I Sacrificed Two Years of My Youth for a Dream That Was Cancelled in Two Minutes.

My hands were shaking when I opened the notification. Just like that, years of waking up at 4 AM, skipping every family gathering, giving up my hobbies, and staring at textbooks until my vision blurred was wiped clean. "Exam cancelled due to irregularities. Re-test dates to be announced." I sat on the floor of my room and I couldn't even cry. I just felt completely hollow. Older generations keep telling us: "Just study harder. Back in our day, we worked hard and made it." But they don't understand what it feels like to be a student right now. We aren't fighting just the syllabus—we are fighting a broken system where question papers get leaked, exams get cancelled overnight, and our whole lives are put on infinite pause. For two years, my entire identity was reduced to a roll number and a target score. My parents sacrificed their savings for coaching classes. Every time they looked at me, I felt the crushing weight of their expectations. I convinced myself that if I just survived until exam day, I would finally get to live. Now, I'm told to "just restart." To sit back down at the same desk, open the same worn-out pages, and pretend my mental health hasn't been completely destroyed. The worst part isn't the studying. It's looking in the mirror and realizing I don't even know who I am outside of this exam. I gave up my teenage years, my friendships, and my peace of mind for an authority that treats our futures like a casual administrative mistake. To every other young person sitting in a quiet room tonight, feeling terrified, furious, and exhausted: how are you holding up? How do we keep going when it feels like the system is rigged against us?