• LAVA Moderator: Shinji Ikari

College Conflict Led to Dropping Out—Currently Seeking Guidance

SideOrderOfOpiates

Bluelighter
Joined
Nov 19, 2010
Messages
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Location
Glendale
So, prior to discovering that I am quite the nerd at heart, I decided that it would be utterly foolish not to give college a shot. To fill you in a bit, I have been addicted to opiates/opiods for five years. I eventually found myself acutely cognizant of how much I wanted to regain control of my life. With that said, I started trying to sober up two years ago. Although I was still relapsing periodically, I found myself stable enough and healthy enough to finally 'live' at least somewhat again. This was when I made the choice to further myself academically. My therapist and I parted ways after I refused to attend AA meetings after landing in jail, and it was truly the most unagreeable time for me to be out of therapy. I soon found myself having intense panic attacks while still consuming my anti-anxiety medication. I was only taking one course, and I had received a solid 85% on everything. Being in a classroom was rather strange for me. I started ditching school at age seven via manipulation techniques, and although I graduated highschool, it was from a very expensive school for troubled youth. On that note, although I knew I was easily capable of an A, I was easily as discouraged. The fact that I felt as though I knew nothing of things such as the format of a Power Point presentation, as well as how to even truly learn academically, wore on me intensely.

It was not soon before I relapsed on Oxycontin, and the material in class became exceedingly difficult to absorb during withdrawals. Then, sickness ensued, and I had to make a choice between my health (I would have had to keep up the opiates/opiods in order to pass), or the reevaluation of my life. I chose the reevaluation of my life. I decided that I will be resuming therapy, but I know that I am still directionless with regard to a lucrative career prospect. My home life is toxic (twenty-three years old, living in a home with perpetual pills and conflict), and I am at the point where I feel as though perhaps I should just devote my time to saving a substantial amount of money until I figure out my next move.

Herein lies the problem (okay, so ANOTHER problem, hahah!), I have always been one to struggle immensely with feeling as though I am directionless. I do not feel as though I am incapable of succeeding in a chosen direction, but I do not feel as though I can procure a mental end result enough for me to do the footwork. When I realize that a goal I have considered requires steps that I do not gain pleasure from, I usually end up relinquishing said possibility. Either that, or becoming a complete drug addict and alcoholic to tolerate how much I despise the tasks required. Anyway, to make a long story a little less long, I had a conversation with a social acquaintance the other day that really made me think. The fellow I was chatting with, a fellow who is quite like me in many ways (we both dated the same gal, too), told me something that has since lingered in my mind. He told me that there are very few individuals that actually truly feel as though they have a definite calling in the workplace; he told me that most of us have to flip a coin to a decide what we want to do in the job world. That statement hit me rather severely, because both he and I seem to struggle immensely with chosing a profession that suits us. I have since been wondering just how lenient I should be when choosing my next step, and even the step after that. I am such a fucking inherently unsatisfied person. I don't know whether to just buckle down and land the first job I see before the possibility of self-annihilation occurs, or if I should look at it the way I truly feel—that this is my life—you ARE your LIFE. In other words, I had better choose something that brings me gratification, because this is my fucking life I am capable of molding it however I please.

So, I ask you lovely folks, shall I try to save myself from destruction via substances by landing any sort of non-sex worker job as soon as possible?

Shall I cater to the fact that I know I am prone to such intense anxiety that I lock myself in bathrooms, or take mass quantities of benzos that make retaining information difficult? Shall I say fuck it, and risk doing either and take it as another one of my many learning experiences?

Also, do you have any job recommendations for a gal with spontaneous panic attacks? Although I think challenge is a necessity, if I landed a job I was content with, but required a lot of social chatting, I would clearly hate to lose that job due to anxiety issues.

Any advice &/or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!
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Find yourself a job right now that'll keep you occupied and pay the bills. In your free time, you can search for a more fulfilling job. Don't do retail if you have anxiety.
 
I feel like I can identify with it all; feeling I have potential but lacking direction; not wanting to put the effort in because it seems so futile, and of course the dope; benzo, cocaine and alcohol abuse.

I guess I'm ahead of you, SOOO, because I already went through dropping out then working a pointless job for years (to, ironically, save up enough to return to school). One thing I experienced 100% is that benzos and drug abuse in general made anxiety exponentially worse. Quit that shit. It's a rocky road but even if you relapse, as long as you can feel and remember what it feels like to just feel good sober it's a powerful motivator. IME occupying your body (exercise) also helps hugely in demolishing anxiety and just helping you feel "OK" sober as opposed to OH-FUCK-THIS-IS-HELLLLLL!!!

