About a month ago I made a post saying how I was dreading starting college. I made an appointment with a counselor and had my initial appointment last week. I have another appointment tomorrow.
I’m about to start my fourth week of classes, and things have just gotten worse since I last posted. I’m completely unmotivated. I can’t bring myself to do the work for my classes, and if I manage to work up the energy to start working, I can’t stay focused long enough to finish it. I hated high school, and I wasn’t really listening to myself when I decided to go to college. I was listening to the expectations of everyone around me to go to college. I feel so incredibly out of place here and I feel like I don’t belong here.
I know it’s not homesickness. While I miss my parents and friends, I’m okay with living on my own. School is the main problem. I just don’t want to be at this school and I don’t want to do work and I don’t know what I want anymore. I just want to be out of school and focusing on something else. My parents have told me I’m committed for at least the semester, and I don’t know what I can do to last without going completely crazy or destroying my academic record because I can’t force myself to focus.
Pretty much, I think I made a huge mistake in coming to college and I don’t think I can survive this semester.
Maybe you should talk with your parents about taking a leave of absence to buy time to consider what will work for you better. There are so many options in life. You don’t need to rush. Take time to figure out what will make you happier.
@lostaccount I know this varies by school, but generally is there a way to get money back? My parents have already paid for tuition and housing for this semester. I don’t want them to lose thousands of dollars because of me.
^You really have to look into the policies at your school. They may refund it, but this far into the semester, they may only give a partial refund or they may refund nothing at all beyond a certain deadline (given by the school). Any speculation by other people is useless if that’s not how your school does it.
Looking into your school’s policies regarding withdrawal, refunds, and readmission will help you figure out what your options are. There’s nothing wrong with looking into it. If you feel like it’s unacceptable, you don’t have to go through with it, but it might help you to know what the deadlines are and how much money you can get refunded. It will also help you to know this information for when you talk to your parents about how unhappy you are. If you don’t know where you find this information, you could post your school and some people may be able to help or you can ask someone at your school for advice. Your counselor would be a good place to start, if you don’t feel comfortable talking to an advisor or some other administrator. They have likely had students consider these options before, and even if they don’t know all of the nitty gritty details, they may be able to point you in the right direction.
Talk to your parent. It’s not a good idea to go through while you have no motivation. Can you take the class pass and fail. Can you take some easier class like gym and stuff. Something that you will enjoy with little effort. This quarter or semester is gone as far your academic year. So don’t worry about it.
I don’t know-it probably depends on how long you have been at school. If you take a leave of absence, then you may be able to get incomplete in your classes. Thus you will be able to make them up without paying more if you decide to go back. I bet your parents would rather you home and happy then continue to be miserable in school. Everyone goes through a time in their life when they are not “in line” with everyone else-you need to step out and think. In the long run you will have saved your parents money compared to if you stayed there and continued to be miserable and did poorly. You are talking about only fees for one semester. Do something meaningful with the time off-like figure out what direction you want your life to take. That will pay you back in large dividends. Tomorrow go see a counselor at your school or an advisor to see what your options might be. You’ve now been miserable for a month. You need to find a way to be happier. There may be other options but they won’t just come to you-so, go see and advisor/counselor and talk to your parents. Don’t think you are alone. You aren’t. Get help from people at your school who are there to help you and confide to your parents. Don’t worry about the tuition-you can work everything out later related to the costs.
I just read your other posts and I’m even more sure of it-talk to both your parents and someone at your school. tons of people who are ultimately successful take time off, have mis-starts, realize they are going in the wrong direction, etc. Tons. You are not unique that way at all. Better now then if you find yourself in a career you hate. So, Talk to your parents and find out from the school what can be done for you-in terms of taking incompletes, etc. Also, see if you can talk with an advisor/counselor on campus. Better to take action now then continue to feel depressed and anxious. There are millions of options in life. There is no reason to stick with one you know is not right for you.
