I messed up really bad...

Parents Forum
1

Hi,

I’m about to go into my sophomore year of college. I’m an athlete with both academic and athletic scholarship. My freshmen year became a crazy up and down year for me in nearly every aspect, just going to college in general, moving to a very different, new, and far place, family drama(A lot of that :frowning: ), a team that wasn’t supportive, roommate issues, and me falling deeper into mental illness. I had been diagnosed with depression in high school.

I’ve really messed up this past year and have a GPA right below 2.0. 'It’s really bad, but I don’t know what going to happen (have my scholarships stripped from me, not be able to do athletics, etc.) I’ve been lying to my parents about my grades, even though I want to tell them, but they don’t really believe in mental illness, or think you can just think positive thoughts and its all over and its all a self fix. Religion they also think has a huge factor in mental health. I honestly have no idea what I believe religiously.

I’ve gotten all the help every told me to, medicine, counselling, talking it out, etc, but I’m the worst I’ve ever been. I’m getting the most help I ever have, but am the worst off I’ve ever been.

I like to say that I did try, I really did, but I understand if people don’t think I did. But I lost interest in more than just school. I didn’t go with friends unless they made plans or asked me directly, which luckily happened a lot. Everything I liked to do, even easy stuff, I didn’t do anymore. I just sat in my room. I had a single to myself. Not even read or play video games, which used to be relaxing, not work. I barely eat too. I’m still like this this summer, still getting help, but I want to be better already and not have all these little handicaps and advantages over everyone else. Or even if I do get all this extra help, get better.

But most of all, will I be able to stay in school? I have to have my scholarships or I can’t go to this school(I like it here though, but its expensive tuition. So I have to keep doing my sport. I obviously will have to get my grades up too. I’m worried I won’t be able to swim or even be in school next semester. Help please!

2

So you have a psychiatrist to prescribe medicine and a psychologist to provide therapy. If so, what do these professionals say?

3

Yes, I’ve been on Prozac for a while now, and increased my dosage. The psychologist and I just kinda talk out everything every two weeks. They both say I should stay in school, but the fact is I’m not sure I actually can.

4

@madair143 - Hang in there and listen to your doctors and counselors. Talk to them about possibly taking some time off from college until you have the tools to succeed.

BTW, this is a forum for students interested in graduate school. Besides all the issues associated with asking for help on an anonymous web-site, the focus of this board is not on first-year college problems. Anyway, good fortune to you.

5

There’s a lot going on in your post!

First, contact your school. No one here can tell you whether or not you’re on academic probation of whether you lost your scholarship. Realistically you can’t make any serious plans without knowing where you stand school-wise. Assuming you’re in an OK academic standing, look into taking a semester off. Lots of kids do it but you need to know the process and the effect of taking a semester off on your scholarship/athletics/academics. Once you know these details, it will be a lot easier to present a reasonable plan of action to your parents.

Second, you need to be honest with your doctors and parents. It sounds like they’re not aware of the extent that you’re hurting. Your parents may not be capable of understanding… but your doctors should take note. Be blunt with your doctors: tell them your current meds/counseling isn’t helping, and that you feel you can’t handle school at this point. It may be hard to fess up to your parents – but they’ll find out sooner rather than later, especially if it turns out you lost your scholarship! Believe me, it will be easier on all of you if the news comes from you and not from a letter from the university!

6

You’ll have to talk to your coach as to whether you can continue on the team, with or without the scholarship. You will not be able to play until your gpa is above 2.0. You need to talk to an adviser about how to bring up your gpa if you are allowed to stay in school.

It is not going to get better is you do nothing. You really need to get these things straightened out.

7

Be very direct with your doctor. Let them know you are still having problems. If you need some time inpatient to adjust your medicine, you could do that before school starts. Your mental health us most important.

8

You have several things going on at once and it is all jumbled up making a bigger mess in your mind. I think you need to break it down. First - you say you feel worse, not sure if that is because the stress over school or your medication isn’t correct. Maybe it is both. Either way, it seems like you need an appt with your doctor sooner than later, it sounds like what I would think of as crisis mode - where you need some assistance quickly. Make an appointment and tell them it is important to be seen asap.

