u/fostercaresurvivor

I was waiting for intimacy until marriage, or that was the plan, but I ended up having sex repeatedly with my then-fiancée. I thought it was okay because we were going to get married. But a few months ago, maybe six months, she called off the wedding and broke up with me. (Over the phone! Which IMO is a bit callous considering we were engaged, but whatever.)

I have OCD and some other mental health challenges, and this has been really difficult for me. I feel like I’ve completely betrayed God and also my own standards for myself. I’ve talked with my priest, who says there are worse sexual sins to commit than loving intimacy with someone you earnestly planned to marry, but I still feel awful. I feel tainted and less than, and like I have no right to ask future partners to wait til marriage when I didn’t even wait myself. I had so badly wanted my first partner to be my only partner, which has made moving on from everything very difficult for me. I wish we hadn’t ever slept together, because you can never take it back. I feel like when I was baptized (as an adult) I was given a chance to be a new person, and I just threw it away.

I would appreciate any advice anyone has about moving forward or how I should conduct myself in the future. (Besides the obvious—at least I’ll hopefully not make this specific mistake again.)

I’m actually a lot better set up than most Haligonians. I have a psychiatrist who I get ongoing care from and who I see every couple of months. I see her nurse every three weeks to get an injection. I see an emotion-focused counsellor in private practice every week. I see a psychologist monthly.

But I also face arguably more concerning mental health symptoms than most Haligonians. I’ve been labelled by my psychiatrist at Dartmouth CMH as having schizoaffective disorder, and my most prominent symptom is hearing voices. They talk to each other about me, and they tell me what to do. I find it very difficult to disobey them because they know everything about me and because they punish me when I refuse. They’re constantly going on about how I must kill myself, it’s the only way I can redeem myself and the only way God will ever love me again, etc. I’ve been to the ER for these voices many times, and I’m pretty much always dismissed with a “if you really believed that you’d have attempted by now” or “I think the best place for you is at home, resting.”

But one thing did surprise me significantly. I recently (as in over the last few days) began regularly hearing voices that urged me to kill three specific people who I have extensive contact with. Because of this, I went to the hospital. I waited for around fifteen hours to see a psychiatrist—I saw an emergency medicine resident and a psychiatric nurse while I was waiting. I was up all night because the emergency room had no rooms and no beds available. I hadn’t slept in a couple nights at this point, so in total I was up for three days by the time I saw the doctor.

The psychiatrist I saw was very kind to me, and she agreed to increase my antipsychotic medication, Olanzapine, from 12.5 mgs to 15, and even put me on 17.5 for two days to get it working faster. But I told them I didn’t feel like I could keep myself or other people safe. I told them I was worried I would harm someone, saying the voices were more compelling than they had ever been, and I asked how we knew I wouldn’t. She said in this line of work you never really know, but that I’ve displayed good judgement in the past even if she acknowledged it was difficult for me. I asked her to admit me for a day or two to let the medicine start working before I was left unsupervised, but she refused and gave me a taxi chit home.

I just feel really confused about what to make of this. I know I’ve displayed good judgement at times, but I’ve also committed significant acts of self and other harm, exclusively while acting on the suggestions or orders of my voices. I sometimes experience outside entities controlling my body/my limbs. I know that the ER doesn’t usually admit people to the psych ward without really florid psychosis or new mania, but I’m really surprised that someone with a diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder who comes to you saying that they can’t keep other people safe from their commanding voices can’t get admitted for even a day or two. I only have two psychiatric diagnoses, OCD and schizoaffective disorder, so I don’t think they could have been concerned about difficult behaviour.

I know that people will say to just call 911 if you don’t feel like you can keep yourself safe, but I saw multiple people in the hospital who’d been brought in by police in handcuffs, who waited just as long as I did for care, and who were probably sent home just as I was. If I go back, all that will happen is being labelled a difficult patient, which is a reputation that follows you.

