Continuing on with my back to school journey, getting there. I was elated to learn that my application for student loan was approved. This is money I thought would not only pay for my tuition, but also sustain me through the year of full-time studies. However, I would be in for a rude awakening. I guess I live in a bubble, thinking the sum would be just enough that I can continue on with my life, as it is, as I attend classes.
The loan would be $27k and my tuition is $19.3k leaving me with $7.7k to live on. Even with the money I squirrelled away over the recent years, this would still not be enough.
By my calculations, living a basic meagre life, living on cheap processed foods, not going out, limiting driving for gas and parking sake; and removing my beautification upkeep of hair dying, waxes, and eyelash extensions, I would still be looking at around $2.5k worth of fees a month. Which means I would need $25k for the year. The math did not add up.
I even called the student loan organization to confirm that the monies awarded would and does include the tuition fee. According to the website, I am to lean on family members for financial support or to take a loan and work part time if needed to supplement.
However, speaking with the student counsellor for Vancouver College of Counsellor Training, the class is intended to be full-time and that it will be intense. Four hours of in class learning followed by two hours of at home reading, plus the need to decompress as the topics and the experiential work does get mentally taxing.
One would think the easiest option would be to move back home with my parents, who did offer. My mom suggested that I do so for the year, where I would not need to pay for rent, internet, hydro, and even little for gas and parking as she is retiring and prepared to drive me to and from school Monday to Friday.
However, here’s the hitch this is not the first time I’ve been in the situation, so given the track record, I was even more reluctant to accept such a generous offer. The reality is I ran away from home in my early 20’s not completing my university degree as a result. All of my childhood I felt suffocated, like an oddball as my family just didn’t seem to understand me. It wasn’t until I regularly attended counselling sessions did I learn that this is because we are completely different people. Where is I am an empath and highly sensitive, mothers autistic and finds it difficult to connect. She loves me, but not in the way I need. After two years of counseling, and not being able to break through to her, specifically the concept of validation, we have decided to keep our relationship on the surface level. She helps me when she can, messages me good night, and surprises me with home-cooked meals and garden grown vegetables, as well as groceries whenever she can. Ever since our “break up“ this function is fine for me. However, I will always carry a chip on my shoulder as a little girl growing up unloved and constantly seeking her approval and affection. Although the adult version now knows not to expect more, and deep down isn’t even sure if she really wants it anymore. This duality is the crux of my dilemma.
In actuality, it was so bad during my childhood, that I ran away from home. Over six years, they knew not where I was. I left with a handful of my belongings, and no money in my bank. I ended up living with my at the time, boyfriend, and his hoarder mother for a month; but that is a story for another day. Eventually, I found a place for myself and having to quit school worked two jobs to be able to stand myself under my own roof. It was a wild time in my life and I looked back at it with pride and also disbelief on how I survived. That too is a story for another day.
Eventually, my mother (father too, but I don’t really have much communication with him) and I reconciled. Although, I never trusted them with where I lived, keeping them at a distance, not wanting them to know too much about me. I ended up living with a different boyfriend, only to break up and was in need of a quick home. Here, I moved into the basement suite of the same home I grew up in.
This was short-lived, and upon my mother’s request, I caught up on life, including getting my drivers license and taking some post secondary classes. I enrolled in overlapping diplomas for Business Management and Human Resources Management at BCIT. However, I never completed the program because as soon as I could, I was on dating sites and setting up dates with men. I eventually met boyfriend number five, I failed to mention the others that came before, but yet again stories for another day.
We would court and date, and I found myself pressuring him to move in together so that I could escape the home I ran away from once before. So, in a repeating pattern, I cut my classes short and run away from home again. I cannot recall, but I do believe I didn’t give my parents much notice before I packed up my stuff and disappeared at my earliest convenience.
So now, in this position of going back to school yet again, and being offered to live in their house, yet again, I only fear history will repeat itself. They say the third time is the charm, but I do not want to test that theory. So, although generous of an offer and one that will set me up for much success after my schooling, my heart of hearts knows it is not sustainable. What seems like a short one year, feels like 52 weeks, which is 356 days, and is 8544 hours. I can continue, with the number feeling more and more daunting, despite it being all relative.
Just thinking about it a feeling of nausea watches over me and my stomach turns. My chest tightens and tears well up in my eyes. An unjustified panic to my support system, when they heard the story and feels the choice is obvious, but for me a life sentence and one that I don’t know if I can come out of alive.
On a lesser note, my life is pretty wonderful now. I love my home, it is my space. It is all mine as messy and as chaotic as my ADHD brain wants it to be. There is no judgement and I am free to be myself, so much so that I walk around naked 98% of the time.
My home also it is located within short distance of my gym. A routine that I have built into my life and one that I cherish as something I do 4 to 5 times a week. It is also a spitting distance away from my partner, so that I may be close to him and with him without living with him.
Another option could’ve been to live with him. However, he is undergoing a similar journey as myself, and I would not want to be a burden to that. As he tries to focus on his full-time career, and utilized his personal space as a studio. A smaller basement suite with barely enough room for himself, so a second body with just as much belongings would not fit. Nor would I want to put that strain onto our pretty great relationship. We are now at a point where we are aligned and don’t argue. I would not want to throw a wrench into that.
So now, my options are possibly taking out a loan with the bank or maybe one with a friend. However the latter would only ruin the dynamic I have with any friend. Plus, I don’t think I have one close enough for that, or one cared about me enough to be so generous. Although I would pay them back.
So realistically, the best option would be to find a part-time job. However, for fear of not being able to keep up with the coursework, as well as taking time away from my passion and hobby of blogging is a concern to me. I know sacrifices have to be made, but I can’t help but to insist on having my cake and eating it too
In the end I will leave it in the hands of God and go into this journey knowing this is where he wants me and what he wants of me.
