Most of the time I am at peace with the fact that I quit university. I know it wasn’t right for me at the time, and I seem to be doing ok in life without having that experience or the subsequent degree.
But sometimes I really do regret it. And I think that’s partly to do with the pressure I’m feeling to progress in my career, and wondering how different things would be if I’d got better qualifications, and partly to do with the shame I feel for not seeing my degree through.
When I meet someone new and they ask if I went to University, I’m faced with an awkward decision. Do I lie and just say no? Say that the idea just didn’t appeal to me? Or do I tell the truth and say that I started a Maths degree and dropped out just three months in? Then do I say why I dropped out, that I had rapidly developed an eating disorder? Or that I just didn’t enjoy it? And then whatever I decide to tell them in that split second, I have to remember so that I can stick to my story from then on.
I know it would seem easier to just tell the truth. But there is something that holds me back from doing that. It’s the shame - shame that I didn’t complete a degree even though I know I’m academically capable. Shame that I just couldn’t handle university when everyone else around me seems to get on just fine. Shame that my mental health deteriorated so rapidly that I could no longer stay living away from home. It’s a feeling of embarrassment, and a fear of what people might assume when I tell them. That they might think I’m not clever, not independent, not disciplined, that I’m weird, troubled, an attention seeker? It’s incredible the number of thoughts that can pass through your mind at one time, and such self-deprecating thoughts.
Thinking those thoughts over and over again, they start to be believable. Maybe I’m not clever enough to have a degree. Maybe the reason I couldn’t cope with university is because I’m not independent enough. Maybe I am weird.
The truth is, at the point of dropping out of university, I’d lost three stone in three months. I was receding more and more from social situations, I was going to the gym twice a day, and the only reason I wanted to go back to Portsmouth was so that I could go back to the gym, and there wouldn’t be anyone stopping me from doing that or watching how much I ate.
I have to remind myself that things were bad, really really bad. That I dropped out of uni to save my own life. That thankfully there was something inside me that knew that I couldn’t go back. As much as I wanted to lie to my family and tell them I was fine, as much as I wanted to keep it all a secret and go back to obsessively working out and restricting, I simultaneously knew that, actually, it wasn’t really what I wanted. The ‘anorexic me’ wanted to stay independent so that I could keep starving myself. But my rational self, whatever tiny part that was left, desperately wanted to go home and be looked after.
It wasn’t as though coming home made everything better. In fact, things got worse for a time. But eventually with the support of my amazing family and mental health services, I did get better. And while sometimes I imagine what my career might be like had I got a degree, I have to remind myself that I may not have lived to find out.
There’s no point being ashamed or embarrassed of my mental illness, or of the fact that I don’t have a degree. We’re all on different paths and I think I’m working out that none of us really know what we’re doing anyway, that we’re all making it up as we go along. Whatever stability or assurance I dream of, it probably won’t have come from a Maths degree from Portsmouth.
Instead of regretting what I may or may not have missed out on, I need to remember how important it was for me to take the step I did. I’ll be eternally grateful to myself and my family. I might have times where I envy other peoples’ careers, despair at the fact that I don’t really know the direction I’m heading in or know what I want to do when I grow up (because I’m still 8, aren’t I, please?)… but actually just taking the time to remind myself why I am where I am helps to put things into perspective, helps to ground me and give me gratitude, and also gives me a true sense of purpose.
