Depression

[Brinn]

Any way to audit classes that interest you? Don't know if it's the same in New Zealand but in the US you can just attend the classes without having to turn in assignments or taking exams.

Look at Steve Jobs childhood. He dropped out of college and then just began attending classes that interested him without the pressure of performance.

[Fist and Faith]

Or attend part-time. Who says you need to get a degree by 20__? People get college degrees at all ages. Take one class next semester, and figure out the best way to deal with it. Add a second class the following semester, and see if the same method works, even if it's more difficult than you'd like. (Heh. It's more difficult than all of us would like.) Or if two classes requires a different approach.

Then write a book about your journey, and make millions.

[lorin]

Been feeling pretty low lately. Finished uni for the year, and I'm pretty sure I won't be going back next year. What I've noticed is that the work really interferes wiht my ability to look after myself. The start of each term is fine, but as soon as the pressure mounts up I start backsliding. My sleep patterns go out the window, my warning signs start kicking in, and I've got no time or energy to devote to making myself better. It's exhausting. I feel like I start making progress with my counselling and therapy and introspection and self care, and then I just find myself back at square one again.

Plus looking back at the time since my psychotic episode (two years ago now), it's like I've just been reeling from one mental event to another. I'll get through a bad patch, pull myself together, tell myself I'm fine, and go spiralling down another hole. I don't want to live like that. I want to find some kind of stability in myself.

But it breaks my heart, because learning is one of the things I love to do, and the learning I've done at uni has expanded my mind exponentially. I have excellent grasp on the concepts and the ideas I'm introduced to, it's assessment I struggle with, and it's assessment that makes me backslide. I can't balance pressure and looking after my headspace.

It sucks. I'm sick of having my mental health interfere with that aspect of my life. And it is that aspect at the moment. I feel like I can cope with every part of my life except uni right now. There's plenty of things I can do with myself next year; I don't feel like I'll be lost or have nowhere to go. I'd like to write, and do more comedy, and I've got an idea for a video blog series I'd like to make. But I feel like a choice has been taken away from me.

I need to fix this.

During my years at school I frequently had to take time off for the same reasons. It took me 7 years to get a four year degree. And all I can say is "so what?" After I got passed other people's expectations of my education and future it seemed so simple. I stopped studying what my family thought I should study, I stopped studying when my family thought I should be studying. It was very liberating.

Another thing to keep in mind. People like you and I (I am making an assumption that you and I are very similar) tend to see the world in black and white, all in or all out, all up or all down, all or nothing. In our world there are no grays, no in-betweens. Try to look at this as a break, not an ending.

One great thing I discovered was night classes. I found the students and professors in night classes were more like me and I felt more comfortable. I finished school going part-time at night.

[lorin]

double double

[Cambo]

Any way to audit classes that interest you? Don't know if it's the same in New Zealand but in the US you can just attend the classes without having to turn in assignments or taking exams.

Hell, I can just show up to lectures without even being enrolled if I want to. No-one checks you actually belong there.

Or attend part-time. Who says you need to get a degree by 20__? People get college degrees at all ages.

Heh. That's what I was doing this term.

Then write a book about your journey, and make millions.

Now that idea I can get behind!

During my years at school I frequently had to take time off for the same reasons. It took me 7 years to get a four year degree. And all I can say is "so what?" After I got passed other people's expectations of my education and future it seemed so simple. I stopped studying what my family thought I should study, I stopped studying when my family thought I should be studying. It was very liberating.

My family's expectations are something of an issue, but not a huge one. We'll just talk it through, I'll try ge them to see things my way, and if they can't I'll do what I was going to do anyway. More of an issue for me is that I don't like the feeling that I'm being forced out of one of my options.

Another thing to keep in mind. People like you and I (I am making an assumption that you and I are very similar) tend to see the world in black and white, all in or all out, all up or all down, all or nothing. In our world there are no grays, no in-betweens. Try to look at this as a break, not an ending.

I get like that sometimes. Usually only when I'm seriously depressed though. I've never considered not going back to uni.

