comps

This PhD program is a constant struggle with feeling like I've bit off more than I can chew. I am not cut out for this, for the life/path of an academic. What was I ever thinking? How did I get talked into this? I perpetually feel like a fraud who will get found out any day now. The latest crisis (well, from the last several months): I fear I've set an unrealistic goal for my comprehensive exam readings. (I consider comps phase 2 of 4). And this stack here represents the books I have already completed (obviously not all of these were cover-to-cover jobs; for example, the bottom book, I only used one essay in there--35 pages total I think). I have also completed a lot of accompanying notes for each book, because just reading them is not enough. I will be tested on them. I have to write three long essays on them all, at one go, in five hours. This stack also represents about 1/5th of what I need completed by the beginning of December. I only set about 7 months to do it. Everyone said I could: my adviser, my friends and colleagues, my family. Am I the only wrong one here because I feel that I cannot, especially when considering in a few weeks I go back to teaching (thankfully just one class this semester)? Don't I know myself better than anybody? Don't I know of my fear, my procrastination, my inabilities to concentrate anymore? Honestly, I feel so much less intelligent after having begun this program two years ago. This is not the fault of my University, I don't think. Nor my instructors. I feel like I can't stand to read anything any more, write anything any more. And I'm stuck. But I'm healthy (generally speaking), I'm in love. I have support. I'm not really stuck. I need to figure out how to adapt, and do it fast. I can. I will. Thanks for listening. No comments necessary, just needed to vent, I suppose, even if just with a laptop keyboard and mouse and thirteen-inch screen and pixels and pixels and words.