In trouble please help Forum

[brookland]

I realize I have no one to blame but myself but I have fallen far behind on my work this semester. I was recently diagnosed with a condition that indicates there is a better than 50/50 chance I will develop a serious neurodegenerative illness by the time I'm 40. In addition I've had some relationship troubles. It's been hard for me to get out of bed, I've missed a fair amount of classes and have fallen about one month behind on readings. I'm at a lower top 14 and I was median last semester. Exams are one month away.

What is the best strategy for the way forward? I'm thinking to mostly focus on reading supplements to make sure I have a basic understanding of the concepts, enough to at least skirt by with B's. Then, if I have time to try to make up all the readings I missed. I'm not sure what to do at this point.

If it helps the one class I'm really concerned about is property law, that is the one I am having a lot of trouble learning. I guess everyone has trouble with property but mine is augmented by missed readings and classes.

[joobacca]

understanding property. it's been recommended on this forum about 092384209384023984092384092834 times. it's very good, especially its organization. helps you understand what's driving those shitty rules and lays out the rules for every jurisdiction, which you will likely need to know. bar bri video is also good. mnemonics help a lot.

i am sorry to hear about your condition. i cannot relate because i haven't been in a similar situation. but it seems like you got some serious issues. i would sort that out before making any move. you got plenty of time. but you should either commit to finals now or sort out whatever it is that needs to be sorted out. i think if you don't address this issue (of what you want to do now given your physical/mental condition) then it might bite you in the ass down the road. that is, because of your failure to address this now you might find yourself in the bad situation (not prepared to finals and without a clear direction of what you want to do).

EDIT: fuck the readings. for real.

[keg411]

1) Make the soonest appointment with your school's counseling center as you can. It sounds like you have a lot on your plate that no one here can help you with.

2) Does your school tape classes? If so, watch/listen to everything you've missed. Multiple times if you have to. Anything you don't understand make appointments with your professors and talk to them about what you are struggling. Buy any supplements keyed to your casebook and read them for a basic understanding of all of the cases you missed (if you have the Dukeminier Property book, there are at least 5 of them).

The reason I suggest #1 is because you are basically going to have to devote all of your time to #2 in order to catch up.

[gwuorbust]

1) Make the soonest appointment with your school's counseling center as you can. It sounds like you have a lot on your plate that no one here can help you with.

2) Does your school tape classes? If so, watch/listen to everything you've missed. Multiple times if you have to. Anything you don't understand make appointments with your professors and talk to them about what you are struggling. Buy any supplements keyed to your casebook and read them for a basic understanding of all of the cases you missed (if you have the Dukeminier Property book, there are at least 5 of them).

The reason I suggest #1 is because you are basically going to have to devote all of your time to #2 in order to catch up.

+1 for this.

Also, I wouldn't worry so much about having fallen behind on the readings. By that standard I'm behind the whole semester in readings because I have yet to use my casebooks.

Buy some E&Es, pre-made outlines from the SBA, look for outlines on TLS. Review those heavy and see if there is any audio/video of your classes. Y

I would first get your medical situation sorted out. After that, you can just do some catch up through the resources I just described. No reason to panic about failing out because you didn't do the readings, you can still do this. I wish you the very best!!

[zeth006]

For core concepts, supplements all the way.

As for outlines/notes, find someone who's really nice, but promise him/her you won't share anything with the entire world.

[YourCaptain]

For core concepts, supplements all the way.

As for outlines/notes, find someone who's really nice, but promise him/her you won't share anything with the entire world.

Crush the supplements; use hornbooks to easily digest the core information, E&Es to familiarize yourself with the information in hypotheticals, and try to get someone's notes for the finer points that your teacher is interested in.

I would not go back to the casebooks for the old readings; you'll simply push yourself behind playing catch up. Look ahead to where you need to be at and get yourself up to speed using shortcuts.

[LurkerNoMore]

Definitely supplements. Do CALI lessons. If you have time after these two things, look through the cases that were assigned as readings and pull Lexis headnotes for them. You can plug them into they supplement reading (supplements often don't mention any case names -- if you can match the case that was assigned to the rule you learned, you can pick up extra points on the exam).

Also see if there are past exams for your professors. Read all of those and get an idea of what you need to learn and focus your readings and any outlining towards the exams.

[traehekat]

It's kinda funny that as I'm listening to everyone's suggestions (read supplements, CALI, headnotes from LexisNexis, etc.), I'm just thinking, "Yeah, that is pretty much all you have to do in the first place, actually..."

So yeah, OP - if you do all this stuff and your school records classes, you actually should be in pretty good shape.

[CanadianWolf]

If suffering from depression , daily exercise such as running, swimming, biking and/or weightlifting can help.

Law school courses should be handled easily if you can copy a classmate's notes & use commercial outlines. Don't panic & do not try to do all of the assigned reading.
Don't overwhelm yourself with negative thoughts about your condition or about the amount of missed reading & classes. Stay positive. Lots of people are misdiagnosed. And medical science makes tremendous advances every year.
Enjoy law school. Enjoy every day.

[zeth006]

For core concepts, supplements all the way.

As for outlines/notes, find someone who's really nice, but promise him/her you won't share anything with the entire world.

Crush the supplements; use hornbooks to easily digest the core information, E&Es to familiarize yourself with the information in hypotheticals, and try to get someone's notes for the finer points that your teacher is interested in.

I would not go back to the casebooks for the old readings; you'll simply push yourself behind playing catch up. Look ahead to where you need to be at and get yourself up to speed using shortcuts.

Well, to be sure, a hornbook is a supplement.

But yeah. Reading the casebook readings this late in the semester would be downright unrealistic.