The whole situation just brings to light, imo, how little hope someone with, say, suicidal thoughts has of getting adequate help. Does anyone have any experience of mental healthcare in other provinces, to compare to here?

I have command hallucinations that want me to kill three specific people. They won’t stop urging me to do it. They have all these reasons why I *must* do it and ways I’ll be punished if I refuse. I’m so scared I’m going to do something I can never take back.

I went to the emergency room, waited all night (was there like fifteen hours) and was discharged after speaking to an ER doctor, a psych nurse, and finally a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist agreed to increase my olanzapine from 12.5 to 15, which is a huge relief, as my treating psychiatrist won’t raise it at all due to weight issues. She actually keeps trying to wean me off it, even though it’s the only antipsychotic I’ve responded to (veteran of Seroquel, Geodon, Abilify oral, Abilify Maintena), she just keeps increasing my Maintena in the hopes of eventually weaning me off olanzapine entirely so I’ll lose weight. I’m open to losing weight, but I’m a little bit indifferent. I just want to stop living with voices.

But I told the doctor I didn’t feel like I could keep myself or other people safe, and pretty much begged her to admit me for a day or two while the increased olanzapine started working. She refused and gave me a taxi chit to go home. I don’t really feel like my concerns are being addressed, when I know where these people who I’m being ordered to hurt live.

I have command hallucinations that want me to kill three specific people. They won’t stop urging me to do it. They have all these reasons why I must do it and ways I’ll be punished if I refuse. I’m so scared I’m going to do something I can never take back.

I went to the emergency room, waited all night (was there like fifteen hours) and was discharged after speaking to an ER doctor, a psych nurse, and finally a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist agreed to increase my olanzapine from 12.5 to 15, which is a huge relief, as my treating psychiatrist won’t raise it at all due to weight issues. She actually keeps trying to wean me off it, even though it’s the only antipsychotic I’ve responded to (veteran of Seroquel, Geodon, Abilify oral, Abilify Maintena), she just keeps increasing my Maintena in the hopes of eventually weaning me off olanzapine entirely so I’ll lose weight. I’m open to losing weight, but I’m a little bit indifferent. I just want to stop living with voices.

But I told the doctor I didn’t feel like I could keep myself or other people safe, and pretty much begged her to admit me for a day or two while the increased olanzapine started working. She refused and gave me a taxi chit to go home. I don’t really feel like my concerns are being addressed, when I know where these people I’m being ordered to hurt live.

I aged out of care in May 2019, in a province that provides no special support for young people from the child welfare system to go to college or university. I did a couple years at a competitive university, on a reduced course load (I finished fourteen courses total, seven credits), and took out around $30k total in government student loans before dropping out due to mental health challenges.

I spent a couple of years working, and I have my own apartment now. Now I face a new, tough decision. I’ve applied to college for acupuncture. The program takes two years full time to complete, but I would probably take it across three years. It costs $32k in tuition total. If I went, I would take out another student loan.

I also have the opportunity to go to university, where I’ve already been accepted. This university has a Post-Care Tuition Waiver program for young people from the child welfare system. This means I could attend for free—my only financial responsibility would be buying the textbooks.

Another factor is that I’ve won a children’s aid foundation of Canada scholarship. They’re going to pay me $5k a year ($2.5k per semester every fall and every winter) to attend school/to offset the cost of tuition and textbooks. The money goes directly to my bank account, not my student account at school, and it’s renewable. I can have it for five more years. This would help significantly with acupuncture, but if I attended the university, I could use the money for textbooks and have money left over for expenses like tutoring or living expenses while my work hours are reduced due to classes.

University feels hopeless sometimes, like I’ll never finish, because I can only handle two courses per semester. Acupuncture feels like it would get me a job a little faster. Right now I work at a cafe making minimum wage. I’m so grateful to have a job, but I’d love to be able to provide more fully for myself. On the other hand, at college the classes are at fixed times, while at university there’s a lot more scheduling flexibility. I work Tuesdays and Fridays at present, and can schedule my classes for the fall term so they’re all Monday. Wednesday, and Thursday—I already checked, and there are plenty of courses I’m interested in that only meet on those days.

