Depressed and need advice | Hacker News Reader

Depressed and need advice

9 pointsbookreader43 comments

I'm an active HN poster under a different name, but I'm posting this anonymously. I'm dealing with some situational depression and need advice.

I've been on a gap year from an Ivy League school after having a bad freshman year (I did well academically, but I had social and personal problems that I was dealing with). I took a gap year with the possibility of dropping out.

I've done pretty well over the gap year. I worked at a programming job and also did some contracting, and managed to save about 18k. I was also able to work through some of the future computer science classes by myself (learned C, graphs, trees, and basic algorithms).

The problem is, I come from an Asian family and am dealing with expectations that I return to school (from both friends and family). I don't feel ready to return, and I feel like I'm becoming depressed and anxious again.

I know this seems like a first world problem, but I just need some perspective and advice. I feel like if I drop out, I'll be okay emotionally and health wise. I think I'll be able to continue self teaching (I'm decently smart, scored 2330 on the SAT and did well in multivariable calc freshman year).

Thanks for any advice. I've just been very depressed and unhappy about the prospect of going back to school, and I'm starting to think it's the wrong decision.

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You should see a doctor.

Its very unlikely that you are getting depressed at the prospect of going to university. It's more likely that you are suffering from depression, that the prospect of going back to uni is making you anxious, which in turn causes stress and people who are depressed have a very different response to stress than people who are not. Also, think of depression as a hole, and stress like this huge bulldozer that digs into it, and you are always at the bottom of the hole, and it just gets deeper and deeper. Eventually it can get too deep.

People who are not depressed can't understand the way stress feels for someone who is depressed, though.

Depression can have roots in some emotional problems, but it's also common for it to be a purely physical condition, too. I am depressed (it's being treated) and I can't guarantee you whether you are depressed or not (if you are, it sounds like a light/mild cases, which is good I believe), but the way you described your situation makes me think that you might be, and a doctor could definitely help you. If not with the depression, then at least with your anxiety and "social" problems.

The problem with depression is that it just gets worse and worse, and there is no stopping it on your own.

You can also develop depression at any stage in your life.

Disclaimer: I have a very bad case of Major Depressive Disorder, I suspect since I was a kid, which almost ruined my life before a friend made me treat it. So I researched a lot about it, but I'm by no means an expert!

I think I might be slightly depressed, but the prospect of going back to college is making me unhappy (I think I'm pretty certain of this, but I don't want to go through all the reasons). I did well academically freshman year despite my depression, and at this point I'm mostly wondering how bad dropping out would be for me career wise (and maybe socially).

I feel confident that I can make friends outside of school, and while I'm worried about my parent's and friend's reactions to my dropping out, I feel like that shouldn't be the deciding factor.

Of course it shouldn't!

If you believe it makes you unhappy, and not simply causing you stress, then you shouldn't go back. I realise your parents and friends might disapprove at first, but you should change their minds by showing them you can do what makes you happy and be successful.

It shouldn't make any difference in you social life, because if someone cares that much, they are probably snobby as fuck.

However, it might make a difference to you in later life. Russell Tovey (British actor) said he always feels ashamed for not having a degree in acting (or whatever it's called, I honestly forgot the term... Drama?) when people talked about which schools they went to. Your parents are probably just scared that you might develop self esteem issues like these.

I am not sure if it will limit your career choices, but you can always compensate with a kickass portfolio!

I'm not worried about developing self esteem issues because of my lack of a degree.

I am somewhat worried about how it could impact my career, though.

I dropped out and am doing well career wise. In computer systems engineering it's the results that matter, not diplomas.

Here's where I'm coming from: a student of psychology, sociology, anthropology, and history. Worked in the Helping Professions for 5+ years, lived in South Korea for over a hear, traveled to China a few times, and as such have made friends with several Asians back home in America. I think I can understand what the pressures are like from your friends and family, and I think I can understand why they feel the need to pressure you, at least to some small extent. However, I may be wildly off, in which case please ignore my ramblings, and I hope not to cause any more frustration for you.

