I've just finished my first year at university and... it was a turbulent time. I started off in a business major, but quickly lost interest, and so in between 1st and 2nd semester, after talking to a couple academic advisors, and my parents, decided to switch to a math specialist and econ major. In doing so, I forfeited a scholarship worth around 60k that I would've received in upper years, had I remained in the business program. The math spec + econ major costs a bit less, so the net loss is about 30k CAD, but is still a large sum. Luckily my father was willing to take that, saying that as long as I was actually passionate about the degree I chose, and worked hard to get the grades I needed.
Well, 2nd semester was really rough. I didn't have a great 1st semester as is, but during 2nd semester, I wasn't able to make any friends, and felt quite isolated and lonely (loneliness is something I've struggled with for most of high school too, and my parents always told me uni will be better). I also just lost a lot of motivation to go to class, and there were quite a few days were I skipped lectures. Even on some days when I went to lectures, it was really difficult to focus, and I just wasn't able to digest the content too well. I also ended up missing a lot of deadlines regarding homework and assignments, and so I lost a lot of points. And final exams didn't go so great. I was already finding it difficult to study, but I tried studying what I could. It didn't seem to be enough, and I struggled with the exams.
I unfortunately just didn't feel like there was anyone I could talk to about this. Because a couple times in the past when I've opened up about my feelings to my family, they get sidelined or downplayed. And I've been struggling with feeling like a burden on them sometimes. I also just was afraid of opening up to another person at all, so I didn't try to seek out any resources for mental health and such, despite them being available.
Right now, it's a couple weeks after exams ended for me, and I got results back for some of my classes, and I had a borderline panic attack. While I didn't explicitly fail the courses, I didn't meet the minimum grade requirement I needed for the programs I wanted to do from 2nd year onwards. I can't do the econ major. And I can't do the math specialist. I could maybe do the math major, but I'd still need one other major. Logically, there's 2 options. It's too late to take summer courses now, and I've already come back to my home country now. So that leaves me with either repeating those courses to try and get a higher grade, which would delay my graduation by 1 semester at least. Or I just pick another major and try and pass that within the next 3 years.
Everything feels like it's just going wrong. I haven't been able to make any new friends at university, while everyone in my family and extended family keeps asking about if I've made friends, and if I've gone out with friends and had fun. And people I know from high school seem to be doing well for themselves in other places from what I've seen of them on social media. On top of that, I chose myself to do the math and economics degree. And I did it knowing the financial cost. And now, I've massively messed this up for myself too. And I'm really afraid to have the conversation with my parents because... well, this is just me being a huge disappointment. I know that logically, it's not the end of the world. But it really does feel like it. And I just feel like a huge failure. I know I'll have to tell them somehow, and some time, but I don't know how. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to move forward.
PS: forgot to mention, but for most of my school life, my identity has been heavily tied to being smart and doing well in school, so not achieving even the bare minimum that I need feels like me failing myself completely as well, and it makes me feel kind of worthless