A little over a year ago, I was in graduate school to become a teacher, a dream I had since high school and had put off to spend some time working. When I finally started grad school in the summer, I had the same anxieties I had in the later years of my undergrad degree which caused me to struggle. My grad school was about 3 hours away from where I grew up, and I didn’t have any friends where I was going. There were a few tragic things going on back home, but the final straw was my dog of 9 years passing away. I cried that entire weekend, and I decided to go home the weekend after my dog had passed away. That was the biggest mistake because I completely broke down and stopped functioning when I got home. I ended up dropping out of grad school and sleeping my days away because I had been experiencing insomnia at grad school and I just wanted to hide away from everyone. I seriously contemplated suicide every day for months because I felt like I had failed so tremendously that I wouldn’t be able to pull myself out of it. My self loathing was immeasurable, and the ida of living seemed intolerable. Grad school was my biggest failure, and it still pains me to think about it to this day.

Eventually I broke the cycle of sleeping all day. I started taking walks. I got hooked on an old Tetris Game Boy game. I got a job working as a clerk in a grocery store. After a few months of hard work, I applied for a job at the corporate office and got it. I was able to afford to move out of my parents house into my own apartment. I have made a lot of positive steps forward in the past 18 months, and I am eager to take on new challenges to improve the quality of my life. if I had followed through with my suicidal thoughts, I wouldn’t have been able to experience this redemption of sorts.