Apologies in advance for the wall of text/crazy, but I’d like to explain my situation fully.
I was one of those annoying kids in high school who almost never had to study and always made “A’s” on every test. Unfortunately, I wasn’t even interested in the opposite sex until I was fifteen, at which point most of my classmates had been dating and having sex for years. I went to a few parties, but never really enjoyed or “got” drinking and dancing. Combined with depression, being overweight, and reading science fiction and history books 24/7, it’s safe to say that I never learned much in the way of social skills.
Come graduation, I was heavily encouraged to follow in my father’s footsteps and become a doctor. To better my chances of entering med-school I enrolled in the honors program at a nearby college that had offered me a large scholarship. I was a bit hesitant about it, because there wasn’t an option to take regular college courses while you were in the program, instead being all honors classes or nothing. However, my family was ecstatic that I had been invited into a prestigious program, and urged me to take them up on the offer. Seeing as I was average at best in math and chemistry, I ended up flunking out of the program and enrolling in the regular college. While there, I did well academically but didn’t meet a single new person all semester. As my “friends” in the honors college started ignoring me once I had left the program, I was rather socially isolated and miserable. After a semester of good grades, I convinced my parents to allow me to transfer to the state university.
Upon arrival, a leasing mixup had me placed in the only available room they had left, which was part of a unit with five senior and grad student frat boys. I tried being social and hanging out with them, but I felt awkward and severely out of place. I didn’t make any friends at that college either, and as I stressed out over my social failures my grades began to fall. In a bout of excellent timing, my depression began to worsen.
I started by staying in my room most of the time, and began avoiding contact with my roommates. I loathed all the happy and carefree seeming people I saw around me, and stopped going to class altogether. Eventually it got to the point that I would exit my room via a window and stay in the woods for days at a time to avoid running into other people. I found that taking incredible risks and killing things would distract me from the depression, but it never lasted long. I ended most of my days sitting on a riverbank with the barrel of a pistol in my mouth, but never worked up the courage to squeeze the trigger. I began going back to the city to wander back alleys in the ghetto, hoping someone would kill me, and at one point came close to attempting suicide by cop.
Knowing at this point that I was academically done for, I sneaked back into the apartment late one night and grabbed some possessions before driving to the family farm. On the way back, I felt like every tree and concrete barrier was calling my name. Mom and dad were rather shocked by my appearance and mental and initially tried to “reason me out” of my depression. They also revealed several close relatives whose existence had been hushed up after they had had committed suicide or otherwise gone bonkers, one being a fairly well-known serial killer. At that point my mother began crying, stating that she didn’t want me to end up the same way the my relatives had. While disappointed that I had deserted my classes, they scheduled an appointment with a psychiatrist. I started taking Pristiq and Buproprion, and while I no longer get suicidally depressed, I can’t say that I ever feel happy either.
Since then, I’ve spent a year working as a corrections officer. I’d like to try going to college again in May, but I’m worried that the same thing that has happened twice before will occur again. However, I’m socially isolated and bored stiff in this remote prison facility, and can’t get far in life without a degree. Plus, at least a college town would give me another chance at meeting people and making friends and relationships.
Is the third time the charm? Should I try attending college again?