Here's my real concern: not that you make money, or that you make your parents happy (or even that you make yourself happy), but that you are able to identify what is happening at the root of all this, and that you are able to navigate it. When that happens, you will become happy, and you will provide the time, the reason, and the opportunity for your parents to become happy about you, though whether or not they choose to is ultimately up to them, not you.

Here are my questions: What is the problem with your situation? (I can assume from what you've typed, but it isn't explicitly stated, and I hate assuming) Where does the problem come from? Where does your sense of identify originate?

My suspicion: there is an identity issue at the root of this (or at least near the root). We all get our identity from somewhere. We were all meant to get a healthy identify from our parents, though not all of us can. Many of us have parents who were not given their own healthy identity from their own parents, which makes it difficult to pass on a healthy sense of identity to us. Where there's a lack of identify (or unhealthy identity, these are essentially the same things with different terminology), poor boundaries are set in place. I highly recommend the book Boundaries by Henry Cloud and John Townsend <http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dap....

Your hesitancy to return to school may be wrapped up in the bad stuff you experienced there. That does not mean you should just go back and tough it out; it means that you have not healed from whatever happened. If you can heal from that (and without knowing what it is, I don't know where to point you), you may find yourself wanting to go back to school. (This imagination technique does not provide solid answers, just hints about what is going on in you. Take it with a grain of salt) Take a few minutes to imagine that you are 100%, completely healed from whatever bad stuff happened your freshmen year. Really let it sink in. Everything is fixed, and none of that stuff can ever happen again. If you are able to imagine that and let it go to the core of your being, do you still want to stay away from school?

If what I'm saying seems to fit so far, get that book. It is a pretty dry read, but the ideas are amazing. If what I'm saying does not fit, I apologize for taking your time. I'd really like to see you get through this, healed of any issues that could cause depression ever again for you.

If you feel confident you'd be happy as a developer or an entrepreneur, and given how you feel I think you should drop out. The real world will teach you much more than school. Developers can and are judged on what they've DONE (not by all companies but by many, and certainly enough) and entrepreneurs are judged only by what they've done. The degree doesn't matter imho. Background: I dropped out (data point of one, I know!) of comp sci after first year, ~18 years ago, and have never looked back. Caveat: If you would be a developer, you'd have to be willing to live in a large/progressive city to find the (many!) companies happy to hire you based on what you've done. Go build stuff. School isn't for everyone.

You should come to New Mexico Tech. We have a great CS program which is essentially throwing you in the deep end and seeing if you can swim. We are far, far away from your overbearing family and whatever horrifying social situation at your old school, over here in Socorro, New Mexico. Even if you got no financial assistance at all, you could pay for two or three years just with the 18K you have saved up now, and that's out-of-state tuition. In reality, with a decent GPA they would probably pay half and in a year you would qualify for in-state tuition cutting it in half again. The students here are mellow and have nothing to do but study. A low key environment, you would be a big fish in a small pond.

Worked for me. :)

Your math seems off. I looked at the New Mexico Tech website, and it estimates that the costs per semester are around $15,000.

http://www.nmt.edu/tuition-and-fees

Tuition seems to have gone up since I last looked.

$4K of that cost is based on staying in the dorms. You can rent a house for $800-1000/month in Socorro, split 2 to 4 ways, and there are studio apartments in the area for as low as $250. Still, these costs are essentially for your first year; after that it goes down considerably, and if you have a 3.25 or 3.5 you're eligible for a $4/5K/year transfer scholarship.

I have no idea where they got that $1600 "travel" cost estimate from.

I'd recommend going back to school. When you go:

* Join some exercise or sports club. Martial arts, ultimate frisbee, swimming -- anything.