I’m not totally sure what I want to do in the future. I know that I’m very very interested in acupuncture and alternative healthcare like TCM, osteopathy, etc., but I have other interests too. I’ve thought about going into ECE or becoming a teacher (in my province education programs require you to come in with an undergrad degree, then the B.Ed is 1-2 years on top of it), I’ve thought about becoming an admin assistant, ive thought about library sciences, I’ve thought about cosmetology school. If I’m not absolutely certain, is taking out a loan a wise thing to do? I know it’s my dream program, but I’m not sure it’s the only thing I could be happy doing.

As some people here know, because I’ve posted about it before, I escaped/was rescued from a “house of horrors” case similar to the Turpins. Mine had less press coverage, thank God for small mercies. I always find seeing the Turpin survivors in the news really hard, because it brings up a lot of memories, and because of the reaction it gets from the public. Just recently I was watching TikTok, and I saw news break about another house of horrors case in America, with sixteen victims rescued from conditions of extreme abuse and deprivation.

I keep seeing people online speculate about the case, the conditions the children were in, how “feral” they were or not, what their lives will look like in the child welfare system, etc. I see a lot of speculation that I’d consider incorrect, especially about the child welfare system and to what degree it supports victims of extreme abuse.

Do any of you relate to feeling a lot of feelings when cases similar to yours are being widely talked about?

I have Level 2 Autism, but a normal IQ. I'm applying to college/have some university credits that I was reasonably successful with. I did a regular academic high school diploma, but a lot of my classes were in the Alternate Instruction room. I'm in my province's disability support program for developmentally disabled adults. I live on my own, but I have support workers in my apartment 31 hours a week (so just over 4 hours a day) to help with cleaning and cooking and to take me to appointments and help me fill out forms and stuff. There's also an on-call staff person available 24 hours a day in case something goes wrong. I also get daily phone call reminders to take my medication from one of my support workers. I've been told I have a very childlike way of interacting socially. My support workers do things like make my stuffed animals do little dances when I'm upset. I can struggle a lot in new situations, like getting really overwhelmed or getting lost in new places.

I've been trying to date, but it's been kind of tricky. Most people without significant developmental disabilities would never want to date someone like me, and would probably feel predatory if they did. When my sister said she was talking to someone she was interested in who had Autism I asked if they had Autism the way I do, and she said she would never have started talking to them romantically if they had Autism like mine. I've dated two people, and they've both been Autistic, but higher functioning than me. One of them broke up with me because I was lower functioning than her.

Anyway, I was on this dating app, and someone had in their bio that they were on the Autism spectrum. I was getting cool vibes from her bio and picture. I messaged her and quickly got a response. She confirmed she's Level 2 as well. She lives with her parents still, and they drive her places. That doesn't bother me, since I've only been living on my own for two years (I'm 28), and while I can take the bus now, I used to get lost and had to call people to come rescue me until like two years ago. We exchanged a lot of messages and figured out some things we had in common, like favourite foods. I work at a supported cafe for workers with developmental disabilities, and we discovered she used to work at the same one. I asked her on a date, and she agreed. We're going to get ice cream in a couple of days.

But then she mentioned her plans for the week, that she was going to go to this day program. I Googled it, and the org that does the day program she mentioned serves adults with intellectual disabilities. An ID is an IQ under 70. Her spelling is really bad, but I had assumed it was dyslexia or something. Sometimes in our messages she didn't seem to quite get what I was asking or misinterpreted questions, but like, common Autism moment. I didn't realize she had an ID when I messaged her, I just assumed she was significantly impacted by Autism.

