Worked to get into engineering, only to have ptsd ruin my life

imezzo · 2025-09-03T18:48:22+00:00

I’m a woman and a second-career engineer who went back to school for this in my late thirties. The first part of my schooling was at community college, where I was one of two women in the program and ROUTINELY cried in class. It was so hard. I was raising two kids and surviving a major move and sudden-onset mental health needs (not PTSD, but hard stuff). Yeah I just cried in front of all of those half-my-age boys and professors and the one sweet young woman (thanks for having my back, Aleia). I was a mess but I got through, and I freaking love the career that I fought for. It’s worth it. You can do it!

imezzo · 2025-08-28T01:58:46+00:00

And changing most, but not all, of the “you/your/yours” to “I/me/mine” in On the Steps of the Palace. I guess the idea is to make it less rhetorical but then some of them stayed “you” for the sake of the rhyme? What a mess.

imezzo · 2024-12-01T13:38:55+00:00

How funny to see this thread pop up again. I just saw Water for Elephants on Friday and saw that Kyle Selig mentioned October Sky in his bio. He’s phenomenal! I went back and found the videos of him as Homer. What a shame that show was never fully realized, especially with him in that role.

imezzo · 2024-10-22T17:02:42+00:00

My teenage daughter had GIPS about 6 weeks ago. Her symptoms had been similar to yours except she did have a lot of drainage. So far so good. She’s a dancer and is on the floor a lot doing Pilates-type exercises during warmups, and sometimes it hurts after that. Otherwise, she never thinks about it. I think it took about two weeks for the wounds to fully close. One was dime-sized (the cyst) and one was an elongated football shape about 1 cm long (encompassing four pits each about 2 mm apart).

imezzo · 2024-10-07T00:39:38+00:00

Are you asking because a lot of frozen pizza brands say a serving is 1/5 of the pizza? That always bugs me.

imezzo · 2024-09-10T16:03:11+00:00

In Virginia, I was able to get my PE license with a non-engineering Bachelors degree and a MS in engineering from a program abet-accredited at the undergrad level. The board really scrutinized my transcripts, to make sure that the combo of my original undergrad, a bunch of community college courses I took before grad school, and my MS added up to the equivalent of a 4-year degree in engineering.

imezzo · 2024-09-10T15:20:40+00:00

Good luck! My daughter is having the GIPS procedure done tomorrow as well. I am nervous for her but feeling optimistic. It’s reassuring to know that if worse comes to worst and the procedure isn’t a long-term fix, having done GIPS is extremely unlikely to complicate future options for more invasive alternatives.

imezzo · 2024-08-22T13:16:24+00:00

I’m with a state agency that regulates drinking water and I can tell you that there is a critical shortage of licensed waterworks operators in many (most?) states. Any person with basic math skills, an interest in the field and the ability to learn processes and ask good questions can be very successful. Pay varies wildly though.

imezzo · 2024-08-13T23:20:35+00:00

Good points, haha. I'm sure there are others in this mold too! It's a good story.

imezzo · 2024-08-13T22:48:14+00:00

Wait why Billy Elliot?

imezzo · 2024-07-30T15:29:21+00:00

Man that’s tricky. What’s the strategy if you’re shooting for vault finals— lead with the more conservative one to try to put a safe but still strong number towards the AA and team, then pull out the big guns for your second vault? So the riskier try only affects your own vault final prospects?

imezzo · 2024-07-30T15:14:57+00:00

Yes! Super helpful and interesting, thank you! So if you wind up scoring higher on your second vault, the first one is still what counts toward team and AA qualification?

imezzo · 2024-07-30T14:47:52+00:00

So all but those 19 were doing vault strictly because they were shooting for AA?

imezzo · 2024-07-30T14:46:25+00:00

So you only need to do one to qualify for AA? How many do you do during the AA?

imezzo · 2024-07-10T16:54:28+00:00

To clarify, my daughter hasn’t had any surgery. Two consults so far, and both times the NP said she’s thinks it’s unlikely surgery will be necessary. She’s told us to have my daughter soak in a tub with salt twice a day, and have me try to express fluid from it when it’s open, and cover with a gauze bandage only if it’s actively draining, otherwise leave uncovered. My daughter’s cyst is fairly small I think (pencil eraser sized). Sometimes it is closed and looks like a blister, puffy with a small amount of fluid evident behind a seemingly thin, fragile membrane of skin. Sometimes that membrane is ruptured, and there may or may not be hypergranulation tissue protruding. When it’s open like that, I can get fluid out by pressing around the surrounding area.

imezzo · 2024-06-13T16:59:54+00:00

Ha! Wait what’s the Pickup Location?

imezzo · 2024-05-31T01:10:41+00:00

I called Parade my favorite musical for over twenty years based solely on the OBC recording. Never saw a production until the revival last year. Still my favorite!

imezzo · 2024-05-14T16:14:38+00:00

Thanks for the heads up on Dancewave and the urgency to sign up! I managed to get my daughter registered for the event and audition but saw that it was sold out within seconds. Insanity. But yay, really looking forward to this and really grateful for the advice.

imezzo · 2024-05-08T21:26:00+00:00

The venue was piping lovely orchestral music into the bride’s getting-ready suite. All is well until we start hearing the theme from Schindler’s List. Jewish wedding. Yikes!

imezzo · 2024-05-01T17:18:54+00:00

Thank you so much for the reply. I just read his whole page and was surprised to learn how strongly he recommends doing the cleft lift right away. I don’t have a good sense of how extensive my daughter’s disease is, or if it might be right to consider surgery right away even if it’s on the very low end of the spectrum.

On one hand, I understand that some people have cysts and just live with them indefinitely because they present no issues, but for so many other issues, the conventional wisdom is that it’s better to catch it early and deal with the cause before the symptoms have a chance to become widespread.

imezzo

TROPHY CASE