I’m happy to be done but sort of embarrassed to post this since I’d be surprised how many people took longer. I’ve been a member of this board for almost 7 years! The only explanation I have for why it took me so long is that I actually work in the industry and have since I started the process. I’ve been an analyst the whole time and have generally had among the best results of the rest of the analyst team where I work so never felt a ton of pressure outside of just peer pressure to get done (all my coworkers already had the CFA). It also took me awhile to actually learn how not just to study, but to study for these exams. For example, I finally passed level one when I realized that using notecards can be helpful.
I stumbled on Level 2 I believe because I passed L1 in the winter. I sort of quit in March/April that year but made a final push at the end and the result was Band 7. That gave me a false sense of being close to passing and I probably didn’t try hard enough the following year and I got the Band 9. Then when I failed band 9 again I was at my lowest low and really close to just quitting (that year I focused on FRA really hard because the prior year is where it tripped me up, then the following year I nailed FRA but did worse in Equity which killed me). Level 3 was a more natural progression and I really feel like I only failed it twice because I quit so early the year my kids were born. Happy to finally be done. It won’t help my career that much but at least I will no longer feel like a pariah at work. To anyone else that feels bogged down in the process of trying to pass, maybe this will help.
Summer 2008 - Level 1 -Fail
Winter 2008 - Level 1 - Fail
Summer 2009 - Level 1 - Fail
Winter 2009 - Level 1 - Pass
2010 - Level 2 - Fail Band 7
2011 - Level 2 - Fail Band 9
2012 - Level 2 - Fail Band 9
2013 - Level 2 - Pass
2014 - Level 3 - Fail band 3 (twins born in late May that year, stopped studying in March)
2015 - Level 3- Fail band 8
2016 Level 3 - Pass!