| First of all, wow, you’re an amazing human being. You’re going to go far in this life because of your courage and determination. Secondly, I encourage you to be intentional with your words. You have post-concussion syndrome, a temporary condition caused by an injury. I’d get away from calling yourself “brain damaged”. This choice of wording is subtle but can make the difference between developing a mindset that will allow you to overcome this, and a mindset that will hold you back long after your injury otherwise would. Don’t worry about the prestigious school. You have something far more valuable which is character and an interesting life story. Now the last thing may be the most challenging. And that is to take this time to learn to love yourself, deep and hard. I mean for f**’s sake you had a traumatic brain injury and all you’re thinking about is how to keep working at full capacity! Imagine that you were someone that you loved and were responsible for; say you were your own child. What would your priorities be? Ultimately you may need to take a lot of time to recover from this. Love yourself enough to do so without guilt or shame. The education system will still be there when you’re healed. The tech industry definitely will stick around, blissfully unaware of you. And that’s OK because you’re a HUMAN BEING who is A LOT more valuable than anything you can put on your LinkedIn. Understand what you are capable of and continue to show yourself respect and dignity. If you end up making sandwiches to pay the bills for a while, don’t let that become your identity. Tell yourself “I am a computer science student who is temporarily making sandwiches to pay my bills, while I recover from the injury I got helping my friend”. Manage this story relentlessly in your head and don’t doubt yourself for a moment. Good luck with finishing high school (or whatever it’s called over there). Pulling off a graduation under your circumstances will be incredible. But also, you may heal substantially between now and then. |
I plan to take as much time as I need between A levels (high school) and uni. I've got the summer break coming up, and I might take it a bit early, so I should get a short (6 weeks, 9 if I stop now) break to heal. A levels take 2 years, so I'm at the halfway point now.