* Ask a few women on dates. If you're at all like I was, you will make an awkward mess of it and get rejected. This is a good thing. It will make you dread failure less.

* Some Saturday, when you really should be working, take the day off and explore whatever city you live in. Don't go to the standard tourist locations. Walk around all day and explore at random. Walk into businesses you might not otherwise walk into. Approach strangers and ask random questions. They'll probably think you're weird -- that's okay, you'll never see them again.

(This might not apply directly if your town is small and/or unsafe.)

* Find some off-campus activity to go and join for a day. The more ridiculous the better. Country line dancing?

* Take some class in some subject that really interests you, but will be useful for nothing. Shakespeare, music theory, some obscure foreign language, ... anything.

* Do reasonably well in your classes. But don't be afraid to get a few B's. Disappoint your family slightly, not totally.

* Read Amy Chua's Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. Wonderfully insightful and funny, and based on what you say I imagine the story she tells will be familiar as hell.

* Tell all of this to your family. IMHO, you will be very, very glad you did so no matter how they react.

Good luck to you!

My advice is to go back to school. And not because you are being pressured to but because it will broaden you in ways you can't anticipate. You'll be in an environment that is unpredictable and stimulating and you don't know where future inspiration will come from because of it.

Jobs found inspiration after dropping out but -- and this is the important bit -- while still on the campus:

>>>“The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting,” he said. Among them was a calligraphy class that appealed to him after he saw posters on campus that were beautifully drawn. “I learned about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.”

-- from the Isaacson bio

Listen, you can always make money later. But you are young only once and if you pass up the chance for serendipity when you're young, you'll regret it later in life because by then you'll understand you've trapped yourself in a bubble for years.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for the response. Several people have advised me to go back for the overall experience, but I feel like I'm not likely to enjoy it if I'm unhappy or depressed there.

I'm wondering how bad dropping out would be. I have about a year and a half of experience as an employed programmer, and I know several languages and frameworks.

Would the lack of a degree become a serious problem in the future?

I entered the professional field after some minor community college experience right during the .com bubble (1997). It was very difficult to get my foot in any doors, largely due to the lack of a degree.

After 5 years of experience that went away, partly from the changes in the tech environment and also my experience.

It is competitive when you are starting out, but developers are high in demand. As someone now more in an employer role (which I'm not hiring now), I would look at Open Source work over a degree. If you have a github account with a maintained project or two, especially with a few stars, I'll think you are more qualified than if you have just a BS.

Will your school allow an open ended leave of absence? I have been on such leave for eighteen years. It's good knowing I could come back.

I'm smart and dropped out, but regretted it later on both pragmatic and personal bases. Is there a possibility to switch schools, or live off-campus and avoid some of the social stuff? Also, consider taking some of your savings and chatting to a psychologist psychiatrist, one that relates to you as an adult individual instead of a student.

If you do drop out your parents will get over it, eventually, but being tagged as a failure is unpleasant in the short term and burdensome in the long term. At least come up with a plan B (for yourself, not for them) to finish your education on your own terms at your own pace. Also, have you considered the possibility that your vocation doesn't necessarily have to line up with your education? If you're doing well as a self-taught programmer and so forth, perhaps you'd be happier studying something quite different from whatever you started with - medieval history or astrobiology or philosophy, say.

Can you be more specific about why you've regretted dropping out? If you're a programmer, how much has it hurt your career? I unfortunately don't think switching schools is an option for me.

A lot (most) of job positions in CS/IT/programming fields require you to have a degree. At least that's how it works in Europe. I think the US is a bit more lenient about it, though.

Three reasons.

One, practical: I'm European, and found that my options for living in other countries were narrowed by not having a degree. I would probably have moved to Japan for several years if I had had one, since it's a prerequisite for getting a work visa in that country and (obviously) being a westerner in that country causes you to stick out like a sore thumb and they're super-bureaucratic about this. I'm just personally interested in Japan and Japanese culture, so I regret foreclosing that option for myself.

