Class Take Away (10/7)

This week we introduced ourselves to the class in the way we thought best fit ourselves.  It was interesting to see what different people thought defined them as a person and so forth, and what some found as important aspects of their lives while others skimmed over those same aspects if they mentioned them at all.  Also, listening to the varying lengths of presentations was fun as well, some people who presented went on for well over ten minutes, and some, like myself, probably didn't even hit five minutes.

I think the stories that resonated with me the most were the ones about people who had had trouble with college, dropped out, and then got a second chance.  I too had a lot of problems my freshman year, I became depressed, went onto academic probation, etc.  I didn't drop out but I lost my scholarships and have spent the last couple years trying to pull my GPA out of the hell I let it fall into.  It's kind of nice to know that I'm not the only one who has screwed up in college, as sometimes I think that everyone else just acclimates to college very easily, at least, that's what it seems like.  So it's nice to see that that's not always the case.

It also makes me respect the people who have been through that just a little more.

Beth's story was also pretty powerful and I enjoyed listening to it.  As I mentioned above, I too am depressed, diagnosed with what my psychiatrist calls lifelong depression, and I am currently being medicated for it.  Prior to the medication and constant counseling I had pretty regular thoughts of suicide and self-harm.  I won't go into all that here, as I'm not sure who all reads this, but suffice to say, it got pretty bad, so seeing that Beth, who is perhaps my favorite professor, went through all that and still managed to turn out awesome is pretty nice and gives me hope.