Author: Tabor Hoatson, he/him
“Do you want to just go to the hospital right now?”
The words hung heavy in the air as I looked at my phone. It was 2016 and I was a sophomore in college; I had just called a mental health hotline for the first time in my life. I had yet to select a major and I was already falling behind my peers. In what would be one of the most consequential decisions of my academic career, I took a deep breath and said,
“…Yes.”
Today, I’m a PhD student in psychiatric epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. I am also a person living with treatment-refractory bipolar disorder. I’ve been hospitalized 9 times and most recently found success with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). I’ve been a student in higher education for over a decade, and during that time, I’ve taken 3 leaves of absence. Each of these leaves has been just as critical to my academic success as my coursework, and I’m here to tell you that if you need to take some time, you have at least one unwavering supporter in me.
During my time off in undergrad, I completed several outpatient programs, clarified my academic interests, switched medications in a lower stress environment, and got sober. Each of these things has been vital to my pursuant success, and I could not have done them while completing coursework.
Most recently, I knew that if I didn’t pause progress in my doctoral program, my performance would suffer, I would damage my relationships with my mentors, and—in full transparency—I may not have survived. Nothing is more important than my well-being, and in my case, taking care of my well-being was highly compatible with academic success on an extended timeline.
I know that I retained substantial privilege in my leave process. I had access to a safe, rent-free place to live outside of school, supportive advisors and family members, and a recovery community available to me 24 hours a day. These facts simplified things that would have made a difficult process far more challenging, and it is important to recognize that these differences in my may limit the usefulness of my experience as a general example. However, each time I took leave, I had to wrestle with another set of problems that will be familiar to anyone in this position—unknown logistics, non-affirming professional environments, loss of income and health insurance, and worst, the fear of never returning to my passion.
Taking care of my health and investing in my recovery saved my life, without which I would be incapable of pursuing even the smallest of my goals. This is why I volunteered to support CRC in creating a service to support people like me, who might not know how to take a next step toward achieving the goals that we put on hold while weathering the storm. If you or a loved one is considering pausing your education or leaving entirely, please reach out to the dedicated team at the Cole Resource Center and ask about BRIDGE Forward. We know what it’s like, and we’re here to help. Life after leave is possible.