Wow man, that's crazy.Well, I am also in the same boat. Reading these posts encouraged me to share my story in case it could lift up anyone's spirit (especially people sitting at 450s who are sounding too impatient and hopeless or someone who is struggling in language score. I apologize in advance for the longer post.
I have been following ROH since Nov-2017 (mostly silently) and have read numerous posts here be it negative or positive. And it won’t be wrong to say that ROH has played a key role in keeping me positive despite a few negative occasions. It is only because of a few good & appreciable people(@13nitinsharma , @NikSharma01 and many others before them) in every ROH thread who keep motivating others, including me.
Anyway, How it started for me?:
It was the golden year 2017 which motivated me to join this race, and I thought that I too stand a decent chance to be through. I calculated the potential CRS and found that the best I could easily reach to is 438. Very well, I said to myself, since the cut-off score that time was dipping even to 413s. So, Hell yeah! I am into it. Although I am having only bachelor’s degree, and my spouse is holding master’s, I dint thought to bother her with the IELTS thing, and thought I could deal with it alone. Without wasting any time, I gave my first IELTS attempt in Jan 2018 (assuming my English is good enough to write the exam straight away), and wallah! I wasn't much disappointed. I got L:8.5|R:9:S:8|but W:6.5. I imagined well it’s not gonna take long and 2018 could be my year. (oh man! I was so wrong). Overall, by the end of Jan-2018 I was sitting at 389.
One failure is nothing, let move on:
As you might guess my next step, was to book another slot, and this time too I got CLB10 in all the other module but CLB8 in W. another set back. Urggghhhh!!!!!
Ok. Ok. Let’s prepare a little bit. I spent next one month on W and felt confident enough to go one more time……. Any guesses???? Yeah. W was again 6.5.
By now, it was Jun-2018 and this IELTS thing took a huge toll on my confidence level. On several forums, I read that BC & IDP do it intentionally. I wanted to believe those stories cause it was easy to blame someone else for your own failures. Hahaha. But would it solve my problem. No way, I definitely need to pull myself together again. I decide to go through Wren n Martin, university paper writing and what not. Well I was ready once again. I told myself lets do it for the final time. This time I got CLB10 in R & L. CLB9 in S(I blame my lower confidence for this), but W again 6.5. What the f*%$^$%.
Should I aim a bit lower:
Ok. I must get over 400 CRS first to increase my PNP chances as the CIC cut-off was oscillating at 440s. I made one more attempt in Oct-2018 to score 7 in W. And this time, I got a 7 but in S . W was again 6.5. Other 2 modules were again 8.5-9. I gave another thought to blame BC/IDP, and honestly I did it this time for a while to console myself a bit. but making further understanding about the expectations in W made me change my mind and I decide to leave it to Jan-2019. By this time, I lost 5 points to my Happy(not so happy btw!) B’day. I was literally cursing myself for not going for a 1 year diploma earlier and for not involving my spouse into it. In order to mend the damage done, I asked my wife to prepare and got myself enrolled in a 1 year diploma.
Final nail in the coffin:
Luckily, IDP has introduced CBT in India by Oct 2018 and being an IT guy, I was happy . I booked another slot. I was prepared more than ever, not for IELTS, but for unfavourable outcome. What else could be devastating than my previous results? I was only focused to give my best that’s all. I finished up L with a feeling that I got all of them correct. Now, it was R time. To my surprise, my test was finished in 35 mins. Wait, I must have missed an entire section. I checked again and found that I am done with R. Again with the feeling of getting all of them correct. Good going! I appreciated myself But now is the real test i.e. W. On computer I was able to finish W in 45 mins. I proof-read twice and thought I cant do any better than this. If this time result is negative, I will bid farewell to IELTS & PR dream.
I got the result after 5 days, I was sitting in a meeting in office when my phone’s message tone rang. It was L:9 | R:9 | W:7 | S:7.5.
F*** you IELTS, I cheered in my mind, but it seemed that everyone else in that meeting room read my thoughts by my expression. I was so happy to beat this demon with the hard work and never giveup attitude.
So, now I am sitting at 428. Hoping to get some PNP invite. But I guess now its time for OINP/SINP/MPNP….. to smirk at me.
But, I know one thing I am not gonna giveup on what I started. Not until I get it. It may take another year till I get additional education certificate to boost my score. I wish my spouse will get the CLB9 soon and all this may end soon.
I think we should just believe these stories about BC and IDP. My first test I had W6, the 2nd one was W6.5 then I stopped and booked TEF, I knew I would just keep wasting my money.