are better written down than spoken (long quotes, statistics, timelines, etc.)

things that will contribute to your audience’s understanding of the material.

and here is an example of the difference b/t notes and handout, from a presentation i did last fall on my husband thomas hoccleve n scholarly fatigue (i was rly tired and wanted to talk abt being Weary) 

my notes on hoccleve’s work life:

the handout version that i emailed to everyone in the course:

tips for running away from home, from someone who did that:

don’t tell your abusers what you’re up to; they will put their energy into sabotaging you, for example, I was fairly clear about intending to move out, and my parents took great effort to convince me that it’s absolutely impossible for me to survive on my own, tried to take away my money by any means necessary, even getting me to sign a contract with a bank so i wouldn’t be able to access my money in there (luckily i didn’t put any of my money there to that scheme failed), and in the end they tried to convince me that any money i made freelancing will be stolen before i ever see it, and tried to prove that the money doesn’t even exist. it didn’t stop me but sure made me a lot more miserable than i should have been

don’t let your abusers know where you are, they will try to get to you; i ran away after an extreme violent outburst my parents threw at me, there was death threats, injuries, broken mobile phone i tried to use to film the violence, door taken away from my room, it was enough for anyone to get the hell away from a place, and when my mother found out my first hiding location she came to tell me that i have to think about why all of that was my fault. again, making me a lot more miserable than i should have been.

first few days (weeks) you’ll be in state of a shock, especially if you’ve been unsure if you’ll be able to get away; i couldn’t determine if i could function at all after escaping, my head was spinning, i had breakdowns every other day convinced that i’m about to die, it was due to the heavy brainwashing that made me believe that i was dead if i were to run away, there was no way to escape the fear and the torture of it, I hope not everyone is brainwashed this way but I do see a lot of people doubting if they have what it takes to go thru life without parents, and the answer is yes you do, you got it all.

your abusers will react in the way that will hurt you most; i know of some parents who aimed to injure their run away kid by pretending they could live just fine without them, like the child was a nuisance to their life and they were better without it, and in that case it was the most hurtful and cruel thing they could have done, since the child slaved their life away for the sake of acknowledgment and attention from parents. In my situation however, my parents kept acting their entire life like i was a huge burden and worthless waste of space, and it made me feel like if I were to run away they would let me be and pretend I never existed, and I would be free. However I was wrong. They contacted my friends, parents of my friends, entire outer family circle and anyone they knew to be in contact with me to make me feel guilty for leaving and tell me i was wrong and should come back, they found the person who sheltered me and convinced even them to tell me to return (this was the person who saw me after the violent attack, while i was shaking and out of my mind with fear, they saw me hide under the bed constantly convinced i was about to be killed, and this person was still convinced by my parents that i should go. back. to that.), they made their friends add me on facebook and request information about my whereabouts until i had a panic attack and deleted facebook, they kept on finding means to contact me and storm me with guilt and shame even after i cut every means of contact i knew, they still sometimes barge into the house of my friend demanding to get in contact with me, demanding that letters, food, even money be given to me that they leave there (it took me a while to figure out they would never ever give me money for the sake of my survival, but would absolutely use money to control and sabotage me) - all you can do is in any case, to be ready for the worst. Be ready for whatever you fear the most they would do - because they will do that. Make plans of resistance, plans of keeping yourself safe thru it, plans of retreat and safety if what they do makes you suicidal.

when you’re free, the trauma symptoms will go berserk at first; your entire system is experiencing protection from abuse for the first time (protection is abusers not knowing where you are or how to get to you), and this means you’ll finally be free to actually feel all the fear, panic, pain, anger, exhaustion, torture and everything else your body has been holding in all this time for the sake of surviving with abusers around. After I settled in my hiding place, I could barely get up for 8 months, panic attacks were almost daily, i couldn’t sleep from how strongly i felt i was about to be killed and punished for escaping, flashbacks and nightmares wouldn’t stop, chronic exhaustion and chronic pain were so bad I could barely move, it was draining my life energy just to make food for myself, and i could often not leave the place and go outside at all, and would get anxiety attacks around any kind of people. Only tip I have is to not feel guilty for resting. Don’t feel guilty for taking your time to recover, you need it, what is happening to you at this moment is recovery from a war, that lasted all of your life. You are wounded and tortured and you need rehabilitation and as much rest as you can get. I know it doesn’t feel good to just lie about and not get anything done, I know the guilt of not being productive, but lying down for almost a year made me feel shameless about resting and taking my time. It also helped me realize that causes of my chronic pain and chronic exhaustion were all the things i was forced to do against my will, basically anything abusers forced me to do, anything school related, and anything i was doing for well being of others and not myself. Resting allowed my natural will to do things to awaken, even though it took long, I now don’t have to force myself to move anymore, i can get up without thinking about it, doing things i want to do makes me more energetic rather than exhausted. So, no more doing things against your will, for anyone.

you will slowly find out just how much your abusers lied to you about the world. and trust me they lied to you a whole fucking lot. you will find out all the threats they made were empty, all their opinions and insults sent at you baseless and imaginary, all the doubts they planted into your mind, will start sounding ridiculous and stupid. A lot of abusers try to make their children incapable of making their own choices and fighting their battles and gathering knowledge about the world, so they would always feel like they can’t do anything on their own, and would turn to their parents for guidance, however, abusive parents while making choices and guidances for you, only thought about themselves and whatever is convenient for them, and not for you, which by default, makes you the person capable of making better choices, because for the first time, choices would be made for you, by you. Control over your life will feel good once you realize it’s not hard or scary, but gives you the power to do what you please, without having to respond to anyone.

there will always be people who will try to make you doubt your decision and blame you and take your abuser’s side, those people are wrong, and they are your enemies. From this point on, anyone who tries to make you doubt your decision to save your life is an enemy. Nobody should ever try to make you doubt if you could have done anything else but pick yourself up and save yourself from abusive environment. You can absolutely decide that those people are scum who would have you dead for their convenience, and turn your back on them.

I don’t have any financial advice, because i only ran away after earning enough money to not end up homeless, and I just did it by freelancing over the internet, which is something my abusers didn’t expect me to be capable of, so they failed to sabotage me on time, they however did make sure to throw abuse my way every time i was doing good and achieving something, but i stubbornly kept working until it got me out.

Conclusion: running away is fucking hard, you lose your family, in some cases all of your relatives as well, you lose your heritage more often than not, your use your security and backup in life, your life just ceases to be what it was and turns into something completely new. You gain: yourself, your freedom, your life, your sanity, your health, your personhood, a chance to heal and recover, a chance to experience life as it should have been. Absolutely. Worth It.