devastated by the gmat

Try again... with good material such as Manhattan series,power score cr bible, OG and ofcourse GmatClub material
good luck

Never give hope.

0. Have faith in yourself and believe that you can do it.
1. You need to assess your weakness.
2. Work on the weakness.
3. Repeat 1 and 2 above till you have mastered the art.

GMAT can be conquered, but it needs patience and practice. I have read stories of people who got 750 or 740 plus in just a few weeks, but not everyone can do so. At least, I am not one of them. It took me many many months to get past 700. My weakness was English, and I began from basics. See what's holding you back.

You need to search for a wide variety of material. Most of the guys get 100+ more than what they score on Kaplan. Don't burn mid night oil too much a few days before the exam. In case you get too stressed out, you need to tell yourself constantly that GMAT can be retaken and that too without too much of wait.

What was the breakup of your score and let us know in which area you need to work more? This forum is full of helpful guys, and I got a lot of help by reading what others were doing to get a great score. Though I am yet to get where I want to, I will reach there soon.

Definitely take it again. I too had a large score differential between my practice tests and the real deal the first time I took the test and it was unbelievably frustrating. I took the GMAT a second time and realized a 100 point upswing in my score (630-730)

The biggest change I made in my strategy was studying to build endurance. My initial (and flawed) strategy was to do a few questions here or there and then routinely "reward" myself by getting distracted by the internet. After switching my strategy up, I definitely was not studying more, but I made sure that any time I was studying I was simulating testing conditions as closely as possible:

1) always study in 75 minute increments (no stops!)
2) only give yourself 8 minute breaks in between segments
3) when doing a full length practice test, don't skip the AWA. You're going to need to be able to think hard for 4 hours straight, and skipping the AWAs is cheating yourself.

Testing fatigue set in during those last verbal questions which definitely tanked my score. You know the content of the test, you just need to have the mental discipline to be able to concentrate for 4 hours--something we are not naturally inclined to do.