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It is not a rare occurrence that I feel like a loser when I think about my situation. The situation, being of course, the fact that I am thirty years old without a college degree. Don't get me wrong - I have a great job with great benefits and great people and great pay, one that most people never have the opportunity to ever achieve, but everyone around me has a college degree, and when I tell people I am going to school they are like omg you're in the master's program?!?! and I'm like no, I'm in my first semester as a freshman.
I went to college when I was nineteen like many people. While working, I attended a community college for a year and a half and got straight As. One test was particularly stressful and while I was taking it, I heard the voices that my brain had become famous for in my own life. It was the first time I heard voices in broad daylight in a public place; prior to that day it only happened at night when I was in bed readying myself for sleep. I had known there was something wrong with me all my life, but it was the first time I couldn't get past it. The first time I couldn't focus and the first time I quit something because of the hallucinations I have dealt with since I was three years old. I did finish the exam, but I never went back. Working and going to school was too much and I had already made the decision to leave my father's house at eighteen so I had to take accountability for my actions and continue working. There was no one there anymore to support me but myself and I didn't feel that I could successfully do both. So I focused on my career and here I am with that great job I talked about.
I was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder a couple years after I left that college exam room. About a year after that they changed my diagnosis to paranoid schizophrenia and after another year passed, I was hospitalized. It was the first time but certainly would not be the last.
I don't mean to make excuses. The reason that I quit school is more of a why than why not; it was my choice and much like I must take accountability for leaving my father's house much too young, I must take accountability for that too, schizophrenia or not. It's not the schizophrenia's fault. It's mine.
I did believe that I was intelligent and witty and hardworking and talented enough to move on without a degree. I'd been at my job for years and I was making good money, but when it came down to growing in my career in my late twenties, I found that the places I wanted to go weren't hiring unless you had a bachelor's degree and a gazillion years of experience. I have a gazillion years of experience but I do not have a college education, and I have experienced personal failures as a result.
After I wasn't hired for the job I knew I was qualified for on the third attempt, I realized it was something I needed, and the major was something I wanted (Journalism). So I tried to get into a local university and they basically wanted me to jump through hoops of fire after I sold my legs to them, so I opted for a local community college once again.
I'm finishing up my first semester; I have 2 essays and 2 speeches to go. The experience has been interesting, to say the least - I am old, and have to dress for Corporate America, so I don't fit in. I don't like being in class. I love learning, but the act of sitting in a class drives me nuts because there are so many other things during those few hours a week that I could be doing. It's been an adjustment for sure. I have homework every single night. I'm exhausted. But I have straight As I think, hopefully, and I made the honors program in my first semester back. So there's that.
Life passes very quickly, and I need to tell myself that yeah, I chose to quit college in my younger years, but I got to do so many things in my twenties that many people that age don't ever get to do. I've written ten novels, have seen myself on bestseller lists, had a wedding, had a divorce, had a career, went off the deep end, learned what being inside of a mental institution is really like (it's not the set of Girl, Interrupted, if you were wondering), became an advocate, a speaker, a writing coach, and met the best friend who led me into a partnership that changed my life forever. Yeah, I chose to quit college in my younger years BUT NOW I'M BACK. I need to tell myself that I do have schizophrenia and though I don't want to make excuses or even admit that it exists it is real and it is a disorder (psychologist's word, not mine) and it cannot be ignored.
I need to tell myself I am not a loser.
