Three Students Reflect on Medical Leave
In this post from our archive, three students reflect on their time on medical leave. Although each story is individual to its author's experience, a recurring theme is the unexpected and difficult decision to take a medical leave, yet the ultimate value and gratitude in taking time to recover and reflect.
Hospitalization and Healing
"I went on leave almost entirely unwillingly. I did not want to admit that there was anything wrong. Was I unhappy? Sure. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t handle everything. I had already been diagnosed with psychiatric problems and was on medication to help me, but I wasn’t really getting any better. Every day, when I knew my roommate wouldn’t be around, I hid in my bed from the world, crying for hours on end. I still made it to all my classes, though, and that’s what I thought mattered the most. Because of my difficulties, I had to drop a course and went on a reduced course load. I thought I would be okay; I was already seeing a psychiatrist and therapist on a weekly basis. But everything kept piling up, and I became more and more miserable by the day.
All of this ended up with me getting hospitalized in the middle of my first semester here. I was still determined to come back to school, even after I had missed a month of school. It didn’t matter how long it was, I knew I could come back. Now, I know just how wrong I was. Maybe I would have been able to get by, but I would have been miserable. That’s not how college is supposed to be; it’s supposed to be the time of your life. If the dean hadn’t practically forced the leave on me, I can only imagine what my freshman year, let alone the rest of college, would have been like.
My leave wasn’t what you would call ideal. I spent the majority of it going in and out of hospitals for psychological reasons. A few months after I took leave, I was hospitalized yet again in-patient for five weeks due to suicidal ideations and remained in partial hospitalization for sixteen weeks to continue intensive treatment. The number of diagnoses I received were incomprehensible: panic disorder, general anxiety disorder, major depression, PTSD, PMDD...the list goes on. When people ask me what I did during my leave, they assume that I travelled the world or was searching for the cure for cancer. In reality, I worked at a law firm as a law clerk, I volunteered at a daycare, and most importantly, I went to therapy at least three times a week. I spent the entire leave trying to fix what seemed irreparable: my mental health.
My break was the best thing that could have happened to me. I can’t imagine where I would be if I hadn’t taken it. I am now so much stronger and believe in myself so much more. It gave me the opportunity to make amends and bridge new relationships with my family and friends that I had hurt in the past. I know how difficult it was for my family to watch me going in and out of hospitals and feeling entirely useless. If anything, it was even more painful for me to watch the fear in their eyes. But during my time off, we worked together to get a better understanding of each other, and my relationship with my parents is stronger than I could have ever imagined.
I am not saying that I came back to Brown perfect. I was, and still am, far from it. But so much had changed; at the time of the leave, I had felt like a failure. Now, I know that it took courage to admit that I needed time, and that that need is nothing to be ashamed of. It also meant that I was okay as me, and that I didn’t have to be perfect in order to get by. I’m proud that I left. It means that I can truly experience Brown at its fullest and be thankful for every amazing moment I have here.”
The Need for Time: Ongoing Recovery from Chronic Pain
"Taking leave wasn’t in my plans. The summer before my junior year, I got very sick—suddenly, overnight, and seriously. I spent August going from doctor to doctor, searching for a diagnosis and treatment. Ultimately, months later, my doctors would decide that I had a chronic pain syndrome. All I knew was that any time I tried to use my body, I was in tremendous pain. My ability to function had been almost completely destroyed overnight.
Despite this, I came back to school my junior year. I struggled through two classes, highly medicated, but spent most of my time in bed. My friends were incredibly supportive ,but I felt terribly alone. Everyone else seemed so healthy and happy in comparison to me. I wasn’t able to have a social life or do anything I was used to. Every single day was a struggle. By the end of the semester, I knew I needed a break.
I spent nine months at home taking care of myself. My health slowly inched forwards as I found pain meds that worked. I kept myself as busy as I was able to—auditing classes at a local college, taking an art class and a meditation class, and helping at a preschool. Mostly, though, I spent more time in bed than I’d like to admit. I continued to visit countless doctors, shift my medications, and search for a way to get my health back to normal. It wasn’t an ideal way to spend a semester, and certainly not what I’d planned for myself, but it was necessary. It gave me time for my health to improve enough that I would be able to function at Brown.
Taking leave was definitely the right thing for me to do. When I came back in the fall, I was able to take four classes that I absolutely loved. I could see my friends again and actually enjoy being at Brown. It had costs—my class graduated without me. It also meant admitting that something was wrong. But it was worth it. Leave wasn’t a magical cure, but my health continued to slowly improve and the extra time was key for that recovery. What’s more, after my leave I was much better prepared to handle the stress of being sick while at college. I’m glad I took leave.”
Not a Tidy Narrative: Slowing Down, TV Watching, and Contemplation
“I went on medical leave last spring in the middle of what would have been my last semester at Brown. To be honest, during the first few months I mostly slept and went to doctor’s appointments. I watched a lot of TV. I started with the first season of The X-Files, which was on in the afternoons when school was still in session. I had more energy when the summer started and I went on a few trips in the mountains of Colorado. I watched Hoarders and every season of House. When the fall semester started, I took a watercolor class at a community college where I live. There have been a lot of moments then (and now, actually) when I’ve been slightly embarrassed about how I spent my time on leave, since I imagine that so many of the stories from people who did the same are exciting and full of valuable things like traveling and working and making important things. I watched TV, I read what I wanted to read, and I thought a lot about the reasons I was where I was, physically and psychologically.
After talking to some other leavetakers, I think there’s at least a good chunk of people who do similar things when they take a break from Brown. We’re probably less likely to talk about it when people ask for details, though. Most of what happened when I was gone — the things I’m telling here and the things I’m keeping to myself—can’t really be distilled into a tidy narrative because they mostly took place in my head. When I couldn’t define myself by what I was achieving, I had to examine the ways I’d been justifying my decisions about annoyingly broad life-stuff, like what I was going to do in the future and how I had been interacting with people. I’m glad I took time off; it was an agonizing decision to make at first, but I realize now that it was both completely necessary and a strangely remarkable period of contemplation. It was an unhurried, reflective, sometimes heartbreaking, but mostly happy and lovely nine-and-a-half months that I’ll hold onto for a long time.”