Thanks guys. I feel better.

[Avatar]

...and if they can't I'll do what I was going to do anyway.

Right on.

More of an issue for me is that I don't like the feeling that I'm being forced out of one of my options.

You're not. If you don't go back right now, it's a voluntary break is all.

--A

[Linna Heartbooger]

But it breaks my heart, because learning is one of the things I love to do, and the learning I've done at uni has expanded my mind exponentially. I have excellent grasp on the concepts and the ideas I'm introduced to, it's assessment I struggle with, and it's assessment that makes me backslide. I can't balance pressure and looking after my headspace.

It really sounds like learning is one of the great loves of your life... and I'm convinced that sometimes learning is a major part of our self-care (or something that makes self-care have more of a point). :-/ That makes things more inconvenient.

I think I get some of the part about the pain of assessment... (and have a lot of that same problem myself) Some days I'm playing every trick in the book to procrastinate... to avoid task-completion ...and I'm pretty sure it's because I'm still trying to dodge the ten-ton hammer of hearing "your work is a piece of sh--!" that I anticipate. And the thing that's unnerving is... one of the things that would give me great satisfaction would be ...choosing goals, and completing them!

I feel like I can cope with every part of my life except uni right now. There's plenty of things I can do with myself next year; I don't feel like I'll be lost or have nowhere to go. I'd like to write, and do more comedy, and I've got an idea for a video blog series I'd like to make.

Hey... that you're saying that is actually pretty neat.

But I feel like a choice has been taken away from me.

That would feel truly exasperating. And you have a tough choice to make... (or possibly a tough choice you've already made.) you could be looking at your limitations wisely & honestly & taking responsibility for yourself by deciding, "no, I'm going to take a year off" or you could be accepting a risky challenge by trying to push through and do it.

Either way, I think the way you're speaking about this shows you seeing yourself realistically.

Btw, I've been doing lousy lately too. So, umm, there you go Cambo.. another one of your posts that encouraged me to open up and spill out some of what's inside me.

[Cambo]

Thanks Linna. You be strong, and try to spill some more!

[deer of the dawn]

I got my bachelor's at 43.... I guess it was the 25-year plan.

If you love learning (and I LOVED being back in college in my 40's, even with kids and a husband) then why feel like you have to do it full time? Can you get a part time job just to get by, and go to classes and do schoolwork? I mean, maybe not, just a thought.

Another thing to keep in mind. People like you and I (I am making an assumption that you and I are very similar) tend to see the world in black and white, all in or all out, all up or all down, all or nothing. In our world there are no grays, no in-betweens. Try to look at this as a break, not an ending.

Amen to that. That "black and white" thinking can be so crippling. It can also be an excuse. When I was in my 20's I spent several months living in a large, crummy apartment all alone with an easel and oil paints. Other than the neighbor's complaints about the smell of turpentine, it was one of the happiest times of my life. But after a few months I discovered I wasn't Georgia O'Keefe and I used the disappointment at myself to bag the whole thing. (That, and work cut my hours due to a drop in business and I couldn't pay rent anymore.)

It's taken me many years to learn that my gifts are my gifts, not anyone else's or to be compared with them or theirs. If I do something creative it should be because I love and believe in it. If others groove on it, so much the better, but if not, I still did something I believed in and grew through it.

Try to look at your schooling the same way. It's your journey through who you are and to who you wish to be, not anybody else's. Some people do the four-year thing, plenty of others don't. (In fact 75% of Americans never get a degree of any kind.)

[Fist and Faith]

deer, this is from the best tv show of all time: Northern Exposure. In an episode called "Fish Story", Holling us upset because Maurice made fun of his paint-by-numbers. Here's Chris explaining things to Holling.

Alright, you've got a very basic problem, Holling. You're confusing product with process. Most people, when they criticize, whether they like it or they hate it, they're talking about product. Now that's not art, that's the result of art. Alright? Art, to the degree of whatever we can get a handle on - and I'm not sure we really can - is a process. Alright? It begins in here, here (indicating his heart and his head) with these and these (indicating his hands and his eyes). Alright. Now, Picasso says the pure plastic act is only secondary. What really counts is the drama of the pure plastic act. That exact moment when the universe comes out of itself, and meets its own destruction.

