My life feels stagnant

[czarcasm]

Alright so to start things off..

 

I'm 19, I'll be 20 in August. I'm currently enrolled at my local community college and I have 49 credits as of right now. I'm technically considered a sophomore still because I'm behind on credits despite going into my third year here soon. I've managed to pull 6 C's so far throughout college and they've really damaged my GPA which is currently a 2.74. Not really sure why I got the C's..they were all in General Education courses that were probably the easiest courses I've taken. For example this past semester I passed Astronomy with an A but I got a C in Business..I found Business really boring and thought I'd easily pass with an A or B, but the lack of interest and minimum effort got me stuck with a C and I believe thats the case for every class I've received a C in other than my very first C, it was my second semester in college and it was my first large class that had lots of studying and I simply just didn't know what to expect. Half way through I got the hang of it and did well, but it wasn't enough to save my grade. So, on top of my embarrassing current GPA..I've struggled immensely with mathematics since the day it was first taught to me in grade school. I fell behind almost immediately and my teacher saw this. She never reached out to my parents or faculty, instead she pulled me aside during tests and gave me the answers. I didn't remember this till later on when nothing could be done about it, needless to say my parents were angry. This caused me to never learn the material while I was still young and overcoming it would've been much easier had I gotten the help I needed. So, each year I somehow dragged myself through each class. Math is a building topic, you apply what was learned before to what you learn in the future. I never had anything to build on, I knew nothing and so I always had C grades or worse. After years of finding tutors, being told it was a phase and it would eventually click here I am in college and I've attempted Intermediate Algebra TWICE, withdrawing both times to avoid an F on my transcript and GPA. At this point I was beyond frustrated, I refused to retake the course the following semester because I was losing my sanity, I needed a break from feeling like a complete idiot. I wanted one semester to myself where I could just succeed at my classes and not hate myself. I thought to myself and told my family, I can't sit here and say this will pass, something about this isn't normal, I'm struggling WAY too much. I started researching things and thought I may have a learning disability, some time went by and I brought it up to my parents who didn't do much with the information, they continued to brush it off and say I just needed to study harder and that I was lazy and had given up because of how long I've struggled. Partially true, but not entirely. Finally after I had withdrawn from the course the second time and met with my advisor, she asked if I experienced these math struggles recently. I told her no and that this had been going on forever, she suggested I contact the disability department and I did. I met with an advisor there and they said I should get testing done. After that, I called my mom in the middle of a mental breakdown because the reality of having to get tested and having a disability scared me and I was of course, beyond fed up with my failure in math. At this point, my parents agreed to get testing done. I got my results back about 3 weeks ago, and I was diagnosed with a math specific learning disorder of moderate severity, so I got enrolled in the disability department and once I sign up for the class again, I'll be assigned a personal tutor who will meet with me everyday after class to review that days lesson for as long as I need, apply specific study/learning skills with me recommended by my psychologist and provide me with extra time on exams, assignments, etc. Great, I'm finally happy I have an answer as to why I've been struggling so much my entire life, that's some weight off of my shoulders. Here's my next issue..on a third retake attempt, you have to may 4 times the amount (approx $1200) to take the class. I'm already on full financial aid, I can't afford that. I have the option of trying to get the charge dropped by filling out a petition w/ a reason to the Dean, but from what I read it seems you need severe circumstances like a family death, illness/injury, etc. My reasoning would be my disability. I took this class twice with an underlying disability that nobody knew about. I put in effort, I watched videos online and did examples, I got tutored my a friend who is great at math but none of it was sticking. I went through the course trying to pass like I was everyone else, when I wasn't. I wasn't getting the extra help I needed, because nobody, including me, knew of my disability. Now that I do, I can resources to utilize that I didn't before. An argument they could bring up is its my fault for not taking action earlier on and trying to figure out why I was struggling but I did try that, and my family brushed me off. I'm 19 and a full time student, I didn't have $1000+ to drop on psychological testing, so if my family refuse, I had no options. If they decline my petition, I'll have to take time off from school working to make the money to pay for the class and I'm already so behind and going to take an extra year to graduate probably, I cannot afford to wait any longer to get this class over with.

 

Basically, I'm feeling like my life is a wreck. I have potential but I never seem to reach it, thats my academic career through-out my life summed up. I'm stuck here with a crap GPA that I don't even know can be raised to anything good even with effort..and I've yet to even transfer to the school I want. How will I get in anywhere with this GPA? What if I can't take this class next semester? Everything is just crumbling down around me like it wasn't already horribly stressful before, now it's awful. I'm losing hope and I'm fed up with it all. I feel like I just wasn't met to get anywhere in life and personally, a good college career = a good life. So far, I don't have the first so why would I get the second. I'm not seeing the point anymore.

[RainyCoast]

Some people have difficulty reading condensed blocks of text without paragraphs, for reasons of age or neurological ones. a smaller font size makes it that much more difficult. if you are not past your editing time, perhaps you can change that to get more replies.

 

tl, dr

 

learning disability, math specific. has gotten tutoring. struggles with a subject, has to take the exam several times. the third attempt at the exam costs more than she can afford.

 

worries about her GPA affecting her future.

[czarcasm]

I didn't change the font size, I changed the font because I didn't want the post length being ridiculously long, but I didn't realize it would condense it so much

 

Heres my post again: Alright so to start things off..