Two, socioeconomic: although a bit of an introvert, I think there's enormous value to the personal networks you can build up in college, in terms of meeting potential mentors, colleagues and so forth. Now, I think there's (pan-)social downsides to that system, and somewhat disapprove of the whole 'Greek system.' But overall I think college provides access to considerable social capital, whose utility may not be apparent in the short term but which makes a huge difference for most people over the longer term. Most of us are not Bill Gates, and the fact is that Gates inherited a lot of social capital from his parents.

Three, intellectual: Although I enjoy being a self-directed learner and feel pretty confident about my smarts, I do go through deep and horrible abysses of self-doubt, and often feel ashamed of not having fulfilled my intellectual potential by completing and exploiting a degree. I'm just shy of 43 now; whereas in my 20s I felt very proud of my ability to learn, navigate life, and make a living sans degree (and still do in many respects; I've built an impressive resume as a high-level film technician over the last decade despite never having taken a film class), these days I hate admitting that I don't have a degree and feel that my career overall has stalled for lack of direction and focus. True, people often tout their degree as a substitute for actual skill and experience, and an excess focus on credentialism is a negative aspect of our society and economy. But at the same time, I am sick to the back teeth of explaining why I don't have a degree, having to sell myself from scratch every time instead of simply saying 'oh yes, I have a BS in Economics from Berkeley' or whatever. Also, I struggle with a nagging feeling of being a dilettante and lacking a solci intellectual focus, so when I'm down in the dumps I don't feel like a smart guy who has a decent life in defiance of the odds, but a bullshit artist whose run of relative good luck could end at any time. Having to regularly re-sell yourself to yourself on your own merits is just as tiresome as having to sell yourself to others. It's a large and omnipresent confidence drain.

PS you can email me if you want.

If you do decide to go back to school, I recommend taking advantage of the free and confidential counseling clinic that they almost certainly have. Don't tell your family about it unless you want to - it can be felt as a betrayal. See someone on a weekly basis to sort through what's going on. It just helps to talk, and counselors are trained to listen and empathize. Psychiatrists and other medical doctors are generally not trained like this, they will instead try to diagnose you with a disorder, so you might want to rely on them just for medication if you go that route. There's lots and lots of free high quality support on a university campus so don't be shy about taking advantage of it. On the other hand, if counseling or therapy in your hometown is an option for you if you drop out, that could help you figure things out too.

Thanks for the advice. I think the depression would probably go away if I drop out (unless I can't find a programming job at all). I have contract work for the next year at least, so I'm not too worried.

If I go back, I'll definitely try out your suggestion of talking to counselor.

There is surface advice, which addresses the high level problem at hand. You got into an ivy league - make the most of it. Learn CS, math, philosophy and whatever else interests you.

Then there is the root problem, which is depression. There is no rational advice about "suck it up and go back to school" that will help here. Your problem is uniquely yours, but you are not the only one to feel it. It is a chemicals in the brain problem, not a willpower issue. Depression hits smart people more than dumb people. (Shouldn't it be the other way around?) If you can't go to your parents, do be aware that most Ivy League caliber schools do have strong support networks if you look around.

If you want to talk, create and post a dummy email address and I'll shoot you my contact info.

If it's not going to make you kill yourself, go back to school. In American society, a degree from an elite university is a skeleton key to opportunity. It's a clear signifier for 'upper-class' in a society that likes to pretend there's no such thing as class. They could teach you nothing except what wine goes with the fish for four years straight, and it'd still be worth the price of tuition.

I have a history degree from Stanford, and it's given me ridiculously unfair advantages in areas completely unrelated to history. I can't even imagine the easy mode my life would be set on if my degree was in something related to what I do for a living. Giving up that kind of advantage because you're temporarily depressed seems pretty foolish to me.

