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Show In severe cases, burnout can lead to clinical depression carpenter and clothing salesman, he says, helped him realize "why I left and why I had to come back." Now, he says, "I'm full of energy and really excited about my classes." Dropping out for a semester or a year was once seen by many as a sign of weakness. Now usually called "stopping out" because the student fully intends to return, it is often actively encouraged. But authorities also recommend less drastic steps to alleviate stress. Academically, they suggest getting to know your adviser well; if that's not possible, try a sympathetic resident adviser or classmate. Class loads can be reduced or better balanced when burnout threatens; just because you can "proficiency out" of numerous entry-leve- l courses, for example, is not necessarily a reason why you should. Develop your own study schedule, even if it seems exotic to others. One Northwestern honors student, for example, used to study well into the night in a neighboring broom closet while her roommates slept much to the consternation of the janitors. Kathy Ellis, a sophomore English major at Notre Dame, has decided she will only socialize on weekends. "I hear a lot about people, mostly upperclassmen, who are at the bars every night," Ellis says with a shrug. "But I can't go out on weekdays. When the weekend comes, though, I feel like going PAULS. HOWELL Confiscated cache: Mollies, crystal meth, Preludin trouble; many use crank a few times and walk away. The ger isn't necessarily that your chest will explode the first time you try speed; but, says Mark Lanier of Charter Hospital ofColumbia in Missouri, "if you normally rely on something else to get you through a situation even something as simple as NoDoz you're coping with life with a drug." As Kierkegaard said: Speed enthusiasts insist they know their drug's power, but find it indispensable for spurts of work. "When it's the night before the big final you don't care about what's going to keep you up you just take it," says Ellen, 20, a UCSB sophomore. Abner Rone, a 1987 UT grad, recalls feeling that speed helped "break down barriers" when he studied. "You feel more alive," Rone says. "It's like what Kierkegaard said, 'the dizziness of freedom.' Speed gives you that." But does it really? Accordcounselors, ing to drug-abus-e the feelings of insight and alertness are generally false. "Tasks that are creative are not enhanced" by chemical stimulants, insists Dr. Kath-ry- n Mclntyre, a psychiatrist at UT's Counseling and Mental Health Center. In fact, she says, students who pull with speed may end high-efficien- cy rs up having an even harder time absorbing and retrieving the information they're trying so desperately to master. And for the few who get sucked in, speed can be a hard habit to break. "When I think about what it means to be wired, I think about the times I scrubbed my bathtub at 3 in the morning," recalls Elaine, an honors student at a large Southwestern university. "I think about the typos in the papers I wrote because I was too shaky to type. I also think about all the scummy people I met . . . using a straw after them, being friendly, because they're selling something you want." She also remembers sleepless nights spent "crying and hating myself for being - so ' stupid." Why has speed come back? Says Charles Edgley, chairman of the Oklahoma State sociology department: "In a highly competitive economy, people search for those things that will enhance their performance so they can do exactly what society is driving them to do." Society says get ahead almost no matter what the cost. For many students, stimulants are becoming a potentially dangerous part of that equation. Jacob Yovnawith Lisa Brown and Kelly K n o x in Austin, Ziva Hobson in Stillwater, Okla., and bureau reports S, f r 1 -- - ' ) . if I j - , . A . ' Drowning sorrow: OCTOBER 1987 if Alcohol causes, doesn't cure, grief NEWSWEEK ON CAMPUS 9 1 |