Sometimes the hardest thing about having a mental illness is the time you can never get back. The time before you got help, the time before you realized that you had a problem. The choices you made out of fear or expectations that may or may not have come to pass.<\/p>\n
I never applied for college when I was in high school. I was a solid C student (though everybody said I was smart. I now know it was inattentive adhd). But I barely coasted my way through high school, i was certain I\u2019d never make it in college. And besides, this was before the Internet, I had no idea how financial aid worked. But I was certain I wouldn\u2019t get any scholarships with my grades and my parents had explained for quite some time that when we were 18 it was military, college or paying rent, and they weren\u2019t helping with college. So I went military.\u00a0(I did finally go school, getting my associates at about 30, and now, at 37, finishing up my bachelors)<\/p>\n
There\u2019s been other things through the years, that looking back at it now, I realize it was my depression telling me lies. Or my inattentive adhd making me scatterbrained. My house has never been neat or clean.<\/p>\n
What I\u2019m mourning today is that, two years ago, pretty much when I hit rock bottom, I lost a semester and a half of college to depression \u00a0Because of that lost time, those failed classes, I need to go for one more semester, so I can graduate in December this year. (That failed semester also forced me to wait a full year to get the job I have now while I got my GPA up.)<\/p>\n
A couple days ago I got an email from financial aid that I\u2019ve hit the max for student loans and so I\u2019ll get no financial aid for fall.<\/p>\n
Today that was coupled with learning I got a D in a class, which means it doesn\u2019t count towards graduation, and instead of needing two more classes I need three.<\/p>\n
I know I missed a couple assignments in that class and I\u2019ve resisted looking to see that if I\u2019d done them if that would make a difference. Of course it would have, but I can\u2019t change it so no point putting myself through that.<\/p>\n
So I have no idea what I\u2019m going to do. My credit is too awful for private loans (another side effect of adhd is being bad with finances). I\u2019m a world better off now then I was last year (for those of you who know what a bitch of a struggle last year was for me). We make enough right now to pay the bills, but not enough to save.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll do what I\u2019ve always done and figure it out. I need to knuckle down and start writing again. \u00a0I may have depression, but, oddly enough, I tend to be naturally optimistic. I\u2019m upset and worried, but I just have to have faith that, somehow, it\u2019ll all work out. Though as of right now I\u2019ve given up on the idea of being able to travel to Arizona to walk in my graduation. The important thing is to finish, and I only have a little farther to go, depression and lost time be damned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sometimes the hardest thing about having a mental illness is the time you can never get back. The time before you got help, the time before you realized that you had a problem. The choices you made out of fear or expectations that may or may not have come to pass. I never applied for … <\/p>\n