I don't even know where to start, man. I'm not doing well dealing with winter here in the north, I have to transfer colleges this fall. I have people encouraging me to apply to top schools because my GPA is really awesome. I kind of want to try but I am running too low on spoons to try and deal with the app process. Then I have people like my dad telling me that I'd have to take out a ton of student loans and it would be bad to go for one year and then change my mind (I've already changed my mind twice on my quest for a degree here, so he basically has zero fucking faith in me whatsoever to succeed I guess?) and then telling me it's just life and I'm gonna have to get over it when I told him I was really stressed out being put on the spot in lab today. (note: this was in reality an anxiety/panic attack because I had to demonstrate something I have never practiced at all in my life, but it's hard to talk to him). I feel like I'm being pulled in 5 different places at once and I'm starting to think what's the point anyways? Even if I do graduate with a bachelors how am I gonna get a job, or cope with all the stuff that stresses me out. Like I'm never gonna be successful in life anyways. I guess a part of me is bitter too. Anyone else I know who has panic attacks people actually take it seriously, like the world stands freaking still while people be nice to them and make sure they are okay. Me? Nope. Too bad. These are normal adult thing suck it up unless you want the world to chew you up. Stop being so sensitive. And you know, I have a really small data pool of about 4 people to work with but I always feel like it's the vagina-having people who get the short end of the stick on this as much as people talk about how men have to be tough. I dunno, something about hysterical women who cry about nothing or whatever. That kind of got off track but I just don't want to deal with this right now. I feel like there is no future for me. I did apply to one college though, so there's that. It's not a top school or anything, but it's in the south so if I live down there I'll hopefully not feel so awful during the winter. Really, I don't want to distress you all here. I'll be okay I just have to go to bed and feel a lot better in the morning. I'm not going to hurt myself or anything. Just between the rough night of a panic attack + mood violently plummeting I need to bounce my feelings off of other people for awhile.
Yeah... If you're having anxiety issues now, I'd tread into college carefully. I've heard that you can get some decent mental health assistance there, so that might be a plus, but it's stressful. I personally took a year off after highschool because I knew I couldn't handle college yet. Anyways! Sleep well!
I am already in college, I am transferring to a new one because I've earned enough credits to "graduate" so if I wanted to take more classes there I'd have to pay out of pocket for them. I actually took off a couple of years between high school and college because I used to be waaaaay worse than I am now. You'd think that this would clue people in that this is an actual disability and not just me being a weak person but I guess denial springs eternal.
I don't think you're distressing anyone; most of the board has mental illness issues of one sort or another, I think. And yeah, I feel you on the 'vagina-having people's panic attacks/burnout/depression is dismissed as silly emotional stuff', I think you may have a point about that. Hope you feel better. Spam the board if it helps!
Yeah my pool is about 4 people. 2 guys and 2 girls. Once incident a guy had a panic attack on a school trip and we actually stopped until he felt better and drank some water and all that. Another guy I know personally panicked at work and decided to quit, and he also got therapy for his anxiety issues. Like people actually understand the concept that it's a serious medical thing that deserves treatment. The one girl actually got some medication but is still being forced into doing things that cause her to panic so bad she stops breathing and passes out. As for me... yeah my treatment has been pretty shit-tacular too. My parents thankfully aren't super antipsych or anything but just see it as silly emotional stuff that I need to just get over. In fact a lot of people have told me that. Except for maybe like... 2-4 people irl who take it seriously. So you can say I'm a little pissed off about that. On a scale of one to ten I am about as bitter as "a strongly brewed black coffee". Which doesn't really help my situation at all but oh well it's my party I'll grump if I want to.
Ah, yes. The wonderful "just get over it", which totally doesn't help with things like "I start hyperventilating any time I leave my room". "But you have so much potential!" :P Sounds like you have good reason to be bitter; I'm a little bitter too. My parents just... didn't notice.
and more on that tangent though because I do think I'm onto something here: I was watching a documentary on brittle bone disease and this couple has two daughters with it and they were going in for this bone strengthening surgery and the father said one girl he knew would be fine because she's a little trooper but the other get's a paper cut and it's the end of the world. The one he said was a drama queen? In the x-ray before her surgery they found both of her legs were broken and they didn't even know about it. You bet your ass if he had broken both his legs he'd be crying and puking from pain on the floor but the one they said cried over nothing was going on like it was nothing. I wonder how many daughters like me and this other little girl are mistaken as weak or drama queens because their complaints are seen as unreasonable?
Lots, apparently - http://abcnews.go.com/Health/PainNews/women-chronic-pain/story?id=15598143 Yay, the patriarchy. =_=
well, after getting that out of my system I feel a lot better. still kind of stressed out about everything but mostly out of crisis mode.
Your dad needs to take a breath and chill. I changed my focus during my time at college so many times that I cannot actually count. Like okay, I started out civil engineering, went undecided, criminal justice, anthropology, english, almost went philosophy, electrical engineering, industrial tech, back to english, interdisciplinary studies, and now finally I'm in psychology minoring in nonprofit leadership - and not even going into psych as a career field. Somewhere in between EE and Psych, I was planning on dropping out and going to tech school, then planning on dropping out and going straight into Americorps. Your major is bio, right? What do you want to do with it? What drove you to bio? (I have a few friends in bio and it seems like most of them are heading into forestry, ranger stuff, so it's interesting to hear) Also the patriarchy sucks and so does the bitter cold of the hinterlands (North Dakota here). I am moving to California by next October.
I went from art, but then changed my mind because art isn't fun when I feel like I'm forced to do it, to vet tech because I like animals and medical stuff, but now switching out of that because it is super hands on and fast paced and it's not meshing well with my dyspraxia even though I like the material. I really only wanted to get into research (working with lab rats, microbes, etc) anyways and for that you only need certification but having a vet tech degree really helps. So if I do get my bio degree I still want to work in research. But if I can't hack it there then my next choice would be in conservation. As of right now I am SO DONE planning for my future and the only goal I have in mind is getting my degree. Biology is really my plan C because the arts and social sciences don't have a lot of jobs going for them and I prioritize not being a starving artist over being an artist. You'd think I'd be unhappy with this but I still really love biology and I'm pretty good at it (I mean, I got an A- in one of the hardest bio classes in the college that everyone else I ask failed or scraped by with a D or C). My only real struggles right now are dyspraxia related, and math and chemistry are kind of a struggle for me. Again you'd think never getting bellow a C would be an indicator that I'd do fine in college but it's like he thinks I am gonna fail classes or drop out of school at any second or change my mind once a year and rack up debt forever. It's really discouraging how little he actually believes in me.
So I talked it out with someone else to try and decide what I actually want, not "what I want to do so I don't disappoint people" which has been really hard for me to sort through because I want to put other people's feelings first and have decided that there is the one college I already applied to (where I'd be living with my mom and miss out on the ~college experience~ that I don't actually care too much about) and one of the big schools that has a degree program that I couldn't get anywhere else that is up my alley. I'm just going to apply to those 2. Not state schools because snowy cold winters for literally half the year are killing me, and no other big name schools because in reality I don't want to actually GO there, just prove that I could go there if I wanted to... and I really don't want to. It would be a waste of application money. So if I get a good enough deal I'll go to the big name school with the fancy program, otherwise I'm going to the other college which isn't even bad it just doesn't have some prestigious name attached. in other news I've been really sore all day like I came down with something but I'm pretty sure that's just the emotional hangover.
