In conclusion... part 3 of picking open old wounds
Where I last left off, it was spring semester at UML. I had developed allergies/breathing problems in my dorm and was missing more classes than I was going to.
That February I became really ill and ventured into Boston Children's certain that I had pneumonia as I was running a fever and it was hard to breathe. For the record, I rarely run fevers and actually usually have a body temp at least 1-2 degrees lower than average. When I actually do have a fever, I know that something is definitely up.
I have an anomaly in my right lung which has just recently been diagnosed as bronchiecstasis. In x-rays it shows up to an uninformed eye as pneumonia. However, the downside is that if/when I do get pneumonia, that's usually the place it settles. That March, I had an x-ray taken and it seemed that I didn't have pneumonia, but they gave me antibiotics anyways just to try to help. The next week I was on spring break and back home in NH. I felt a lot better and went back to school to a message on my phone from the doc's just telling me to call them when I got a chance. I called and they were on vacation for a week. Finally when we touched base, they told me that after some closer comparison to a 'normal' x-ray and my most recent one, they found that I did indeed have pneumonia.
I think I was just so disheartened by this point. I was depressed and felt like I didn't have anyone I could talk to. I I had pretty much given up on all my classes and only involved myself in choir. Near the end of the school year, I got a notice about being placed on academic withdrawal from the school. Again, they said I could attend a hearing and make my case to stay, but I already felt so ostracized (a lot of it was internal) that I couldn't imagine staying there for another year. I even made arrangements to put my stuff in storage and go to key west for a few weeks to see my dad before my optional hearing date. I had completely given up hope at this point. Fully believing in some of the negative reinforcement that some of my 'family' members had imparted on me - that I would never be successful or that I could never make it through college and that I would wind up like my mother. Gotta love family, right?
That summer I stayed with Mum for a bit and then decided to move to East Boston. I found a room for $300/month and with me getting SSDI, I could afford that. I figured I might want to try working full time or something for a little bit before I could go back to school again. That summer was probably one of the best ones ever. One of my best friends lived just 7 blocks from me, I was responsible for myself and I was figuring out who I was. In August, my dad got the shingles and was very sick. I worried about him a lot and even though he was on the mend, by the end of August I again packed up all my stuff in storage and headed on down to Florida to take care of him.
In September I started thinking about taking some classes at FKCC (florida keys community college) and maybe transferring to an in-state school after I got my GPA and Gen. Eds. out of the way. While I was thinking on what I wanted to do with my life, an old friend of Mom #2 contacted me about a potential job in Los Angeles. I had never been to California before and I figured I was young so why not? That's where I am today 3 1/2 years later.
I had tried going back to school once. I tried with AIU which was completely online. I figured, I'm a computer networking consultant and during 'down time' at work, I could be working my way towards a degree. I enrolled in November to start classes in January. It was all very exciting and even though my focus had changed drastically (Business & Computer Science) I was excited to be in a learning environment once more.
Within a week of enrolling, I got a phone call from my aunt and uncle on my dad's side with whom my grammy was living that she had become pretty ill and was in the hospital. That same week, I got a call that Mum (mom #3) had been diagnosed with cancer. I held out hope for both of them, and had many long conversations with 'Mum' about beating her cancer. She was proud of me for going back to school and said that she knew she could beat her cancer because I gave her strength.
January, my classes had started and I was kicking butt and taking names. I loved my classes and the flexibility they offered. The first session I did awesome. My grammy was doing better and Mum had finished her first round of treatment. However, at this time I got a call from my mom's side of the family saying that my aunt was in the advanced stages of aggressive lung/bone cancer and that she was dying. They had known about it since the same week I got all the other bad news but they thought I might be 'home' (in new england) for the holidays and so they waited to maybe tell me in person.