Your team/sport/athletic scholarship. Certainly you have a relationship with the coach and should be talking with him/her - this is a simple phone call to clarify your academics. A slide at or under 2.0 won’t always get you sidelined, sometimes there is a grace/probationary period. The coach knows this stuff, no doubt. Your athletic academic advisor should be involved to get you the proper courses/schedule next term to help with your gpa. Call him/her immediately and this will be cleared up - at least you will know where you stand.

Work on these two primary things first. Health is #1, but I think the worry of school status is weighing heavy on you. So call your doctor, then hang up and call your coach. Best to you…

9

Are you registered with the disabilities office? If you get documentation from professionals and register, you can get accommodations that can help in the future if you need more time for an assignment, need a reduced courseload and so on. If you do a medical withdrawal, based on your depression, you should also be able to get your grades wiped clean and avoid a W. But that is for the future. I think you need more support at school and you will have to do some things to set that up, which is tough when you are depressed. Your parents could help but you would have to tell them.

It sounds like medications aren’t working. Prozac has a very long half life and takes longer to work. I wonder if you could try a med like Lexapro, a newer one. It sounds like you are undertreated.

Be aware as well that as a med begins to work and the depression kind of thaws out, you actually may feel more pain. Depression kind of numbs you out, slows you down, and as you get better- well picture what happens to fingers when they thaw from numbness in the cold.

Please be aware that some of us parents have kids who have gone through similar things (or have ourselves). Don’t despair about any of your present circumstances. The world is more forgiving than you think and many of our kids have gone on to thrive- sometimes not in the same situation or at the same college, but doing well. You can too.

If your MD is not treating you adequately (wondering why Prozac) maybe try another one, or at least push for a better med. Again, if you tell your parents they might be able to advocate for you.

Hospitalization is an extreme measure and some are awful. But if it comes to that, they do get people on meds quickly.

10

@Beaudreau are you saying that this Parent Forum in which this OP posted is not for general discussions relating to any level of school? You mention this Parent Forum is for grad school and not “first-year college problems.” I didn’t know this Forum has a strict focus until I saw your comment. In looking at the other threads, I think many people aren’t aware of this rule, either. May I ask where the Forum descriptions are located? Once I saw your post, I tried searching but can’t locate descriptions or rules on where to post.

11

You’ve gotten good advice in the posts above. Something I told my own kids before they started college is that they will mess up. They will make mistakes. They will not understand how they got themselves into the mess they are in. I even said that if I could look into the future and find out about the ways you will mess up and tell you about them, you’d have a hard time believing you did that. Nobody gets through life without having experienced this-making a mess of things. Your parents too have messed up. They may not have shared it with you but they did. The key is to try to be thoughtful about finding healthy ways out. And you seem to be doing that. And one of the things you should do is tell your folks. You could write a letter or say “mom and dad, you better sit down because I have to tell you something…” Or, you can ask if you could meet with your parents and your therapist-all together. You will feel much better afterwards. You may be very surprised by your parents’ response. Your situation is very common. You need to garner support to help you work it out. Good luck with doing that.

12

This is the parents’ forum and students often also post here. It is not related to grad studies. It is very common for a student in early college to post here about problems.

13

I see you. I hear you. And all is not lost.

You may lose scholarships, you may take a leave of absence, you may not swim competitively again but then again, maybe that’s just your brain telling you a lie. Break your problems into manageable parts. If you are on probation, go sit down with an academic advisor or coach and find out what that means exactly.

Your parents’ belief about mental illness notwithstanding, you still need to tell them. They will be shocked, they will be sad, they will be worried. But your life will be more true, you will lay down that burden, and they will have the chance to journey with you in this. You have a difficult illness and it’s going to take time and teamwork to get treatment that works. For you. Enlist your allies. You haven’t done anything to be ashamed of. Failing and imperfection is how life is, and practice saying “I’m taking a break to work on my health” Remember that your parents love you, and if your path isn’t a straight line, that doesn’t mean it will end in disaster.

My son had a similar experience. When the truth came to light, it was hard for all of us, but we hung on and slowed down and hung on and remembered that it’s okay to go slow. He did finish his degree, he has a job he loves. Does he struggle sometimes? Yup. But he is precious and unique, and so are you. Let us know how things are unfolding for you.

14

One issue is that you have a legitimate medical reason for your poor performance your first year at university. The university needs to know that. This for example might allow them to treat your poor grades as a medical issue, and not an academic issue. You need to make sure that the mental health people at your university and also your academic advisor know about this medical problem.

