Dear Unilag Law Student,

You’re standing in front of the notice board, staring at the broadsheet and as you come across your matric number, you feel your being fall apart. You have watched your results go from not so bad to bad to worse to a mix of ‘you dunno wuh iz going on and only God can safe me.’

When the first set of bad results came, you told yourself you could recover from it, that next semester would be a chance to pick yourself up, that you could do better. So you put in the extra hours, the extra work, fought for library seats, but nothing changed and it remained that way the semester after that and the semester after that, and it just wouldn’t stop going downhill.

So here you are, realising that all the goals you set for yourself — graduate with a first class or at least a 2.1, be best graduating student perhaps, maybe be the best student in at least one course — will remain dreams, never a reality. You can’t graduate with a first class, you’ve barely managed to pass most of your courses, there’s a carryover waiting to be written and you’re one more terrible result away from not graduating with a 2.1 or 2.2. You’re losing hope in everything.

You thought you were intelligent, an above average student at the least. You’ve never done this bad in school so dealing with feeling like a failure is taking a toll on you. You’re questioning who you are, questioning your abilities because you thought you could do better, you thought you could never struggle in school. You can’t bring yourself to speak about it because these conversations are not easy to have. How hard can it possibly be they’ll ask. Aren’t people still doing well? So how do you tell them that you’re struggling to keep your head afloat? That this degree is taking too much from you?

There has always been pressure, pressure to do well, pressure to have your life put together, to know no failure. You’re afraid to ask for help because you cannot be known to struggle but here you are, falling under the weight of how much you have to bear, of all that is happening.

You don’t feel like you can carry on. You don’t know if law is for you. How do you cope in a world where your grades are said to define you? How do you explain that because you’re not doing well in school doesn’t make you failure?

But this is not the end. Who you are transcends beyond grades, beyond results, beyond what the broadsheet says you are. You are so much more and as hard as it is to believe, your grades do not define you. Do not confine yourself to what this educational system says you are. Free yourself of the limitations you’re posed with and let each day bring you new opportunities to be who you want to be.

I know that nothing prepared you for how being in this faculty would make you feel but I need you to know that you’re so much more than this faculty will ever make you feel and you deserve a lot more than this faculty gives you.

I can’t lie and say that it gets easier because it may or may not, but you will need to keep going. So when it gets hard, remember all that you are, and all the good that is in you and all your small victories.

Know that it is okay to struggle. There is no shame in not having your life put together, there is no shame in not being where you want to be and there is absolutely no shame in asking for help.

Embrace the process and try love every bit of it. Work on yourself, on the person you want to be, build relationships, develop the other areas of your life, live. Create a life that doesn’t revolve around the faculty.

Take care of yourself. I know that it is easy to slip into depression, for your failures to overwhelm you and make you feel like you’re not good enough but you must remember that you are enough, that how you see yourself is what matters the most. You must be kind and gentle with yourself, to not be too hard on yourself, to stop blaming yourself. You must remember to appreciate who you are and love yourself through all that is happening.

Remember that you must never lose hope, that you must confront each situation life presents you with the understanding that you can accept things as they are and make changes where you can. You must always remember to see all the abilities that you possess and the possibilities that lie ahead of you.

This is barely a chapter and not the end of your story. There are still pages left to be written. Begin to write your story as you want it to be told and remembered. You have all that it takes to live the life that you desire.

Never forget that you’re loved, deeply and recklessly. You’re supported. I, personally, am rooting for you and most importantly, you’re not alone in this.