The second session I kept up, but it was a little bit of a struggle to stay focused. My grammy had become sick again and knew she was dying. She even called to say good bye. That phone call is the singular most difficult phone call I have ever had in my entire life. Then I got a call from Mum saying that they still needed to do more treatment but she was still hopeful. We even dreamed about after she was better that she would come visit and we'd go to Disneyland for a girls day and just pamper ourselves.
I finished up my second session but any excitement had completely faded about school. My days were spent lost in memories and thoughts about these 3 women fighting for their lives. My third session I realized, I would have to take a break from school. Then my grandmother died. I learned a lesson from days at UML - ask for help when you need it. I called my school counselor and told her that my grandmother had passed and that I didn't feel in a position to dedicate as much attention to my lessons as I needed to. I wanted to take a session (a session is 5 weeks) off to get my head back together so I could come back and be a successful student. She urged me to try to finish at least 60% of my work for that session and then appeal to get incompletes and then just continue on. She said that I couldn't take a session off, that I would have to withdraw completely from the university and then reapply to get in. Really, she insisted, that it was much better for me to just try to 'buck up'.
I tried to do as she asked, but within a month and a half, my aunt had passed away. While I was back east for my aunts funeral, I went to see Mum in NH. That Friday, unbeknownst to me, she had received a terminal diagnosis and was given 2-6 months to live. After that diagnosis, she went into a comatose state and had pretty much given up the goat. I extended my stay and kept vigil with Seth by her bedside. After being awake for 27+ hours I had snuck downstairs to catch a catnap and she passed while I was asleep.
After all that, school was the least of my concerns. My counselor was less than sympathetic, but I'm sure it must have sounded fishy having 3 deaths within a 2 month span. I got into a shouting match with her when she practically accused me of lying and said that she couldn't keep giving me extensions because so many people were dying. I told her 'I don't believe you'll have to as I don't have many more people left to die'.
That ended my AIU experience and since then I've been traumatized to try to go back to school.
I *DO* want to go back, but I just have to get over this anxiety about it and figure out where I want to go and what I want to study. Obviously I'll have to probably start off at a community college and work my way up to prove that I'm still smart, but it's just something I have to figure out.
That was a major release of writer's block, hopefully I'll be able to write more soon :)
That February I became really ill and ventured into Boston Children's certain that I had pneumonia as I was running a fever and it was hard to breathe. For the record, I rarely run fevers and actually usually have a body temp at least 1-2 degrees lower than average. When I actually do have a fever, I know that something is definitely up.
I have an anomaly in my right lung which has just recently been diagnosed as bronchiecstasis. In x-rays it shows up to an uninformed eye as pneumonia. However, the downside is that if/when I do get pneumonia, that's usually the place it settles. That March, I had an x-ray taken and it seemed that I didn't have pneumonia, but they gave me antibiotics anyways just to try to help. The next week I was on spring break and back home in NH. I felt a lot better and went back to school to a message on my phone from the doc's just telling me to call them when I got a chance. I called and they were on vacation for a week. Finally when we touched base, they told me that after some closer comparison to a 'normal' x-ray and my most recent one, they found that I did indeed have pneumonia.
I think I was just so disheartened by this point. I was depressed and felt like I didn't have anyone I could talk to. I I had pretty much given up on all my classes and only involved myself in choir. Near the end of the school year, I got a notice about being placed on academic withdrawal from the school. Again, they said I could attend a hearing and make my case to stay, but I already felt so ostracized (a lot of it was internal) that I couldn't imagine staying there for another year. I even made arrangements to put my stuff in storage and go to key west for a few weeks to see my dad before my optional hearing date. I had completely given up hope at this point. Fully believing in some of the negative reinforcement that some of my 'family' members had imparted on me - that I would never be successful or that I could never make it through college and that I would wind up like my mother. Gotta love family, right?
That summer I stayed with Mum for a bit and then decided to move to East Boston. I found a room for $300/month and with me getting SSDI, I could afford that. I figured I might want to try working full time or something for a little bit before I could go back to school again. That summer was probably one of the best ones ever. One of my best friends lived just 7 blocks from me, I was responsible for myself and I was figuring out who I was. In August, my dad got the shingles and was very sick. I worried about him a lot and even though he was on the mend, by the end of August I again packed up all my stuff in storage and headed on down to Florida to take care of him.
