[tass]

You should talk to a school counsellor about the load. What is the worst that can happen if you don't graduate on time? I'm asking because i don't actually know...

Talk to a doctor about the other problems you're having - if it's stress related you'll at least have some evidence to back you up if you discuss workload with your school.

[xhdjejxjx]

But you don't understand: that's what everyone else in the program is doing too.

[thephyber]

What does what "everyone else is doing" have to do with _your_ personal physical and mental health?

Take an honest appraisal of what you think you can do and talk it over with both your major counselor and a school nurse. If your body or mental health can't handle it, take it down a notch and consider dropping a course and retaking it the next semester/quarter.

Half of the controversy of the suicides based on parental+peer pressure and competition is that the demands will never plateau or fall. They will continue to rise above the abilities of more than 99% of the people who enter the competition. There is no supply/demand curve where parents/peers and you will magically find an equilibrium. Learn to have your own expectations, independent of your parents and peers.

[secabeen]

The other thing to remember is that only a few years after you finish your education, the specifics of it will matter little. What you show on your resume for your first job completely swamps where you went to school, and especially how you did there.

[rwallace]

What's to understand? If all your acquaintances started cutting themselves or smoking crystal meth, would you insist on emulating them in that too?

As it is, your standard of living would be markedly improved if you went and lived on the streets and scrounged food out of dumpsters. Bonus: you're not even effectively learning the material you're nominally studying. Cut back to a sane workload. If they won't let you stay in that course at that rate, transfer to something else, or drop out entirely. If being a homeless derelict would improve your standard of living, you need to do something other than what you're doing.

[will_pseudonym]

You are risking your life to keep up with the Joneses. It's not worth it.