I recently completed an associate degree and transferred to a four year school. I moved out of my mom's house for the first time and live on my own. It's a bit lonely but I like it.
I had a 3.4 GPA in CC, which includes a period from a long time ago where my GPA was much lower (2.x) and I managed to pull it up. Not the best but for me it is very good. I got into a fairly prestigious school. And now I'm failing everything. Tests, papers, lab reports (I at least get Bs on those so far). I hate school, I can barely make myself go to class, and be told how to think, and what to memorize for tests that will immediately empty from my brain once I no longer need it. They're much more concerned with the finer details here, and vaguer about their expectations. I don't feel like preparing for exams actually expands my understanding of the material in any meaningful way, instead it's a game of trying to guess what that specific professor wants me to say. I can't stand the stress, and the stress is constant. I don't know what to do, my work was always good enough before (when I did it) and now it suddenly isn't. I don't have the energy or emotional wherewithal to be the kind of person who pulls all nighters multiple times a week and throws themselves entirely at it because I have to even though I barely care about it for its own sake (even when the subject matter is interesting). I'm not an ambitious person, I know I'll never accomplish anything valuable. I probably sound spoiled for saying this, and I have been very lucky in many ways, but I just want an easy life.
It's clear I need to do something else but I don't know what. Maybe try transferring again to a school with more relaxed standards, but I'm not sure how much of a difference that will make. I had no direction before this. This was the plan. And now I'm just thinking about the future, and how it's always going to be like this from now on. The feeling that all I've been doing is evading adult responsibility, but inevitably it'll catch me and destroy me, is creeping up on me. I feel like I'm cornered. I accept myself more fully than I ever have before in my life. I carried a lot of guilt and shame and I'm finally learning to let it go. I've always had passive suicidal ideation since I was a kid, but it had subsided to the point where even though I don't enjoy life, I didn't think about ending it every day. Now that I actually like myself somewhat, suicidal ideation is back in full force, for completely different reasons. I don't want to kill myself cause I'm sad anymore, even though I still am. Now I'm sad because I feel like there's no feasible alternative. I know these are just feelings, and I have options and right now it probably seems worse than it is. I just don't know what to do. I only know that I don't want to be here. It would break my mom's heart, I couldn't do that to her. But I don't know how to survive, especially when I don't particularly even want to, and also live on my own terms (the only way that survival can be personally valuable/meaningful to me). This school is so cold, mechanical, ruthless and unfeeling (a reflection of the world it's supposed to be preparing you for I guess). School always feels like that to some degree, but the difference between here and CC is stark. I almost retroactively assign warmth to CC, something I never thought I'd do.
Maybe I'll adapt. Maybe I just need to toughen up. Maybe I can contain this downward trend and mitigate the damage. But I will hate it throughout that whole process. It doesn't feel rewarding, it just feels like fending off a threat. People here on campus carry themselves with so much pride and I can't do that because I don't sincerely believe in any of it like they do. I don't wanna die cause I want to be able to create that place of warmth that's lacking elsewhere and sustain it someday, but the things that are expected of all of us just to exist, it's all too much.
If there's anyone who's managed to recover and survive somehow outside the norm, I'd love to hear your story. I'm a sucker for the innawoods fantasy but have zero clue about any actually practical alternative lifestyles.
I had a 3.4 GPA in CC, which includes a period from a long time ago where my GPA was much lower (2.x) and I managed to pull it up. Not the best but for me it is very good. I got into a fairly prestigious school. And now I'm failing everything. Tests, papers, lab reports (I at least get Bs on those so far). I hate school, I can barely make myself go to class, and be told how to think, and what to memorize for tests that will immediately empty from my brain once I no longer need it. They're much more concerned with the finer details here, and vaguer about their expectations. I don't feel like preparing for exams actually expands my understanding of the material in any meaningful way, instead it's a game of trying to guess what that specific professor wants me to say. I can't stand the stress, and the stress is constant. I don't know what to do, my work was always good enough before (when I did it) and now it suddenly isn't. I don't have the energy or emotional wherewithal to be the kind of person who pulls all nighters multiple times a week and throws themselves entirely at it because I have to even though I barely care about it for its own sake (even when the subject matter is interesting). I'm not an ambitious person, I know I'll never accomplish anything valuable. I probably sound spoiled for saying this, and I have been very lucky in many ways, but I just want an easy life.
It's clear I need to do something else but I don't know what. Maybe try transferring again to a school with more relaxed standards, but I'm not sure how much of a difference that will make. I had no direction before this. This was the plan. And now I'm just thinking about the future, and how it's always going to be like this from now on. The feeling that all I've been doing is evading adult responsibility, but inevitably it'll catch me and destroy me, is creeping up on me. I feel like I'm cornered. I accept myself more fully than I ever have before in my life. I carried a lot of guilt and shame and I'm finally learning to let it go. I've always had passive suicidal ideation since I was a kid, but it had subsided to the point where even though I don't enjoy life, I didn't think about ending it every day. Now that I actually like myself somewhat, suicidal ideation is back in full force, for completely different reasons. I don't want to kill myself cause I'm sad anymore, even though I still am. Now I'm sad because I feel like there's no feasible alternative. I know these are just feelings, and I have options and right now it probably seems worse than it is. I just don't know what to do. I only know that I don't want to be here. It would break my mom's heart, I couldn't do that to her. But I don't know how to survive, especially when I don't particularly even want to, and also live on my own terms (the only way that survival can be personally valuable/meaningful to me). This school is so cold, mechanical, ruthless and unfeeling (a reflection of the world it's supposed to be preparing you for I guess). School always feels like that to some degree, but the difference between here and CC is stark. I almost retroactively assign warmth to CC, something I never thought I'd do.
Maybe I'll adapt. Maybe I just need to toughen up. Maybe I can contain this downward trend and mitigate the damage. But I will hate it throughout that whole process. It doesn't feel rewarding, it just feels like fending off a threat. People here on campus carry themselves with so much pride and I can't do that because I don't sincerely believe in any of it like they do. I don't wanna die cause I want to be able to create that place of warmth that's lacking elsewhere and sustain it someday, but the things that are expected of all of us just to exist, it's all too much.
If there's anyone who's managed to recover and survive somehow outside the norm, I'd love to hear your story. I'm a sucker for the innawoods fantasy but have zero clue about any actually practical alternative lifestyles.