In September I started thinking about taking some classes at FKCC (florida keys community college) and maybe transferring to an in-state school after I got my GPA and Gen. Eds. out of the way. While I was thinking on what I wanted to do with my life, an old friend of Mom #2 contacted me about a potential job in Los Angeles. I had never been to California before and I figured I was young so why not? That's where I am today 3 1/2 years later.
I had tried going back to school once. I tried with AIU which was completely online. I figured, I'm a computer networking consultant and during 'down time' at work, I could be working my way towards a degree. I enrolled in November to start classes in January. It was all very exciting and even though my focus had changed drastically (Business & Computer Science) I was excited to be in a learning environment once more.
Within a week of enrolling, I got a phone call from my aunt and uncle on my dad's side with whom my grammy was living that she had become pretty ill and was in the hospital. That same week, I got a call that Mum (mom #3) had been diagnosed with cancer. I held out hope for both of them, and had many long conversations with 'Mum' about beating her cancer. She was proud of me for going back to school and said that she knew she could beat her cancer because I gave her strength.
January, my classes had started and I was kicking butt and taking names. I loved my classes and the flexibility they offered. The first session I did awesome. My grammy was doing better and Mum had finished her first round of treatment. However, at this time I got a call from my mom's side of the family saying that my aunt was in the advanced stages of aggressive lung/bone cancer and that she was dying. They had known about it since the same week I got all the other bad news but they thought I might be 'home' (in new england) for the holidays and so they waited to maybe tell me in person.
The second session I kept up, but it was a little bit of a struggle to stay focused. My grammy had become sick again and knew she was dying. She even called to say good bye. That phone call is the singular most difficult phone call I have ever had in my entire life. Then I got a call from Mum saying that they still needed to do more treatment but she was still hopeful. We even dreamed about after she was better that she would come visit and we'd go to Disneyland for a girls day and just pamper ourselves.
I finished up my second session but any excitement had completely faded about school. My days were spent lost in memories and thoughts about these 3 women fighting for their lives. My third session I realized, I would have to take a break from school. Then my grandmother died. I learned a lesson from days at UML - ask for help when you need it. I called my school counselor and told her that my grandmother had passed and that I didn't feel in a position to dedicate as much attention to my lessons as I needed to. I wanted to take a session (a session is 5 weeks) off to get my head back together so I could come back and be a successful student. She urged me to try to finish at least 60% of my work for that session and then appeal to get incompletes and then just continue on. She said that I couldn't take a session off, that I would have to withdraw completely from the university and then reapply to get in. Really, she insisted, that it was much better for me to just try to 'buck up'.
I tried to do as she asked, but within a month and a half, my aunt had passed away. While I was back east for my aunts funeral, I went to see Mum in NH. That Friday, unbeknownst to me, she had received a terminal diagnosis and was given 2-6 months to live. After that diagnosis, she went into a comatose state and had pretty much given up the goat. I extended my stay and kept vigil with Seth by her bedside. After being awake for 27+ hours I had snuck downstairs to catch a catnap and she passed while I was asleep.
After all that, school was the least of my concerns. My counselor was less than sympathetic, but I'm sure it must have sounded fishy having 3 deaths within a 2 month span. I got into a shouting match with her when she practically accused me of lying and said that she couldn't keep giving me extensions because so many people were dying. I told her 'I don't believe you'll have to as I don't have many more people left to die'.
That ended my AIU experience and since then I've been traumatized to try to go back to school.
I *DO* want to go back, but I just have to get over this anxiety about it and figure out where I want to go and what I want to study. Obviously I'll have to probably start off at a community college and work my way up to prove that I'm still smart, but it's just something I have to figure out.
That was a major release of writer's block, hopefully I'll be able to write more soon :)