[Cambo]

Can you get a part time job just to get by, and go to classes and do schoolwork? I mean, maybe not, just a thought.

I've had a part time job since I started uni. The student loan isn't enough to live on. Last term I went full time work/part time uni. It wasn't a lot better.

But now that I've made my decision not to go back next year, I feel a lot better. Thanks for the support guys.

[deer of the dawn]

Lorin: Borderline, admitting it, and working on it?!
Maybe people around these parts don't know how impressive that is. Way to go.

Thanks!!!!!!!! Took me 20 years to say the word
borderline,
BORDERLINE,
BORDERLINE

(desensitization therapy )

Two different social workers told me that the ex's 3rd wife, a.k.a. the Lovely Wife, a.k.a. The Bitch (that's what my kids call her now) was borderline. Not only did she make our lives a living hell, but she also would not admit that she had any problems whatsoever. I'd love to get back those ten years of my and my kids' lives. Things would be a *lot* different for my kids now.

But anyway, kudos to you, lorin, for being able to admit your problems.

I want to thank lorin just for saying the word. Never having been to any kind of therapy or psychiatry I was unfamiliar with the word, so I googled.

Borderline explains my late teens to mid-twenties. I'm still recovering. Although I've learned to deal and live a "normal" life, if people realized how much effort it takes... I also have ADD and have to keep moving all the time, if not physically, then mentally or emotionally and I HAVE learned how to channel a lot of that positively. But hey, who said life was easy?

Fist, I love the quote! Good stuff. And Cambo, keep on truckin'.

[Linna Heartbooger]

Thanks Linna. You be strong, and try to spill some more!

Thanks! =) ...but.. but, if I show how flawed I am, won't everybody jump on me and criticize me and attack me?

But now that I've made my decision not to go back next year, I feel a lot better. Thanks for the support guys.

YOU are the one who made a tough decision.

Btw, since you mentioned school negatively impacting your self-care, (and I realize there are a multitude of ways in which that could be true) is one of the big areas sleep deprivation? "I could always be doing more studying, so I should be" kind of thing? Or what?

I want to thank lorin just for saying the word.

Yup, you're not the only one who's found something lorin's shared incredibly helpful. I'd say this thread is a permanent reminder of... some important things I'm usually good at putting out of my mind:
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=20967

[Avatar]

...but.. but, if I show how flawed I am, won't everybody jump on me and criticize me and attack me?

Actually, it tends to work the other way...tell people how flawed you are, and they'll tell you you're not. It's only when you tell them you're not that they try and prove you are.

--A

[Ananda]

...but.. but, if I show how flawed I am, won't everybody jump on me and criticize me and attack me?

Actually, it tends to work the other way...tell people how flawed you are, and they'll tell you you're not. It's only when you tell them you're not that they try and prove you are.

--A

How funny and totally accurate. I like your style Avatar. You're going to look great with that macrame purse you are making!

[Avatar]

--A

[deer of the dawn]

Hey, macrame is due for a big-time revival!! This time next year it should be all over the runways!!!

[Linna Heartbooger]

Actually, it tends to work the other way...tell people how flawed you are, and they'll tell you you're not. It's only when you tell them you're not that they try and prove you are.

Yes, that's true for if you say how flawed you are.
But I said show how flawed I am, not tell.

Granted, there are some ways of showing people I'm flawed in which they do not experience the direct consequences of my negative attributes.

[aliantha]

Linna, honey, we're all just pixels on a screen here.

You might get jumped for being flawed in the Tank. But elsewhere on the Watch? Nah.

BTW, I love your new avatar. So peaceful.

[Avatar]

Why are you so sure that you're "flawed?" Don't give too much credence to some sort of ideal that probably doesn't exist anyway, except in your head.

--A