I talked to several programmers, and they mostly said that a prestigious degree only helps out with the first few jobs (though they said that no degree at all is a slight to moderate negative). I'm not sure how accurate their perceptions are, and I think the tech industry might also be unique in caring less about prestigious credentials.

These programmers also said that a prestigious degree does help significantly in other areas, like finance and law.

What areas has your Stanford degree helped you in?

"I talked to several programmers, and they mostly said that a prestigious degree only helps out with the first few jobs"

Any degree helps out with the first few jobs. A prestigious degree is for life man. Would that I lived in a state with a top-tier CS school in a good location. I'm doing fine, don't get me wrong, but a Stanford or MIT or Carnegie Melon degree is worth so much more.

When many people hear you have a degree from a prestigious school, they automatically assume you're smart and talented and right about whatever you're talking about, even if it's unrelated to your degree. This is a general effect that goes far beyond individual fields like science or law. Just being aware of your school will cause many people to unconsciously defer to your opinions and automatically treat you like their social superior.

This effect is so pronounced, some people try to avoid saying where they went to school, instead saying things like 'I went to school in the Bay Area' or 'I went to school in Boston'. They find the automatic obseqious treatment they get awkward, so they only mention their school when they need to use it for something they want.

In practice, this general 'we automatically respect your opinions and assume you're right' effect makes getting all kinds of opportunities easier. Jobs, promotions, meetings with and mentorship from powerful people, etc. It can also help with petty bureaucrats, law enforcement, medical doctors - pretty much everywhere.

It doesn't surprise me that programmers say a prestigious degree doesn't matter - this is America, after all, and automatically treating someone as your better seems profoundly undemocratic. But saying you don't care about prestigious degrees is kind of like saying 'advertising doesn't work on me'. People who actually don't care about and react positively to prestigious degrees are very rare.

I'll add that I didn't know this effect existed when I was going to school - I just wanted to be a history professor! I only noticed it later, when I realized the game board of life was oddly slanted to favor me. But I bet your parents are very well aware of this, and that's why they want you to stay in your school.

Thanks for the informative response. Based on your experience with people from prestigious schools, do you think this automatic deference is justified?

Not really, no. A person with a degree from a prestigious school is likely to be smarter than a person selected at random from the population, sure. But that doesn't mean they should be deferred to in areas where they lack knowledge and experience, and never automatically.

That said, we all get to deal with the world as it is, not as it should be, and an Ivy degree is a pretty nice perk. It seems a shame to toss it away if there are other ways to deal with your depression.

My advice is to ignore thoughts about what you don't want to do.

Focus on thoughts about what you do want to do. Figure it out, what your idea of success is over the next 1-5 years (probably part of a plan of success for your lifetime). Measure success in your own terms, not those of your parents, peers, or anyone else.

Boil your 1-5 year down to some basic actions, and move to complete those actions.

It's not easy to ignore outside pressures, but I think it's important to make an attempt at being truly happy. Some people's measure of success might be to make their parents proud, and so they should follow a course that makes that happen.

If the idea of success over a year at a time is interesting, I recommend reading 18 Minutes by Peter Bregman. It's a very practical guide to this approach.

Does your family know why you took a gap year despite good academic performance? If they don't know the reasons or only have a vague notion of why you took a year off, it might be good to have one of those honest vulnerable conversations and make sure they understand both the situational issues and how it has impacted you emotionally.

I am a parent with a 19 year old at university. Despite my ambitions that she proceed full speed ahead, I know that I value her mental health more than a speedy completion of studies. You might find your parents more understanding than you imagine if they know all the details.

My parents are aware that I was depressed. I've also told them that I think dropping out would be the better choice for my mental health.

They disagree and seem to think that I don't have enough wisdom (I think this is what many Asian parents believe about twenty year olds).

They're not going to kick me out though if I drop out. And even if they do, I've saved 18k and have contracting work for at least the next year. I think I should be okay. I'm just asking for perspective and to see if I'm making any serious mistakes in my reasoning.

