This is just a rant... (depressed, mom, husband, college)

[krmb]

I'm really depressed and somewhat discouraged because I can't find work like the other 20-somethings in the area. I almost have a master's degree in Education. I'm set to graduate in only a few weeks, but I have not held a decent job in quite a few years. I'm hard-working when it comes to school work, but my attention jumps from thing to thing, and it's very hard for me to focus on and stick with a goal. I can do school work, because the tasks I need to do are broken into smaller parts, but the real world doesn't work that way, and the challenges I face sometimes overwhelm me. I have very low confidence, too, because I'm working only for survival wages right now. It's enough to pay my rent and utilities and buy gas, but that is about it. It's not enough for me to even think about paying my student loans or a recent hospital bill or any of my other debts. I was raised in a family that valued hard work, and my mom and dad were never without a good a jobs. I just can't seem to cut it, though. Employers in the past have gotten very impatient with me, and I haven't been exposed to any real opportunities for advancement. I'm interested in running my own business, like my parents did, but I don't know how to get started, and I have so little confidence that anything will turn out right that I don't really even feel like trying. I feel like I learned very little in college about actually teaching. I'm a little angry with myself. I had this great opportunity to make something out of myself, and I blew it. I should have stuck with math or science and really done something useful. As it stands, I'm in a flood of debt with my worthless little liberal arts education degree. Had I been given all of the money I borrowed upfront and been able to invest it in something, I would have probably done pretty well.

I also have no social life to speak of, partially because I hang out with people who are at least thirty years older than me, and I listen to what they tell me to do. It's like I feel guilty when I don't take their advice, even though I don't think a lot of it has helped me much in the real world. I'm tired of this. I would like to get away from these suggestions and all of this condemnation and start to actually think for myself. Most of these people aren't close family, after all, so why do I listen to them? Why do I insist on making myself feel so guilty about what I haven't accomplished and why that might be? Why do I continue to stay in a place and around people who may not be interested in advancing? I have one relative who cries about losing her husband all of the time. I don't know what that feels like, but I can't do anything. I have a life, too, even though I haven't lived it. I need to get out, but I don't think I can afford to.

[HighFlyingBird]

I'm really sorry you are feeling so stuck. I hope things turn around for you soon. None the less, congrats on the degree.

[RP2C]

"I had this great opportunity to make something out of myself, and I blew it." In your 20's, you have opportunity and a new degree ahead of you. You mention your family (parents?) appreciating hard work, but not your employers. You mention your parents running a business, but doubt your abilities to do the same. These older "surrogate parents" you look to for affirmation are not your parents, but rather people of an age when they are perhaps mulling there own regrets and lost opportunities. Do not let them project their skewed views (however well-intentioned) onto your future. Break those parental bonds (in whatever form) and forge your own life. Perhaps you do not need external approval/validation at this juncture of your life as you did when you were growing up - employer approval will come with results wrought by your own hands and mind. Good luck!