If you’re currently feeling overwhelmed as a physical therapy student, take comfort in knowing that you certainly aren’t alone. Every semester there are students all over the globe in their program who feel like some aspect of their schooling is getting out of control. This article is written to help you take a step back, breathe and know what some initial steps are to take when it comes to regaining the sense of control in your program.

When feeling overwhelmed, start by identifying the underlying sources of stress. Next, identify who to talk to for appropriate help (academically or personally). From there, identify and commit to specific action strategies to regain your sense of control. You’ve got this!

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with feeling overwhelmed in your program — you’re a human, and you’re putting yourself through a set of academic demands that not many people are willing to undergo. Be proud of the fact that you’re willing to put yourself through discomfort and know that the right steps will help to bring things back under control.

If you want the specifics on how to do this, keep on reading!

ARTICLE OVERVIEW (Quick Links)
Click/tap on any headline below to instantly read that section!

Action 1: Pinpointing the sources
Action 2: Know who to talk to
Action 3: Identify and implement changes

Related article: How PT Students Can Manage and Reduce Stress in School

Action 1: Pinpointing the sources

Feeling overwhelmed can be a very disorienting experience. It can be hard to determine what is causing you to feel uneasy or why you aren’t exactly at peace. Stress and anxiety have an uncanny way of obscuring or covering the specifics of the underlying problem.

It’s hard to take action against a problem and fix it when you’re unclear what the actual issue is. Conquering the feeling of being overwhelmed requires you to be crystal-clear on the reason(s) why you currently aren’t at peace.

Start by shutting everything down around you (literally and metaphorically) and ask yourself what is causing you to feel overwhelmed. It might help to write anything down as it comes to you. Whether it’s the pace at which all of your courses are moving, one single particular course, financial stress, a recent poor exam score, or anything else, take the required time to explore what’s got you feeling rather uneasy.

Whether it takes five minutes or two hours, write everything down. From there, look at everything written and identify if anything is the primary culprit or which issues are more significant sources of stress than others. Once you’ve got your list and know which ones are the most significant sources contributing to feeling overwhelmed, coming up with an attack plan will be much easier and more effective for regaining your control.

Action 2: Identify who it is you should talk to

Physical therapy school is not a solo endeavour (nor is life, for that matter). If you don’t want to get eaten alive by the stress and weight of your program, it’s a good idea to have others in your life who can offer you the specific types of insight and help required to get your situation under control.

Sometimes you might benefit from talking about your situation with a confidant, such as a close friend or family member. Other times it might be an academic professor or physical therapist who can help you with your curricula.

This is why step 1 is so crucial — it helps you identify who will be best to seek out assistance with regaining control of your situation.

To help you out a bit more, I’ll be providing some information below to perhaps get more out of seeking out help from specific individuals.

Academic resources

Your academic professors should be your primary source of help if your sense of feeling overwhelmed is primarily (or in part) due to the curricula of any of your courses. They know the curricula and the demands of the course the best, and they’re very familiar with which topics students tend to struggle with the most.

As a result, locate their office and take advantage of their open office hours. Each of your professors should have available slots of time throughout the week that you can go in and let them know the topics you’re struggling with and any particular insight or additional resources that they may have for helping you get back on top of your situation.

Related article: How to Succeed in PT School (Don’t Make These Mistakes)

Personal & professional resources

Whether or not your sense of feeling overwhelmed is strictly due to academic demands, having one or more people you can simply share your situation with and how it makes you feel can be an immensely powerful source of help.

Every student enrolled in an academic program has access to professional counselling through resources provided by their institution free of charge.

This is something that I myself, as well as a couple of my peers in my cohort, made use of during our days as PT students. For some of us, it was due to the stress of the program. For others, such as myself, it was for ongoing life stressors outside the program. But the end result was the same: having a professional councillor we could talk to was a game-changer for helping us regain our sense of control in otherwise stressful and seemingly overwhelming times.

If seeking help from a professional councillor isn’t something you feel necessary or comfortable with, consider any other ally you have access to; a friend, pastor, classmate, etc. So long as you feel that you have someone who can provide you comfort and support, you’ll be taking a powerful step in the right direction for regaining your sense of control.

Action 3: Identify and implement changes

With all of your problem sources identified and the assembling of appropriate personnel in your corner, the next step is to formulate an action plan — one that gets you back on track to feeling confident and in charge of your time spent in your program.

There is a whole world that could be unpacked with this process. As a result, the fine details of how you formulate and execute your necessary changes are a bit beyond the scope of what I can concisely fit within this article. Nonetheless, some global concepts can indeed be pointed out.

Here are some tips on how to begin making any required changes:

Tip 1: Be prepared to make sacrifices

It can be near impossible to get yourself out of an uncomfortable situation without making changes that require some form of sacrifice. Common sacrifices that you can expect to make can include:

• Sacrificing leisure time
• Sacrificing social activities
• Sacrificing finances (cutting down on work hours outside of school)

Regardless of the category or type of sacrifice you feel you must make, keep it within healthy limits; going too extreme can often have adverse effects. But let’s be clear: you will need to have the maturity to know when to make (and stick to) needed sacrifices.

Pro tip: Take pride in needing to make (and sticking to) sacrifices. It shows remarkable maturity and discipline, and it will yield massive rewards as a result!

Tip 2: Find a way to track the process

As the old saying goes: if you don’t assess, the best you can do is guess. Whether you’re making a single change or undertaking a massive overhaul for getting back under control, make sure you can ensure that the process is working.

This can be as simple as checking in with yourself on a daily basis to ensure your sense of feeling overwhelmed is decreasing. You can also opt for other ways of tracking your progress, as there’s no right or wrong way to do so.

The point is that when you have a way to track, monitor and see how your sense of wellbeing is improving, you’ll gain added confidence that you’re not wasting your time or efforts. What’s more, you’ll be able to continually tweak and optimize these changes as you move forward in your program, ensuring that you’re making great things happen.

Tip 3: Help others to help yourself

One of the best ways to improve your sense of wellbeing is to help others. Don’t worry; I’m not talking about getting involved with a local organization and volunteering hours of free time each week.

Rather, I’m referring to helping a fellow classmate or friend who might be undergoing some challenges as well. This can be in the form of studying together and helping one another by teaching academic concepts or material that one of you may be struggling with.

It can even be more simple than that. Simply letting a struggling classmate know that you empathize with them and will do your best to help them along their journey can remind you that you’re not the only one going through the struggle.

So, consider teaching others what you know or having a dedicated study buddy that you can bounce questions off of when a topic or academic concept doesn’t make sense. The results can be surprisingly effective.

Final thoughts

Feeling overwhelmed in PT school is a sensation that plenty of students will experience during their academic pursuits. If you’re one of them, relax — plenty of other students have made it through this scenario, and you too. Follow the steps in this article for a solid starting point on how you can go about regaining your sense of control and personal wellbeing when it comes to being a PT student.