Stress Stinks

Back home, I was always told that I had an "East Coast type of personality." That was people's nice way of telling me that I was a little neurotic, anal-retentive, prone to stress out, etc. I took no offense because I knew it was all true.

So imagine my surprise when I get to law school in DC, and I feel like I am one of the more mellow people here. In fact, my 1L students have actually commented on how I seemed far less stressed out than other people here. I wonder if the elevated levels of stress here is an East Coast phenomenon, law school thing, or combination of both. I suspect the last.

When I am relatively the laid-back person in an environment, that is probably not a good sign. There are seriously people around me who I worry that will self-combust. We all have stress, law school students and not, but some people here really do not know how to handle it. There are people who are worrying about everything under the sun, pulling all-nighters (I have no idea why), and double-fisting caffeine. Yesterday, one of my classmates reached the end of the rope with another student, stood-up, yelled a response, and left the room. We all sat there in shock. What is scary is that I go to the happy "kumbayah law school;" I do not know how it is at the unhappy competitive schools.

I do not pretend that law school is not stressful; I have had my fair share of anxiety (we call that first semester 1L year). I don't always deal with it the best way either. But some people here just really need to chill out. This is why lawyers are like twice as likely to have heart attacks.