@DrGoogle This isn’t just one class in particular. When I signed up for classes in June, I picked things I was interested in. Now, I have no interest in anything anymore. Unfortunately the add/drop deadline has passed so I can’t change my schedule.
@lostaccount This is my first semester of college. I moved in roughly a month ago and I’m about to start my fourth week of classes. I’ve talked to my parents already and they seem unwilling to change their opinions on this situation. If I leave this semester, I’d pretty much be on my own and have to start paying back my parents for wasting their money.
I can see why they would feel that way. If you know for sure that you can leave at the end of one semester, is it possible for you to stick this out? You might be really glad to have at least passing grades in one semester’s credits if you ever decide to go back to college (never say never, I just heard from a 63 year old friend today that he enrolled in college to study history). It is three months until the end of the semester.
Talk to your counselor and see if you can get a diagnosis, such as depression. You might have more luck getting a refund if you have an official diagnosis. My son has gotten full refunds more than once, from two different schools. We found people to be very understanding. Schools don’t want to take a chance on someone hurting themselves if they stick it out and are miserable.
@intparent Honestly I don’t know. Some days are better than others and today is a pretty bad one. I’m afraid I might do something serious that I’ll regret if I try sticking it out.
If you really feel like you will hurt yourself, please get yourself, or ask someone, your RA, a friend, whoever, to get you to emergency services. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. Please please make sure you don’t let things get life threatening.
You might need to ask your counselor to write a letter to the college to support a late drop of all your courses as a medical withdrawal. Get on this immediately and find out what the policy is at school for such a withdrawal with money back.
What serious thing might you do that you’ll regret? I don’t know how to interpret that. If you think you might harm yourself, you need to get immediate help.
You should withdraw from school immediately. Your school has a refund schedule with which you can withdraw and get a partial refund. You can probably withdraw from classes with an W, not a WF in the forth week. It depends which school to go to. Spend some time looking at the catalog and what the actual catalog says. You don’t need your parents permission to do this. If you need help, tell us which school and we can look it up for you.
This is an assignment that you want to complete. Don’t worry about wasting your parents money. You are doing them a favor by getting most of the money back. There is no point in being in school in the mental state you are in.
If it turns out that you can’t just withdraw, you can probably get a medical withdrawal. This will required a diagnosis from a mental health professional.
Perhaps therapy will help, but perhaps you just simply have other things that you’d rather do with your life than go to college. It’s your life. You own it. Nobody else does. Start owning it now.
@clarinet1234 I feel exactly like you. Like to the point. Only thing is is I loved high school. I go to a private Christian college and I can’t get my money back. It’s freaking expensive too. It sucks. im trying to finish out the semester. Prayer is the only thing helping me. I’ve got exactly 12 weeks left. I’m depressed and don’t want to waste my dads money. But do what makes you happy! You got this! We got this! God’s got our back!
I checked, and it looks like if I withdraw by the end of this week I can get 50% of my tuition back. I don’t think it’ll be possible for me to withdraw by Friday. My counselor didn’t tell me that I should or shouldn’t quit, but they told me it’s important to do what’s best for me. Do you guys have any suggestions on how to seriously bring this up to my parents?
Just call and talk to them, tell them what you told us. Bad grades will affect you in the long run. Tell them they can get 50% right now if they act quick otherwise if you have all Fs and they still lose all their money.
I’ve tried talking to them before, and my mom has the mentality that if I just try hard enough, I can get through anything. She thinks I’m not putting enough effort into my schoolwork and that’s why I struggle. Even though I’m trying really hard and I’m just getting so burnt out.
This is a really awful situation to be in, and for what it’s worth, I feel you. I know that counselors tend to be swamped at the beginning of the year, but would it be possible to have yours advocate on your behalf? Or maybe a dean of the college? Do you think your parents would be more receptive if they were talking to someone “official,” who could vouch for you?
