wanting to leave the profession
I became an ATC in 2022. I came from a poor single parent family with little to no guidance from the adult in my life on most everything and really had no idea what I was doing in college. Don’t want to solely blame my parent but was very clueless on what to do and thought I could try PA. I was failing and at the time i was playing college sports in my junior year and my coach told me to do something else and I liked an ATC class in college and so i did and he made me feel good about the decision and i never really looked back until I was in grad school and realized that ATCs do not make good money. I feel like our preceptors just made athletic training sound awesome and no one ever really shared the real truth about how wild this job can be? At that point i was terrified and felt too deep in the program and everything I had done and just finished it because I didn’t know what else I would do and I just continued. Fast forward to now, I am drowning in debt. I know that’s nothing special and most of us probably are, i feel burnout, i feel like I don’t even know how to make decisions if that makes sense. overwhelmed. I got switched from my previous sporting assignments of football, xc, t&f and lax to Mens and Women’s soccer, men’s basketball and lacrosse. I was not expecting this change and starting into it has made me feel like i want to quit every single day. I feel trapped. I feel like I will never escape the financial burden of what school cost me (88k) and I make about 65k before taxes and I just feel like i choose the wrong profession, I feel lost. I don’t know what to do or what else I could look into. I want to go back to school to be a PA but the schedule I have is so incredibly busy and it makes life miserable. I started a&p1 last spring and it was really rough. My mental state feels so messed up right now. I don’t feel like I can trust anyone at work, maybe everyone feels that to an extent? It seems like I picked the wrong career and i feel trapped. Any advice or directions. I honestly feel like I need to quit. This new sporting assignment with no inclusion on the decision was quite shocking and i expressed to my co workers i. the spring I didn’t not want to switch any of my sporting assignments and then management made this decision. I have no clue what to do with the masters and athletic training. I don’t know how that transfers over anywhere. I feel like I’d have to go back to school for something no matter what if I want to make decent money. I need advice or suggestions or guidance. everything feels hopeless right now and i feel like im drowning with most all my time being spent at work. It makes me feel crazy especially to people who are not ATCs