Feeling lost

LegacyUser

Don’t really know where to start with this, it’s a bit of a long one. Basically I’m just finishing my final year of college, and I feel completely lost, as if I’ve every choice I’ve made up to this point has been the wrong one. I know this is to be expected to some extent, but this doesn’t seem normal.

As some background, I started off in a different college, before transferring to my current one after first year. I moved in with a group of friends that I’d known from home, and for the first few months, I never really strayed beyond that friend group. In retrospect, I feel like transferring was a big mistake, as I came into second year knowing nobody in the course, when everyone else had already gotten to know each other and formed cliques. I’ve made some acquaintances since then, but I’ve never managed to shake the feeling of not fitting in. After the initial few months, I also began to drift apart from the friends from back home to an extent, which was sort of inevitable really.

So I found myself at the start of third year, still not really having settled into college. It isn’t to say that I had no friends, or didn’t go out or anything; as I tended to go out along with some of the friends from back home, and got on fairly well with their classmates etc. It’s just that I felt that I should be able to meet people under my own steam.

I made a conscious effort to get involved with clubs and socs, which was fine for a while, but it kind of felt like too little too late, as all of the other newcomers were first years, while the people in my year again all knew each other from the start, and were taking leadership roles in the club, whilst I was still seen as a beginner. Towards the end of third year I began to feel less and less comfortable with the clubs, and even the social aspects of it, and eventually drifted away from it.

Then came final year, which naturally had a fairly heavy workload, with projects and so on meaning I spent a lot of nights working in college until late in the evening. I began to realise however, that even at times when I had some time to myself, I no longer had any interests outside of college, and would waste all my free time at home, doing nothing in particular. I tried getting a gym membership, but I had little motivation to go, and ended up only using it a handful of times.

Over the last few months it’s dawned on me that I’ve essentially wasted my time in college, despite my best efforts to try and fix it along the way, and now it’s essentially over. I keep seeing others posting on Facebook how it’s been the best four years of their lives, and that they’ve made friends that they’ll have for life, but I honestly can’t say that about myself, and feel horrible about that.

The main point of the matter is that I can’t help but think that all of this could’ve been better if I had stayed at my original college, as I had made some friends there initially, and I was much more involved in clubs and other activities there. I feel so guilty and annoyed at myself for being so insistent on moving after first year, since the reasons I was unhappy there could’ve probably been resolved another way.

I had actually made plans to go traveling with some friends from the original college over the summer, which I thought might have given me some sense of resolution to all of this, and given me some perspective, but that has now fallen through as well, which I was fairly gutted about.

Since college is essentially over now I know I need to just put that chapter behind me, but the problem is that I feel completely unable to make any decisions about my future, as I feel that any major decisions I’ve made before have been wrong, and despite my best efforts, I keep messing up everything I try to do. I’m trying to decide on jobs for after college, but I feel and that whatever I decide to do, I’ll end up regretting it one way or another.

I have tried going the college counselor, have only had one session so far, but they seem to be focusing on social anxiety, which I suppose does play some role, but I think it is far from the main issue here. I am also running out of time to address this fully with the counselor, as I will be returning home in a few weeks.

Has anyone any similar experience, or any recommendations for where to go from here?

SarahMollie

Firstly, you got your qualification so therefore college was not wasted.

Yes, its a good opportunity to make friends, but its not the only chance you'll ever have.

Learn from this and next time you face a comparable decision, remember that the grass isnt always greener.