Ethically speaking, should I cancel our date? She seems interesting and fun to be around, but I don't want to prey on someone who's significantly more vulnerable than me. Honestly, I would like to go out with her and see if we vibe in person. She doesn't seem to me to be much more childlike than I am. But I don't want to be unfair to her or burden her with things she might not be able to understand, like a romantic relationship. Going out with me would be her first date. I know she wants a girlfriend because she said it in her bio, and she's said she wants to get married one day, so it's not like I'd be pushing her into something she had no interest in. But I don't want to be a predator, and I'm feeling a sense of unease now that I know about her likely ID. Thoughts?

Obviously, I mean in addition to standard therapies. I'm on an long-acting injection (Abilify Maintena) and a daily antipsychotic pill, I see a counsellor for Emotion-Focused Therapy weekly, and I see a psychologist for CBT for Psychosis every other week. I also see my psychiatrist every couple of months, and am starting twice-weekly occupational therapy. I do not believe that herbs or acupuncture or massage or a keto diet can cure schizophrenia spectrum disorders, and I always listen to my doctors before trying anything.

That said, I think there is some evidence that complementary therapies can help make antipsychotic side effects more tolerable, and they help me feel a greater sense of control over my illness, because I feel like I'm being proactive. I've been seeing an osteopathic manual practitioner regularly to help with some of the tension I'm holding in my body from the stress of my illness. I went to a massage therapist for the same reason, although only once as I found it was really expensive and I'm on disability. I've also tried various herbal treatments as part of TCM, especially when I was prodromal. Again, I don't think herbs can replace antipsychotics, but I've found that some do help with some of the side effects.

I've been so inspired by my experience with complementary medicine that, now that I'm beginning to feel a lot better in terms of my mental health and ready to return to daily life, I've actually been applying to some local college programs for things like acupuncture and massage. My first choice would be acupuncture and East Asian medicine at a small college in my city. I'd really like to specialize in mental health care, as an adjunct therapy for people who are dealing with any kind of mental distress. I'm very open about living with the challenges of schizoaffective disorder, and my hope is that I could use my lived experience to be especially supportive of patients. (Obviously I would only agree to see people who were also pursuing traditional medical treatment.)

So I was curious whether any of you had tried anything like acupuncture, TCM, massage, anything along those lines, and what your experiences were with it.

I recently applied to a college program I'm intensely interested in, and they responded with an invitation to come tour the school and meet with the school's director. I'm hyping it up in my head a lot, because I want to get in really badly. There are two colleges in my municipality that teach the program I'm interested in. Specifically, I'm applying for acupuncture and traditional East Asian medicine. I've always been really interested in healthcare, and especially complementary care like massage therapy, acupuncture, osteopathy, traditional herbalism, things like that. I've found a lot of help, healing, and connection through things like osteopathy and herbal medicine.

I have had some mental health struggles, and I talked over my acupuncture decision with my therapist and with my priest. They were both excited for me to be applying, especially my therapist--she thinks it would be a really good fit for me, as the education can be taken part time (three days a week, leaving two days a week for therapy appointments and injections and so on), and there's a lot of flexibility and room to set your own hours working in the field. My priest was also amped for me--he's a huge proponent of education (he has a doctorate in...priestly studies, I guess?, and he lectures at a university) and remembers me talking for the last several years about wanting to go into healthcare. And my osteopath is especially excited for me. Right now I'm working a minimum wage job that has no benefits. In my city, a lot of complementary health practices are opening up and expanding, and I see plenty of acupuncture and wellness jobs that pay upwards of $30 an hour, plus benefits, which is crazy money to me. My osteo said that doing the program, if I get in, would change my life. There are even acupuncturists at her practice!

