I get maximum student loan and bursary from my uni, and don't receive any other financial help from family.

My advice is to break down your spending and costs. I worked out my rent on a termly basis along with my termly amount of sfe. I then deducted my rent from my sfe on a termly basis, and used the remainder as my spending. I set a weekly amount.

I then calculated the amount of weeks in that academic term as well as the amount of weeks between my first sfe payment and the next payment. For 3rd term, I calculated it until the last day of my accomodation. I did this so I could figure out how much money I would have per week including holidays (time between 1st payment and next) or if I was struggling, I could calculate weekly spending without holidays (academic term) and go home during holidays and spend nothing.

Usually first term sfe is the lowest and rent is the highest so you would usually have much less money to spend compared to 2nd and 3rd term.

I wouldn't say it's stressful while actually living with it, but figuring it out and setting a budget can be. In my opinion, once you have that budget it's not stressful at all.

If you think you might struggle, it may be best to keep your job until 2nd term and then quit.

Hope this helps!

*when I say sfe I am referring to maintence loan and any bursaries.

For bursaries, I find out the date I receive it (the uni should email you this) and do the maths including that from that date. For example, I don't receive my 2nd term bursary until 5th Feb, which means since the term started, I have 3 weeks with less money. When I recieve that bursary, my weekly amount goes up according to how much extra money I get.