{"id":2695,"date":"2025-05-13T08:14:13","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T08:14:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/?p=2695"},"modified":"2025-10-06T16:34:59","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T11:04:59","slug":"natashas-story-of-improving-her-grades-and-enhancing-herself-with-counseling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/2025\/05\/natashas-story-of-improving-her-grades-and-enhancing-herself-with-counseling.html","title":{"rendered":"Natasha\u2019s Story Of Improving Her Grades And Enhancing Herself With Counseling"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Natasha D\u2019Souza, originally from Mangalore, is 22 years old and is awaiting her final semester at the National Institute of Fashion Technology, Bangalore, for a Bachelor\u2019s degree in textile design.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha spent her childhood living outside India with her parents. As an only child, she always got all the attention and remembered her days as filled with fun. Natasha says she was also close only to her parents as they lived away from all her relatives growing up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cI value my parents the most, and to meet their expectations, I grew up as a perfectionist. Good grades weren\u2019t enough; I always needed the top grade.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Natasha had diverse interests as a kid, from archaeology to astronomy. In her fifth grade, she found her love for fashion when she spent all her free time drawing dresses. Natasha elaborates, saying that she even used to draw on the question papers in the exam hall during school. Apart from fashion, Natasha plays piano and reads novels in her leisure time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha returned to India during tenth grade. Since then, the difference in the curriculum has become a challenge for her, and when she moved to Bangalore for her undergraduate studies, she felt more pressured, says Natasha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She explained that she had a feeling that she needed therapy from her first year, but since it was pandemic time, the college\u2019s in-house counsellors weren\u2019t available. After a few months, she immediately booked a session when she received an e-mail regarding NIFT\u2019s tie-up with YourDOST.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe first session, I was nervous and awkward as I didn\u2019t know how it worked, but the counselor explained everything to me, and it sounded systematic, which felt convincing for me to continue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha adds that she intended to disclose everything she felt from her first session, as Natasha started believing it could help her definitively. She explains that she felt very comfortable during the following sessions with the counselors, Ms Maria Shantharaj and Ms Shravya Devadhar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha elucidates that the sessions helped her reflect on her situations in college. She was slowly finding her reasons for the pressure she felt in college.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cI have a lot of anxiety when it comes to academics. I kept high standards regarding grades and criticised myself too hard when I couldn\u2019t achieve high scores. Along with that, I started having issues with my friends, too. College life started becoming traumatising with both of these issues.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Natasha explains that she met one of her best friends in her first year of college, and they had many misunderstandings, which became the root cause of her trust issues. She adds that she wanted to drop out of college because she didn\u2019t want to face her best friend or academic challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen people expect something from me, I used to feel obligated to meet them. Abroad, the education system was easy for me to tackle, but when I couldn\u2019t provide the same results in India, I felt like a failure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha describes that she began to self-doubt and felt insecure. She couldn\u2019t handle the stress and felt desperate for help, as she wasn\u2019t on good terms with her friend either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therapy gave her an open space, as Natasha felt reserved about telling the people around her. She also adds that her parents couldn\u2019t understand what she was going through, as they thought it was a necessary struggle to succeed academically.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cMy parents think that even though they have gone through stress during their college times, it was normal, and my friends, who were under pressure too, were self \u2013 psychoanalysing, which I felt wasn\u2019t healthy. Between these, I made a conscious decision to prioritise my mind and continued therapy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

As the session went on, Natasha says that she realised that her patterns of anxiety associated with being a perfectionist and a people-pleaser started in childhood when she wanted to impress her parents. She started working on those patterns using the techniques taught in therapy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha\u2019s counselor asked her to consciously identify and pay attention to her thoughts to prevent burnout. This helped Natasha point out the things that bothered her throughout the years. She was also told to practice being assertive to the people she finds a threat, and Natasha adds that she is still working on it on her part.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her counselor also encouraged her habits of poetry writing and suggested meditation to help her with her anxiety issues. Natasha explains that her counselor was very adaptive as she was provided alternative activities when one didn\u2019t work out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBoth the counselors have been beneficial. While one went for an empathetic way, the other used a systematic way. Both the methods brought me a lot of progress.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha feels she can get through each day, holding onto the hope and faith that she can work on herself through her therapy sessions every Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cI have started being assertive and communicating better. It is not a lot, but progress doesn\u2019t have to be dramatic; even a subtle and slow change is progress.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Natasha explains that she feels better equipped to handle or adjust to a difficult situation. She adds that instead of trying to quit college or avoid conflicts with friends, Natasha realised she had to deal with them to put them behind her. She says that she has even made peace with her best friend, and they have found a way to understand each other better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have never been more grateful to anyone than my counselors. Without them, I wouldn\u2019t be where I am now, and we need more people like them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha expressed that she was glad she had the chance to seek help. As she continues her process, she rates herself 2.5 out of 5 in terms of Improvement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cThe way I see it, Improvement is not always about positive results daily; it is having the strength to move ahead even when we spiral back to square one.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

We are genuinely proud of Natasha\u2019s optimistic approach and believe that she will achieve her goals with therapy as her safe space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha\u2019s Warrior Tips:<\/strong>
1.\u201cAlways keep an open mind when seeking help. Whether it works or not, you will be satisfied that you tried.\u201d<\/strong>
2.\u201cIn society, we try to be collective even when things get challenging. The beauty of counseling is that we can be as vulnerable as we want.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are you someone who has gone through a difficult phase and emerged stronger and better, with some professional help? Share your story with us to encourage thousands of others who might be struggling. <\/em><\/strong>click here<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/a> to submit your story.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Natasha D\u2019Souza, originally from Mangalore, is 22 years old and is awaiting her final semester at the National Institute of Fashion Technology, Bangalore, for a Bachelor\u2019s degree in textile design. Natasha spent her childhood living outside India with her parents. As an only child, she always got all the attention and remembered her days as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2696,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,37,86],"tags":[53,28,54,56,25,55,52,51,27,26],"class_list":["post-2695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-student-life","category-study-skills","tag-academicsupport","tag-counselingsupport","tag-exampreparedness","tag-goalsetting","tag-letstalk","tag-mentalfitness","tag-studysmart","tag-yd-diaries","tag-yd-stories","tag-youarenotalone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2695"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2697,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2695\/revisions\/2697"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yourdost.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}