Anyway, I've applied to the first of the two schools that teach acupuncture here. The curriculum seems amazing. You do three semesters of Classical Chinese language study so you can read passages from classical acupuncture texts in their original languages, you do three semesters of taijiquan and can even continue your studies to become an instructor, they incorporate qi gong and meditation every day, and they teach more than just TCM acupuncture, they also cover Japanese and other acupuncture methods. The other acupuncture school in my city is good too, but it only teaches TCM acupuncture, and only has a single term of Chinese. The first school also has a reputation of being a better environment to learn in, and is slightly less expensive. So I know which school I'd prefer to go to. I've paid the $75 application fee to the first college, and I'll apply to the second if I don't get into the first. The first school is apparently much more competitive.

I aged out of care a few years ago mid-way through 12th grade, and I'm not in contact with my old social worker or any former foster parents, so I don't have a lot of more experienced adults to ask for advice, besides my priest and my osteo, who I've already talked to. I have been talking online with someone who's a current student at the college, who told me that the tour and meeting with the director will probably be really chill and I shouldn't worry too much about it. But I am worried, and I wanted advice.

I have three chief areas of concern. The first is my outfit. I work a casual job, and don't really own any business type clothes. It would be a significant financial strain to buy some. What should I wear? I was thinking I could wear a white button-up blouse with a light green cotton checked jumper dress I have. It's casual, but it's pretty and it's modest and I feel confident in it. Do you think that's dressy enough for a school tour? The director of the school is setting his lunch hour aside to show me around (it's a pretty small school.)

The second is, how do I make a good first impression? I can be pretty socially awkward--I'm actually on the Autism spectrum. I know to shake hands with reasonable firmness and to make eye contact, but any other tips? I'm terrified they'll find me unpleasant or off-putting, even though I've put a lot of work into improving my social skills.

The final concern is, what questions should I definitely ask? I've made a list.

• What is the employment rate of their graduates?
• What is the graduation rate of their students?
• What is the pass rate of their students on the Pan-Canadian qualifying exam?
• Which acupuncture associations can their graduates join?
• Have they had students with disabilities before? What kind of accommodations can they make for a student with a disability?
• Have any students from the acupuncture program gone on to take the TCM-P diploma that other schools offer acupuncture grads? Were they successful?
• What is their process for needs-based grants? (The website says they offer them and you can apply when you're accepted, based on availability and need.)
• The course catalog says you can optionally continue your taijiquan studies to become an instructor, what's that process like? What is the additional cost?

I already know the tuition cost, textbook cost, and biographies of all their teachers. I've read the course descriptions for each course. Should I do anything else to prepare for the tour and meeting the director?

I get $5,000 a year towards my education from the Children's Aid Foundation as a former youth in care. If I take the program over three years, as is my intention, the tuition will be about $10,000 a year (it's $31,800 for the entire program, $210 per credit), so the CAF help will significantly reduce my debt. It's still a big decision to take on debt to go to school. But if I don't get some kind of specialized education, I'll never get out of the cafe and the minimum wage job world. I won't be able to build a future. So I think it's wise--what do you all think?

Sorry for the long post and all the questions, I just love getting feedback from people and want to make sure I don't miss anything obvious. It also helps me to write things out.

My city has two acupuncture colleges. Both are good schools, but one in particular has an amazing environment, reputation, and curriculum. You do three semesters of Classical Chinese language study so you can read passages from classical acupuncture texts in their original languages, you do three semesters of taijiquan and can even continue your studies to become an instructor, they incorporate qi gong and meditation every day, and they teach more than just TCM acupuncture, they also cover Japanese and other acupuncture methods. The other acupuncture school in my city is good too, but it only teaches TCM acupuncture, and only has a single term of Chinese. The first school also has a reputation of being a better environment to learn in, and is slightly less expensive. So I know which school I'd prefer to go to.

I applied a couple of days ago, and I've just been invited to come in for a tour, to sit in on a class, and to meet the school's director one on one. I'm feeling pretty scared*.* What if I say something stupid? What if he doesn't like my vibe? I really really want to get into this college. I aged out of foster care, so I don't have a lot of adults to ask for advice about a big thing like starting college. So I figured I would ask all of you!

