#sorry for my bad english but important imformation in this post
I really regret taking my university degree in highly demanded major
Most jobs are high end (actually means dead end for a sz career) is not suitable for me at all.
For many reasons :
High responsibility
Lots of meetings
Need more communication skills
Difficulty of disclosing your illness to get job acommodations
If you are a young schizophrenic (especially who suffer from negative symptoms ) no need to take a degree from university because you will find high end (dead end) jobs. Of course it pays well but trust me you cant continue in these kind of jobs unless you get acommodations which is not be an easy walk.
You can work in a diploma degree or even high school as now I am working with my high school degree.
I wish someone give me this lesson before applying to university
Please share my post especially for those young vulnerable andnewly diagnosed schizophrenics
I was always the loser in my family because I dropped out of college after a year and went to work. It was great working in the mailroom because everyone liked me and said I did a good job. I was promoted several times and finished a business school (vo-tech) degree taking night classes.
Things are so much better now re what can be achieved than when I became severely mentally ill in the mid 1970s. Back then schizophrenia was a living death. Doing well was jumping over a very low hurdle. My 1st admission was in May 1975 at the start of my last term at public school. The term I was due to sit my A levels. Doing well at those meant you could go to a university or polytechnic.
My problem wasn’t so much the academic side of things but the non academic,independent living, side of things. I basically crashed and burned due to the relentless high anxiety of wanting my parents to be proud of me vs knowing I’d really struggle with the independent living skills that were required.
That and ‘bullying related trauma’ ,combined with lack of help for those independent living skills and the trauma, has meant that higher education has never been a realistic option for me. If you have the opportunity to go to college/uni grab it firmly with both hands. I think till the day I die that I’ll always feel inferior for only having 6 O levels. Don’t end up like me. In comparison to how it was when I was young the world is your oyster. Make as much out of that as you can.
Yes, you are right. I was sick when I was in graduation of civil engineering degree in an University. After SZ any how i was able to complete this. Working in a job that requires only diploma, for more than 28 years as junior engineer.
I dont think my cognitive skill is good enough for university. It was barely enough to graduate high school. Its the academic component and having to be consistent. I could probably do it if you give me 20 years lol
Somehow i did my own small business though.
I feel similar to @Joker. I wanted to prove that I could do it. I’d also seen my parents really struggle to get past a ceiling because they didn’t have degrees. In my mind at the time, a degree meant avoiding poverty. I have something to fall back on, even though I would not teach high schoolers.
I was very MI throughout my 5 years of nurses college. How I got through it is a miracle. I worked in some form of nursing or other for ten years. Then, I got suspended indefinitely. Which is apparently another way of saying forever. My degree never did me any good careerwise after that. But it enriched me greatly in my personal life.
Neither of my parents went to university. My father got a commission to be an army officer instead ,but soon switched to the Foreign office.My mother was in a single parent family and didn’t want to place a further financial burden on her mother. She also went to work at the Foreign office. My father started an external law degree, but I don’t think he ever finished it. Despite that he managed to get to be the diplomatic equivalent of a major general , and has an entry in ‘Who’s who’ . My mother went back to work after leaving my father. She worked as an assistant library manager. Ability wise she could’ve done better than that, but wasn’t ambitious.