So yeh, that's the one thing I'm sure of. Not sure of anything else because it took me years of shitty work while relapsing to finally start heading in the right direction, with any luck you can turn things around even faster =D
 
Also, do you have any job recommendations for a gal with spontaneous panic attacks? Although I think challenge is a necessity, if I landed a job I was content with, but required a lot of social chatting, I would clearly hate to lose that job due to anxiety issues.

Any advice &/or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

First of all: Not to sound pedantic, but have you tried every single alternative to those aforementioned highly abusable, physically addictive drugs for your psychiatric complications? Right off the bat, I'll add that you seem to be a pretty smart gal, so I doubt that your treatment history consists entirely of haphazard self-medication; surely you were offered (and accepted) "real" treatment at some point. You mentioned being in therapy - what drug(s) were you prescribed, if any? Just benzos? Cognitive behavioral therapy has its limits in treating people with panic disorder, you know, especially those who use/abuse benzodiazepines. There is a decent selection of well-tested, non-benzo antipanic drugs on the market, including multiple classes of antidepressant, calcium channel blockers, a ton of medicinal herbs, and a few others that I've forgotten at the moment. But again, you're probably smart enough to know all of this already, and since this is a thread about career choices, I'll just assume that you're, like, completely refractory and go from there.

There exist a few IT occupations (e.g. programming), that require less human-human interface than most other decently-paying jobs. If your typical workday consists of staring into an LCD monitor for 9 hours straight attempting a bugfix for some convoluted app, I doubt seriously that you would lose your job due to any kind of mental illness that didn't significantly reduce your eventual productive output. Also, if you're talented and/or lucky enough, you might just get to stay home all day and work from there, minimizing the likelihood of social fuckups, potentially increasing productivity, and reducing the likelihood that you'll even have a panic attack in the first place. I'm not expecting the idea of being a computer programmer to rattle your saber or anything, but it at least sounds doable and comfortable. Nameen? As a plus, you may very well survive doing this kind of work whilst under the influence of a maintenance-dose opioid or low-dose tranquilizer...if you're smart enough, that is.

Aside from that, I don't think that I have anything realistic to offer. However, despite the generous supply of helpful detail included in your post, you've neglected to divulge the most important things: What, if applicable, do you consider to be your talents? Your passions? When you picture yourself in an ideal career, what do you envision yourself doing, sans panic attacks? And what's the deal with the panic disorder and social anxiety, anyway? Your post treats them as though they were nothing more remediable than personal quirks or stubborn nuisances to be stifled, tiptoed around, and ignored. Again, not trying to sound like a total dick or anything here, but don't you think that the more sensible thing to do goes something like,

1. Find a good psychiatrist, or something of the sort, preferably one that owns a prescription pad and knows how to use it.
2. Whilst working out a rough sketch (it may, and often does, take years to get a good drug regimen buttoned up) of your treatment protocol, work a shitty, preferably non-sex job until you feel comfortable enough with yourself and your life circumstances to...
3. Read descriptions of different careers, find one that you won't absolutely loathe doing forever, then learn how to do it well (usually in college; YMMV).
4. Do this thing, or some variant thereof, for the rest of your life, provided that you don't end up hating it or find yourself otherwise indisposed at some future date.
5. Make enough money to be completely financially secure, or as close as is humanly possible. Do not have any children, heavily involved relationships, nor any other serious life-changing circumstances occur until this has happened.

Steps 1 and 5 might be the hardest on my 5 Steps to a Successfully Mediocre Life that May Not Suck list, but maybe you should give it a shot if you haven't already. If you have already tried all this (or at least steps 1 through 3) and failed at the age of 23, then I'm genuinely sorry for having wasted your time.

Also, in case you were wondering, the answer is yes, I too have panic disorder. Being a male in the United States, I also find it considerably difficult to feel socially comfortable whilst locking myself in bathroom stalls, a practice which used to be (depending upon the week) a daily affair.
 
i'd also recommend therapy, i have severe PTSD and doing tons of cognitive therapy helped stopped a large large majority of my panic attacks. shit if you could get into a treatment program that'd probably be best, your self medicating isn't getting you anywhere good
 
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what do you want to do, or perhaps what do you not want to do workwise? What career goals do you want to achieve?
 
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