ADHD

9748 readers

490 users here now

A casual community for people with ADHD

Values:

Acceptance, Openness, Understanding, Equality, Reciprocity.

Rules:

No abusive, derogatory, or offensive post/comments.
No porn, gore, spam, or advertisements allowed.
Do not request for donations.
Do not link to other social media or paywalled content.
Do not gatekeep or diagnose.
Mark NSFW content accordingly.
No racism, homophobia, sexism, ableism, or ageism.
Respectful venting, including dealing with oppressive neurotypical culture, is okay.
Discussing other neurological problems like autism, anxiety, ptsd, and brain injury are allowed.
Discussions regarding medication are allowed as long as you are describing your own situation and not telling others what to do (only qualified medical practitioners can prescribe medication).

Encouraged:

Funny memes.
Welcoming and accepting attitudes.
Questions on confusing situations.
Seeking and sharing support.
Engagement in our values.

Relevant Lemmy communities:

Neurodivergent Life Hacks

lemmy.world/c/adhd will happily promote other ND communities as long as said communities demonstrate that they share our values.

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

Never finished degree and I feel stuck/suicidal over it (lemmy.world)

submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

24 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I started uni 2014 and I've still yet to finish it because of life BS. Dealing with depression / ADHD has made finishing my degree seem impossible for me to do and I feel like an absolute failure everyday because of it. I wasted many semesters attempting clases and then dropping out when my grades weren't good.

My parents both graduated by their early 20s and had me at 23; I'll be 29 soon and I still live with them working at a Walmart to make ends meet and even with that I'm about to be fired for poor performance. I feel depressed being there because I was given everything in life to be successful and yet I wasted my 20s away being depressed / suicidal. All of my friends all have graduated long ago and have better jobs and I get envious seeing them being successful. All I think about is splattering my brains all over the wall.

I don't have a plan to follow, every day I'm just hating myself for wasting my best years over stupid shit instead of focusing.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 21 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (2 children)

If you're like me, the literal only people that will tell you that you need a degree are your parents.

I also studied for 4 years and was still in the first semester at the end of it. I just stopped trying. Now I'm a self-taught programmer.

I can tell you with my whole heart: "success" is completely and utterly irrelevant. If you have enough to live, you have already "won". Most other people would disagree with this. But there's so much free or almost free stuff to do that you can literally fill your whole life with it and never run out. Everything else is, even though it's very clichéd, a mindset issue. It is possible to be happy with very very little.

I don't know anything about your life, but if I have one advice it is this: figure out which of your beliefs come from within you or come from other people. Do you actually believe a degree is necessary? Or have other people instilled in you the sense that a degree is necessary? Is earning lots of money actually important? Or is that just what other people think is important and you copied?

Also get therapy help if you can.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Yeah fuck uni

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

My degree is in computer science, I'm very good with computers/Linux and programming but I haven't practiced in a while. How did you jumpstart a career in programming without a degree?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Don't know where you're from. I'm from Germany and we have a large vocational training culture. I just looked at some and found one that specialized in people that couldn't finish university.

But to be honest, it wouldn't have been hard to find any entry level job either. You just need to explain that you're not made for the educational institutions. And then provide proof of how you are good with computers/Linux and programming, most easily done through some contributions to open source projects. Of course you actually need to know about what clean code is, software engineering paradigms etc

Very important to apply to very small companies, never large ones. The large ones do automatic filtering for people without degree or some shit, but the small ones actually look at resumes. In you resume, you can just make a compelling case (even if it's totally bullshit) that you would be a good worker with your current skillset even though you don't have formal education, and it's likely you'll be able to find some kind of job eventually.