Hi, throwaway account because my other account may be personally identifiable.
I have had nothing but PFOs for 2 years running, and not so much as an AC. I have a question about mitigating circumstances and how to present them. I'm afraid it's a bit of a rollercoaster.
I had an interesting relationship with my parents. My parents both have a low-key history of mental illness, with my dad having been sectioned at a young age and my mum having a fairly obvious case of narcissistic personality disorder. They are both hardcore, irrationally religious, claiming to hear the voice of god and consult him on a daily basis. Despite this, they are both relatively functional in public because their narcissistic behaviour is channelled into appearing to be community do-gooders. My mum founded a charity and my dad is a vicar.
Behind closed doors, however, they are abusive and controlling. Because they hear the voice of god and he guides their decisions, they find iron justification in anything they decide to do. They compartmentalise everything, professing their love for me verbally but consistently making decisions which harmed me. I like to consider myself a surprisingly normal person despite my background. Unfortunately, my religious decisions escalated their controlling and irrational behaviour. I could talk all day about how this manifested itself, but I'll try and keep to the basics.
When I left for uni, in response to a lack of control, they started to assert control over my finances, taking my maintenance loan payments and refusing to guarantor me for housing. This made my time at uni hell - I was determined to get my degree and worked long overnight hours as a bartender. This itself would have affected my grades, but I was also caught up in a constant game of cat and mouse with hiding my finances from them, arguing constantly for my independence, and putting up with them constantly disrupting me in other ways like making unsolicited calls to the faculty when I tried to avoid contact with them. Years later, I realised that short of formal estrangement the best solution would have been publicly posting about what was happening - the threat of reputational damage would have been the only way I could have resolved it. I didn't consider formal estrangement an option as I couldn't conceive of being able to support myself at the time, and I was permanently maxed out of several overdrafts so had no money for deposits.
Overall, this experience was exhausting, and so unstable that I struggled to achieve my best. It is immensely frustrating - I knew I could have achieved a first had my parents been supportive and were I financially stable. Honestly I cannot imagine anything disrupting my studies more besides a serious illness.
To make matters even worse, when COVID hit I lost my source of income and had to interrupt the year, so my degree took 4 years rather than 3.
My GCSEs are all good, 5A*s + 5As. My A-levels are A*,A,B. At the end of my non-law degree, I had the following grades:
First year:
51, 44, 49, 51, 55, 55
Second year:
66, 56, 59, 62, 60
Third year:
75, 65, 60, 61
After my undergrad, I studied the MA Law with the University of Law and scored a high commendation (68%) with firsts in Contract Law and my commercial law research project.
Obviously, I recognise the position this puts me in. My grades are poor and inconsistent enough to seriously hinder my chances at lots of firms. Technically, I scored a 64% 2:1.
The university faculty was somewhat aware of this, and I have a reference from the head of my programme who I went to for support just before I had to interrupt my studies. I was an anxious mess.
My question is this: these circumstances are extremely difficult to explain concisely. When I do explain them, I believe they lie outside of most people’s scope of reference and instead it just comes across poorly. So how can I approach discussing them?
I apologise for the length - I really feel it's necessary to actually understand it. I would really appreciate a bit of advice, and especially the expertise of @Jessica Booker
I have had nothing but PFOs for 2 years running, and not so much as an AC. I have a question about mitigating circumstances and how to present them. I'm afraid it's a bit of a rollercoaster.
I had an interesting relationship with my parents. My parents both have a low-key history of mental illness, with my dad having been sectioned at a young age and my mum having a fairly obvious case of narcissistic personality disorder. They are both hardcore, irrationally religious, claiming to hear the voice of god and consult him on a daily basis. Despite this, they are both relatively functional in public because their narcissistic behaviour is channelled into appearing to be community do-gooders. My mum founded a charity and my dad is a vicar.
Behind closed doors, however, they are abusive and controlling. Because they hear the voice of god and he guides their decisions, they find iron justification in anything they decide to do. They compartmentalise everything, professing their love for me verbally but consistently making decisions which harmed me. I like to consider myself a surprisingly normal person despite my background. Unfortunately, my religious decisions escalated their controlling and irrational behaviour. I could talk all day about how this manifested itself, but I'll try and keep to the basics.
When I left for uni, in response to a lack of control, they started to assert control over my finances, taking my maintenance loan payments and refusing to guarantor me for housing. This made my time at uni hell - I was determined to get my degree and worked long overnight hours as a bartender. This itself would have affected my grades, but I was also caught up in a constant game of cat and mouse with hiding my finances from them, arguing constantly for my independence, and putting up with them constantly disrupting me in other ways like making unsolicited calls to the faculty when I tried to avoid contact with them. Years later, I realised that short of formal estrangement the best solution would have been publicly posting about what was happening - the threat of reputational damage would have been the only way I could have resolved it. I didn't consider formal estrangement an option as I couldn't conceive of being able to support myself at the time, and I was permanently maxed out of several overdrafts so had no money for deposits.
Overall, this experience was exhausting, and so unstable that I struggled to achieve my best. It is immensely frustrating - I knew I could have achieved a first had my parents been supportive and were I financially stable. Honestly I cannot imagine anything disrupting my studies more besides a serious illness.
To make matters even worse, when COVID hit I lost my source of income and had to interrupt the year, so my degree took 4 years rather than 3.
My GCSEs are all good, 5A*s + 5As. My A-levels are A*,A,B. At the end of my non-law degree, I had the following grades:
First year:
51, 44, 49, 51, 55, 55
Second year:
66, 56, 59, 62, 60
Third year:
75, 65, 60, 61
After my undergrad, I studied the MA Law with the University of Law and scored a high commendation (68%) with firsts in Contract Law and my commercial law research project.
Obviously, I recognise the position this puts me in. My grades are poor and inconsistent enough to seriously hinder my chances at lots of firms. Technically, I scored a 64% 2:1.
The university faculty was somewhat aware of this, and I have a reference from the head of my programme who I went to for support just before I had to interrupt my studies. I was an anxious mess.
My question is this: these circumstances are extremely difficult to explain concisely. When I do explain them, I believe they lie outside of most people’s scope of reference and instead it just comes across poorly. So how can I approach discussing them?
I apologise for the length - I really feel it's necessary to actually understand it. I would really appreciate a bit of advice, and especially the expertise of @Jessica Booker
