Catching up after nearly 6 months of absence

Hello fellow SPWers,


I've been away for quite sometime, major changes in my life have taken place during that period ; therefore, the purpose of this post is to attempt to summarize what has been going on during that time. For the lazy ones I've included a tl;dr part at the very bottom of this post.

Studies & work :

From mid-April to late-September I was doing an internship at some IT-consulting company, that had nothing to do with my major of studies, but it was either that, or putting my degree at stake because of being unable to find a compulsory end-of-year internship.

This was the second internship I had ever done, but the first remunerating one that was, moreover, done in a company full of suit-wearing people...basically it was something completely new to me.

Everything proved rather stressful for 3 main reasons :
  • Lack of supervision : Since I studied electronics, IT development was completely new to me, so I had to sort of teach myself through youtube how things were being done. My supervisor being most of the time absent, I had to rely on forums a lot to find a solution to my problems, so it required a lot of autonomy, which I lacked of.

  • Routine : Waking up early and working till at least 5PM while sitting in a bad posture behind a computer, wasn't the most exciting thing I had done. This meant less time for myself, less time to exercise, and less time to cook.

  • Things being at stake : Surely this was the most stressful of the 3, I was so apprehensive of messing up that it made me freak out so many times, because failing was inconceivable to me, it would have entailed : no degree => no possibility to work => no possibility to settle in France, also disappointing people that had done so much to contribute to my success.

Social interactions with colleagues weren't bad at all, I had a rather easy contact with them, I got to chat with them during lunch break (even if I most of the time don't have lunch), sometimes also being invited to the restaurent with the whole team and even crack a joke with the director general about him promising not to lower my salary if I was too familiar with him.

When the big day came to expose my work before the university's jury I freaked out about stuttering, as I always do at any defenses. This time however, things went rather smoothly because of me coming up with a script I wrote on my PowerPoint comments, focusing on reading it diverted my attention from the jury, but also, I had a lucky charm in my hand that I kept hold of throughout all the presentation, I felt this also contributed to my success. What's so special about it you might ask? Just the fact that it was offered to me by a person I care very much about. More about this below.

Housing :

In addition to the resulting stress from my studies, I had to look for an accommodation since my 2-years-contract with my residency in Versailles had ended, but with an almost expired permit and no stable income yet it was hard for me to get hold of anything, let alone in a place as convenient as were I used to stay, so what happened is that a former classmate of mine has agreed to accommodate me at his place, well almost... since it's a different floor and there is no shower or kitchen/fridge it turned out quite challenging, to find a way around it, I decided to subscribe to the gym (Yes, for the first time) so I could both go with him there, take a shower, stretch and exercise, since the room I am in isn't big enough for that, but above all : finally have real machines to treat my hunchback problems by muscling my back. Talk about getting out of your comfort zone.

Sentimental life :

During all that time, I kept contact with a lady I'd met on some forum (won't say which), living so far away from me, we kept chatting about many topics, she partly alleviated the pressure and stress the internship had resulted in, she contributed a lot to my psychological support and made me feel wanted and boosted my confidence in myself, which is a feeling that even my closest friends don't provide me with. I have the utmost appreciation to her for that.

When July came it was the vacations period, we both made a major step out of our comfort zones : meeting the one behind the pixels!
I would have never thought that one day I would be meeting someone I've been talking so much with, someone with which I hadn't even had any audio or video conversations, but we both wanted crazy, so we went for it.

Moments before she arrived at the airport my social anxiety was sky-rocketing, my hands were shaking and I was wondering if I had the right facial expression, that I wouldn't scare her away lol. No woman would have done what she did, book a flight to meet a complete stranger she'd never even had a video chat with beforehand, that greatly affected my feelings for her, it proved her commitment and esteem to the guy I was.

For the first time in my life I was able to meet someone who feels the same I feel for her.

The first time we hugged was quite an unconventional one Xd ... she was literally sitting 5 cm away from me on a train, I pulled out my phone and texted her, asking if I could put my arm around her shoulders, she replied "Go for it". I will never forget that moment.

We had so much fun together, it made discover the city I was in for 2 years, which I would have been too bored to explore otherwise.

Above all, I don't regret this experience a bit, it made me meet a wonderful person with so many qualities, she's cute, trustworthy, reasonable, gentle and very very very caring. I am forgetting some others probably :eek:h:

All this impacted me positively : it changed my outlook on sentimental relationships and is making me feel more confident in myself.

We'll be meeting in December, but I'll be the one to fly this time.

Maybe someday we'll figure all this out, try to put an end to all our doubt and live our lives out loud.

tl;dr : I graduated, and I got out of my comfort zone big time!
 
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......For the lazy ones I've included a tl;dr part at the very bottom of this post.....
^ Loved this bit! :lol:


Good to see you back in here, Jungle! :thumbup:

That took a lot of courage to meet up with that girl! I am happy for you that it went so well and you both had a great time. :perfect:
 
^ Loved this bit! :lol:


Good to see you back in here, Jungle! :thumbup:

That took a lot of courage to meet up with that girl! I am happy for you that it went so well and you both had a great time. :perfect:

Hello BlueDays!

Thank you very much (-= , maybe in the future I'll give more details about this.
 
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