Most parents, not just Asian ones, believe this about 20 year olds. Unfortunately, they're right.

The problem is that parents/society tends to say to 20 year olds 'you just don't know, go ahead and do the conventional thing even if you don't feel good about it, you'll be glad later when it comes to getting a better job/finding a mate/buying your own home.' The benefits of a complete education seem so obvious to them that anyone who doesn't want one appears obtuse, so they don't make much effort to sell the notion, any more than you or I would seriously entertain a kid's stated willingness to be illiterate or innumerate.

If I could invent a time machine ('and if I had gone to college, maybe I could...' - nagging doubt like that hangs around :-) ), then I'd go back and tell my youthful self that there's a bunch of cool stuff I'm missing out on, even if if I have to go through a few false starts within the tertiary education system before finding the right path.

It's obviously not true that you can't get an education except by going to college, because any smart person can educate themselves to a great degree, and often at considerable speed. But proof of education is a valuable asset, and access to a large social network and intellectual depth in an environment devoted to rewarding your curiosity it a huge huge benefit.

What sort of things do you want to do in your life? Obviously it's nice too be financially independent and so on right now, but that's practical stuff. Look beyond your immediate needs, and assume for a minute that you'll probably be able to enjoy a pleasant lifestyle and reasonable financial security because you were lucky enough to get born where and when you did etc.. What would you like to work on that you can't possibly do right now, but could imagine doing one day? Astronaut? Tycoon? Philosopher? Dentist? (I presume some people must enjoy dentistry rather than just doing it because it pays well)

Give your imagination some time to operate. There must be something that you're interested in that would be an awful lot easier to achieve with an Ivy-league education. Don't be too quick to rule out wacky possibilities because they seem wacky. If you secretly dream of being Indiana Jones, then you'll need an archaeology degree. Never mind just now how many jobs there are for archaeologists, that's just a matter of competition which can come later. Likewise, programming as you're doing now is an excellent means of making a living and you could become $uper rich. The question is whether being a computer programmer is the most awesome and desirable thing you can imagine wanting to do with your life, or whether you're just doing it because it's cool and you're good at it.

I think the problem is that my parents seem to feel that college is a necessity for a good life, which I think I disagree with. There seem to be plenty of programmers without degrees.

The things I'm really interested in doing beyond practical needs don't require a college degree, and in some ways I think three years in the real world would be more valuable. I'm interested in entrepreneurship and non-fiction / fiction writing, and both of those seem to benefit heavily from real world experience.

Well, it helps. And don't make the mistake of thinking that college is not real life, just because it's curated. Think of it like an intellectual shopping mall :-)

See if there's a way that you can hang on to some option to return and finish your degree, even if you are away for a few years. It sounds like you are not interested in going back right now, but it would be good to have the option if you ever change your mind.

Whatever you decide to do, keep your options open.

Are you more motivated to conquer your depression or to sidestep the situation?

From an opportunity standpoint, this could be a chance to overcome a difficult personal challenge (depression) while also being able to do something many don't (go to university).

I hope that you find your answer.

Thanks for the advice. I'm not sure if I want to try and conquer my depression right now, but I'm definitely thinking about the choice ahead.

Oh, one more thing, spend an hour watching this: http://thisweekinstartups.com/thisweekin-startups/jerry-colo...

Jerry Colonna was at the top of the business world, partnered with Fred Wilson, and couldn't out run his depression. How he solved it isn't going to work for you, but he tells a wonderful story and really talks about what can be at the core of our desires.

Getting into an Ivy League program is pretty hard. Unless you're starting Microsoft or Facebook it seems like a wasted opportunity if you didn't follow through with it. It really opens up a lot of doors you wouldn't have without the degree, or even with a degree from a 2nd tier school.

I don't have any advice that's not been said, but wanted to wish you luck whatever path you take.

Thank you!

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