this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2023
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I feel like you watched me grow up. For a long time I was smart enough to pick things up naturally, I was even offered to skip grades.
Then the math got complicated and I didn't know how to learn it. I went from being the smart kid to being the stupid one in remedial math. Being smart was all I had at that point, so when I "lost" that, I lost everything in my eyes. I was stupid and I was never going to be anything because of it.
I ended up getting my GED as an adult and I now have a promising career in insurance- so I didn't really lose everything, but when I was 15 it sure felt like I had.
More or less the same, except I ran out of steam somewhere in the calc 2 to calc 3 area...so instead of becoming an engineer, I became someone who works for them.
In some ways it ain't bad. I'm "skilled technical staff" whose work makes my position "salary non-exempt", which means that at most companies/employers, my work gets guaranteed salary pay, but if I am asked to go over 40h in any given week, they're legally obligated to pay me 1.5x OT pay.
I am crossing this divide now. I have secondary education but no university and I am working to get to med school now (In Finland it is a combined undergrad and med school). I think I can do it but I don't really know how to study. I know how to learn but learning in schedule is the issue. I was too ill to go to university when I should have and I could have gone to easier courses I could have gone to without an entrance exam and done OK but I always wanted medicine. Or well, I not easier but easier to get into like maths. After I got better I ended up in aid work, and stopping that is really hard. But I still want to become a doctor so I am trying now in my thirties. Having what looks like undiagnosed ADHD that is now under investigation and crappy childhood might explain part of why I never became what people felt I should have but the fact that I never had to learn to study because I didn't need to get through is up there.
I try to remember that our education does not mean anything for our value, but it seems hard when it comes to you.