1. What should I wear? I don't own any business casual clothes, and it would be hard for me to afford to buy a new outfit. Is casual okay? I was thinking I could wear a white cotton button-up blouse I have, and an ankle length green checked jumper. It's casual, but modest and it looks nice, it's probably my favourite outfit. Or is more business clothes super necessary/should I borrow money from a friend to get a new outfit?
2. What kind of questions should I ask the director?
3. What are things I should be looking out for to make sure the school is the right environment for me?

You'll forgive me if this is a silly question.

I live in Nova Scotia. There was, until a few years ago, according to my priest, an Anglican convent in Digby, but few younger people were interested in becoming nuns. The last two nuns there passed away, and the convent is no more. If they still existed, I would have been interested in joining them to see whether monastic life is for me. There is an Anglican convent in Ontario, but I can't leave Nova Scotia for more than a month because I have responsibilities here. I've considered reaching out to them to find out about visiting, though. I like the idea of a Christian community focused on God entirely, who say pray the Daily Office together. I also like the idea of serving the community through outreach.

I wondered whether there's such a thing as a solitary nun or anything like it, who devotes herself to prayer, simplicity, and service, and takes a vow of chastity, without being part of a community. (Obviously a community would be preferable, but I have practical constraints.) I suppose I could do all of those things on my own without being a nun or anything like it (consecrated virgin perhaps??), but I like the idea of taking a vow that's recognized by other people in the church. I've poked around a little on the Single Consecrated Life website, but I don't know if any support for that exists in Canada.

I'm a relatively new Christian (baptized in October), so this may be a bit of remaining zeal of the new convert. I just can't think of anything that would be better than vowing my life to God. I know I have a great deal to learn about faith before I'd be anywhere near knowledgeable enough to make that kind of vow. I just wondered if it was even a remote possibility for my future, in a few years when I'm done college.

My LPIII is set up and connected to service as of last night. Yay! This morning, though, it started doing something odd. It makes a text notification sound every couple of minutes, without any text having been delivered when I check. It isn’t my alarm or my calendar app, I have no events today in my calendar and I shut my morning alarms off. It’s definitely the texting noise.

Does anyone know what this means? Are texts coming in that I don’t see? I assume it’s probably not that because the texting notification has happened a lot, probably two or three dozen times just this morning. Could it be some kind of alert I’ve inadvertently set up?

I know Anglicans allow the use of contraception within a marriage, which I think is the right stance. I was wondering about other family planning methods, particularly within my own family's context.

I come from a family affected by a rare genetic disorder called Li-Fraumeni syndrome. People living with LFS lack a tumour suppressing gene, and tend to get multiple primary cancers from very young ages. Someone with LFS has to get very extensive cancer testing many times every year from birth (or at the time they're diagnosed) until they die.

Li-Fraumeni syndrome is heritable, and it's autosomal dominant, which means if you have one copy of the gene, you have LFS. That means that everyone living with LFS (one copy of the bad gene) has a 50% chance of passing it on to their child. In the LFS community I've seen many cases where someone is diagnosed as an adult, learns some or all of his or her children have it, and watches them all die before dying themselves.

LFS, therefore, obviously has major impacts on many people's family planning. My mother yearned for a large family with many children, but was diagnosed after having her first child. She chose not to have more biological children because of the risk. Many people with LFS who plan to have children use sperm or egg donors. (They wouldn't generally be cleared medically to adopt, except for special cases like kinship adoption.)

Now science has progressed, and people with LFS who yearn to have children but who are unwilling to saddle them with this disease have another option. They can have embryos made with their own eggs or sperm, and then test each embryo for the mutation, implanting only the embryos that don't have the mutation.

I was wondering what an Anglican or more broadly a Christian stance on this--pre-implantation genetic testing, or the use of sperm or egg donors--would be. Thankfully this is an academic question for me, not one related to any imminent plans. I don't live with LFS. It's just something I think about sometimes, because I'm in some LFS Facebook groups where pre-implantation genetic testing is widely seen as a great gift, and because I see a lot of debate online about things like pre-implantation testing.

