Dropping Out of Law Saved My Life
TW // depression, suicidal ideation
The title of this might seem dramatic, but I promise you it’s not. Dropping out of law saved my life and is probably the best decision I’ve ever made.
I had been depressed for years or felt like I had, so it was no surprise when the psychiatrist said, “you have severe recurrent depressive disorder”. I thought to myself, “no fucking shit”.
My mum and my sister had suggested multiple times over the years that I change courses or schools, but I didn’t want to start over. I was like “what’s the point?” I can be stubborn, you see, because nobody wanted me to study law in the first place. You know how people encourage their children to study law? They tried to discourage me from studying it.
I insisted I wanted to study law because I foolishly felt like I was the defender of the universe and that I had to study law. Apart from the fear of starting over, I think that was another reason I carried on.
Anyone who goes or went to a federal university in Nigeria will tell you it’s the ghetto. And anyone who studied or is studying law will tell you the same thing. Imagine doing both. I was in the fucking ghetto. I stopped caring about getting good grades. I was okay as long as I didn’t have any carryover because I didn’t want anything to keep me there for longer than I needed to be.
In 2020, I was at home for most of the year because of the strike and COVID-19. I think that year made everything much harder and much worse. I was SICK and had completely lost interest in anything law related. I had no idea what I was going to do, so I couldn’t tell my mum I wasn’t going back to my university. I only told her that I had no plans of going to Law School, and she seemed okay with it.
Anyway, I finally went to the psychiatric hospital because I felt like I was losing my mind — more than I could deal with. It was the first semester of my fourth year studying law. I realised law wasn’t for me in my second year, but I decided to finish what I had started. And trust me, I tried to. I really tried.
It was a not-so-random Tuesday in April 2021. I was no stranger to suicidal ideation, but this was different. I was hanging on by whatever is thinner than a thread and was on the verge of deleting myself from existence a few days before this not-so-random Tuesday just so I could get out of studying law. That was when I decided that I needed help. Trying to off myself to avoid school was clearly not normal behaviour.
I sent a message to my siblings the day I wanted to unalive myself, and my brother called me almost immediately. I spent the whole time crying and saying I couldn’t continue. He calmed me down and said in the most authoritative voice ever that I wasn’t going to continue with that course. I was wondering how I was going to tell my parents, especially my dad, but my brother assured me that he was going to handle it.
I can’t remember whose idea it was for me to go to the hospital anymore, but the important thing is that I went. It took a few days because my roommate at the time wanted to go with me to make sure I was okay. Anyway, they asked me a million questions and the psychiatrist just kept writing, and I was wondering if my life was that insane. I should mention that all of this was like a week to first semester exams.
I called my mum later that day to tell her that I went to the psychiatric hospital earlier and that I had been put on anti-depressants. She told me to come home. I was like “but I have exams”. I didn’t really care about the exams, but I also didn’t want to go home. She asked if I was sure I could write them and that there’s always next year.
Fun facts:
- My mum had told me to take time off school before all of this happened.
- I “wrote” one exam and abandoned the rest.
So back to my mum asking if I was okay and me insisting I was. She came to my hostel that night and tried to take me home, but I refused to go. Exam week came, and I barely wrote one paper. Barely because I was half asleep and crying while scribbling Lord knows what on my answer sheet. I went straight to my course advisor’s office after I submitted my paper, and bawled my eyes out. Bro was like, “have you tried talking to Jesus?” and I almost started laughing. By the way, this man had no idea who I was before that day; I was just a strange unstable student crying in his office.
After the disaster that was that day, I simply stayed in my hostel and refused to write any other exams before finally going home on the last day and telling my mum I only wrote one exam and that I was going to fail it. She said it was okay.
I started the long process of trying to defer the session some weeks later. Long because my medical report from the psychiatric hospital was apparently not enough. I needed one from the school’s medical centre too. That meant I had to do my medicals to get a medical report even though I already had one. Yes, I just did my medicals in Year 4. I’m not the first.
When I finally got it, I submitted it with a letter asking to defer the session and my first medical report. I never followed up because I honestly didn’t give a shit. I had no plans of returning and only went through the stress of trying to defer the session because my mum said to.
It’s been a little over a year since I dropped out and started at a new school, and I haven’t felt this happy or normal since probably junior secondary school. I also got off my anti-depressants last month with the psychiatrist’s approval.
If you’ve been looking for a sign to start over or anything like that, this is it. You’re welcome.