Another issue is that you need to get your depression treated effectively. This can take time. It is not unusual for the first medication to not be quite the right one, and for some experimentation to be needed. Depression is a very common problem, and is primarily a medical problem. In the US this common medical problem is probably made significantly more common due to the very high stress that we put on our students (we can think of this as similar to heart disease being worse for people who are under stress – both depression and heart disease can exist without stress, but can also be made worse by it). Fortunately our medical profession has gotten a lot better in recent years at dealing effectively with depression.

I agree with other posts above that you need to be very clear with your doctors regarding how you are feeling. It is very common for people suffering from depression to tell their doctors that all is well when really it is not. Doctor’s are not mind readers and can do a much better job if they understand what is really going on.

Life is not a race. As such, you don’t need to be eager to graduate quickly. If you can get your medical issue (depression) under control and effectively treated by September then you might be ready to start at university again in September. However, if you can’t get this treated effectively by September, then don’t worry about it. Make sure that the school knows what is going on and they should be willing to let you take a medical leave of absence, and start again when you are ready. I know a few people whose children took a leave of absence for similar medical reasons. In some cases they went back after a semester or two or three. In one case after a semester or two the student took a couple of classes at the extension service of a different highly regarded university, then went back to their original university when they were ready. In all of the cases that I know of the student did eventually go back to university (whether the same one or a different one) and did very well and graduated. You will get there too. It might take some time and will almost certainly need some appropriate medical attention.

15

MODERATOR’S NOTE: This thread was in the Grad School forum at first. I moved it to the Parents’ forum.

16

@MaineLonghorn thank you for the clarification. I thought when a thread is moved, it is easily identified as such with all caps MOVED and a lock next to the title. This thread has no such identifiers, at least not at this moment…

17

There is one of those, at least under Latest Posts, but it’s separate from the thread itself.

18

If you do decide to take time off from college while you get your health problem under better control, consider very carefully whether you should take a semester or a full year off.

In some majors, many courses are taught as year-long sequences, and the first half is offered only in the fall, while the second half is offered only in the spring. So, for example, you may only be able to take Organic Chemistry 1 in the fall, and you may only be able to take Organic Chemistry 2 in the spring.

If there are a lot of course sequences like this in your major, it may make sense to take a full year off. Otherwise, you might need more than 8 semesters of school to finish your degree, and that costs $$$$.

19

You have had a lot of replies here - may with good advice. Let me tell you my story and I hope I can offer some help…

I love school, I love learning. It has been like that since I can remember. I have never gotten below a B in any class up until last semester when I got my first C and my first F. It was the worst semester and worst time in my entire life. I don’t do anything but turn on the TV and sleep. The only thing I could do regularly was feed my dog. I gained more than 5 pounds in a short time. I started skipping classes (which I never do). I had never been so depressed in my entire life. I have been treated for mild depression and anxiety since high school. They tried me on countless medications: Prozac, buproprion, wellbutrin, citalopram… You name it. None of my doctors would try any other medication unless I went to a psychiatrist. Towards the end of the semester I finally reached out and they eventually diagnosed me with bipolar 2.5. There are many reasons for this diagnosis that I would be happy to delve into with you if you’d like. I am not saying you have this, but I do believe your doctors may need to try another type of medication.

I wish I had an answer for you on what to do about school, but I am in a similar situation. I don’t know whether I should finish my degree right now or not. At this point, I am still fighting my mental illness desperately trying to find my normal again… Desperately trying to find myself again. But, I think what I may have to do is take a semester of medical absence.

Also, your psychiciatrist ~can~ help you do a retroactive withdrawal from classes. Look up your uni’s information about this. It could help you save your gpa. You also have some leeway. You can bring that up, but you need to help yourself first. You are not a failure. If anything you a fucking amazing! Because I could never be doing all that you are.

Please send me a message if you need to talk more about this. I know it sucks so much.

20

Sounds like you need to take some time off from school and clear your head.

I’m not saying it’s what you should do, but when I got sick of school and ran out of money after my sophomore year, I enlisted in the Air Force for four years. It was a nice break, I got to travel around the world, and I matured. When I got out, I was very motivated to go back to school and did a lot better academically.