I received my SIM card for my LPIII in the mail today. My Light account was already set up when I received the actual phone in the mail last week--I uploaded a bunch of music. When I logged in today I activated my SIM card according to the instructions it came with, and paid for my cell service plan on the LightPhone BeOne page. Now when I log in on BeOne it says "Our team is reviewing your information. You’ll get an email once your activation is approved and ready." It's been around six hours now, and I just wanted to see if this is typical, or if I might have done something wrong. Thanks for any insight you can provide!

I was raised non-Christian, with only slight exposure to a friend's "non-denominational" church that I went to with them occasionally. They taught that people should basically say "dear God", say what's on their mind, and then finish with "amen", and bam, prayer.

Now that I'm Christian (baptized in October), I go to morning prayer at a local parish about once a week. I like it very much, I like the rhythm of it, the way it's the same all the time and the way we as Christians are all saying these things together. I like the history of our words, how they've been basically unchanged for hundreds of years. But I don't go to morning prayer daily, and I'd like to pray more often at home. I was wondering what my approach should be. Should I get a Book of Common Prayer for home use and start praying the morning and evening prayers by myself? Should I get a rosary and start praying it? I do lean Anglo-Catholic. Just saying what's on my mind strikes me as too casual to be respectful of God, but should I perhaps be doing that?

You'll have to forgive foolish questions, I was baptized in October.

I was wondering about Saints. I took a saint's name as my middle name when I was baptized. My priest said that was unusual but allowed, and I wanted it, so we did it--it's on my baptismal certificate and everything. I find her life very inspiring. Specifically, I chose Dymphna for my middle name because as an incest victim I connected with her story as soon as I heard it. I've found a lot of interest in reading about the lives of various Saints. I've heard that Catholics have patron saints for nearly everything, and you can ask them for help when you're struggling with something they're the patron of.

My priest is quite Anglo-Catholic, and I would say I am too. I asked him about praying to Saints, and he said that you can ask them to pray for you just as you'd ask one of your friends here on Earth to pray for you. That made sense to me. So I wondered, when I'm troubled by something, should I pray to God or ask the relevant Saint to or both?

I don't really have anyone to celebrate with (not that there's anything to celebrate yet, except maybe reaching a point where I can apply), so I figured I would post here. I tried a year of university in the past, but it went poorly due to my then-undiagnosed schizophrenia spectrum disorder. But now I'm correctly diagnosed, taking medicine, and I have an apartment of my own. It feels like now could be the right time to go to school. I'm not sure I'll ever be capable of working full time, or even working in the field I study, but it would still be amazing to be able to get my diploma. I could frame it, and throw a graduation party--I never got one when I finished high school. It's a chance to make friends and learn a new skill, and I get some support with college from the Children's Aid Foundation, so my debt would be a little bit reduced.

I dropped out of university under a bit of a cloud when I became unwell in the summer between first and second year. I battled a lot of mental health struggles which led to many difficulties including misdiagnosis and homelessness. But now, years on, I'm correctly diagnosed and on antipsychotics, including an LIA, and beginning to feel much better. I've been applying to various college programs, to hopefully start in the fall. I'm really excited. Even if I'm never able to work full time, or work in the field I study, I think getting my diploma would be a really cool experience, it gets me out of the house, and it's a chance to make friends and learn a new skill.

I dropped out of university under a bit of a cloud when I became unwell in the summer between first and second year. I battled a lot of mental health struggles which led to many difficulties including misdiagnosis and homelessness. But now, years on, I'm correctly diagnosed and on antipsychotics, including an LIA, and beginning to feel much better. I've been applying to various college programs, to hopefully start in the fall. I'm really excited. Even if I'm never able to work full time, or work in the field I study, I think getting my diploma would be a really cool experience, it gets me out of the house, and it's a chance to make friends and learn a new skill.