 

I'm 19, I'll be 20 in August. I'm currently enrolled at my local community college and I have 49 credits as of right now. I'm technically considered a sophomore still because I'm behind on credits despite going into my third year here soon. I've managed to pull 6 C's so far throughout college and they've really damaged my GPA which is currently a 2.74. Not really sure why I got the C's..they were all in General Education courses that were probably the easiest courses I've taken. For example this past semester I passed Astronomy with an A but I got a C in Business..I found Business really boring and thought I'd easily pass with an A or B, but the lack of interest and minimum effort got me stuck with a C and I believe thats the case for every class I've received a C in other than my very first C, it was my second semester in college and it was my first large class that had lots of studying and I simply just didn't know what to expect. Half way through I got the hang of it and did well, but it wasn't enough to save my grade.

 

So, on top of my embarrassing current GPA..I've struggled immensely with mathematics since the day it was first taught to me in grade school. I fell behind almost immediately and my teacher saw this. She never reached out to my parents or faculty, instead she pulled me aside during tests and gave me the answers. I didn't remember this till later on when nothing could be done about it, needless to say my parents were angry. This caused me to never learn the material while I was still young and overcoming it would've been much easier had I gotten the help I needed. So, each year I somehow dragged myself through each class. Math is a building topic, you apply what was learned before to what you learn in the future. I never had anything to build on, I knew nothing and so I always had C grades or worse. After years of finding tutors, being told it was a phase and it would eventually click here I am in college and I've attempted Intermediate Algebra TWICE, withdrawing both times to avoid an F on my transcript and GPA. At this point I was beyond frustrated, I refused to retake the course the following semester because I was losing my sanity, I needed a break from feeling like a complete idiot. I wanted one semester to myself where I could just succeed at my classes and not hate myself.

 

I thought to myself and told my family, I can't sit here and say this will pass, something about this isn't normal, I'm struggling WAY too much. I started researching things and thought I may have a learning disability, some time went by and I brought it up to my parents who didn't do much with the information, they continued to brush it off and say I just needed to study harder and that I was lazy and had given up because of how long I've struggled. Partially true, but not entirely. Finally after I had withdrawn from the course the second time and met with my advisor, she asked if I experienced these math struggles recently. I told her no and that this had been going on forever, she suggested I contact the disability department and I did. I met with an advisor there and they said I should get testing done. After that, I called my mom in the middle of a mental breakdown because the reality of having to get tested and having a disability scared me and I was of course, beyond fed up with my failure in math. At this point, my parents agreed to get testing done. I got my results back about 3 weeks ago, and I was diagnosed with a math specific learning disorder of moderate severity, so I got enrolled in the disability department and once I sign up for the class again, I'll be assigned a personal tutor who will meet with me everyday after class to review that days lesson for as long as I need, apply specific study/learning skills with me recommended by my psychologist and provide me with extra time on exams, assignments, etc.

 

Great, I'm finally happy I have an answer as to why I've been struggling so much my entire life, that's some weight off of my shoulders. Here's my next issue..on a third retake attempt, you have to may 4 times the amount (approx $1200) to take the class. I'm already on full financial aid, I can't afford that. I have the option of trying to get the charge dropped by filling out a petition w/ a reason to the Dean, but from what I read it seems you need severe circumstances like a family death, illness/injury, etc. My reasoning would be my disability. I took this class twice with an underlying disability that nobody knew about. I put in effort, I watched videos online and did examples, I got tutored my a friend who is great at math but none of it was sticking. I went through the course trying to pass like I was everyone else, when I wasn't. I wasn't getting the extra help I needed, because nobody, including me, knew of my disability. Now that I do, I can resources to utilize that I didn't before. An argument they could bring up is its my fault for not taking action earlier on and trying to figure out why I was struggling but I did try that, and my family brushed me off. I'm 19 and a full time student, I didn't have $1000+ to drop on psychological testing, so if my family refuse, I had no options. If they decline my petition, I'll have to take time off from school working to make the money to pay for the class and I'm already so behind and going to take an extra year to graduate probably, I cannot afford to wait any longer to get this class over with.

 

Basically, I'm feeling like my life is a wreck. I have potential but I never seem to reach it, thats my academic career through-out my life summed up. I'm stuck here with a crap GPA that I don't even know can be raised to anything good even with effort..and I've yet to even transfer to the school I want. How will I get in anywhere with this GPA? What if I can't take this class next semester? Everything is just crumbling down around me like it wasn't already horribly stressful before, now it's awful. I'm losing hope and I'm fed up with it all. I feel like I just wasn't met to get anywhere in life and personally, a good college career = a good life. So far, I don't have the first so why would I get the second. I'm not seeing the point anymore.

[chitown9]

Your severe circumstances would be that your disability was not discovered until just recently. I would enclose documentation for this. I seriously doubt that it will be questioned as to why it was not discovered earlier. It was simply discovered when it was discovered. Do don't even mention that or try to justify that because there is no need. I think that your reason for "severe circumstances" is without question a valid one. It just is not a typical one such as a death in the family. I would be shocked if it was not accepted to get fees waives for the reason that you have recourse if they deny you due to your disability you are now receiving in the form of tutoring etc. and how it has helped you.

 

Most of your anxiety is due to what will happen if your appeal fails, so don't entertain thoughts about how you will pay if it fails. It will not fail. chi

[Jibralta]

I'm glad you found the root of your problem, and that you are doing better in math. I don't know where you are in the world or what the rules are there, but I wouldn't worry so much about the retake fee if its negotiable based on the reason that you are retaking the class. You can prove that you had a learning disability that you did eventually identify and address. When the disability was addressed isn't as important as the fact that it was addressed. It's generally understood that people com from different circumstances with different resources at their disposal.