Captiosus
Shared on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 13:52One of my high school-era friends is getting married this Friday. Such an event always makes me stop and think about the past few years and, inevitably, I get rather downtrodden when I think about them. The thing I keep coming back to is 'Wow, life sure didn't turn out like I had hoped it would.' I know that probably sounds trite, and we all could probably say that, but sometimes I just wonder where things went horribly awry.
After High School, I had a very clear idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I was your typical Computer Geek, destined for a job in the Information Technology sector. And I ended up there, too. With a whole bevy of acronyms behind my name, I spent several years doing what I loved doing and getting paid decently for it. But everything started to unravel around 1998. In 1998, my medical problems began to appear. Nothing major, and I had insurance so I could afford to see doctors and what not. For a couple years, the problems were just a minor nuisance, but in 2000, the downward spiral went into full effect. The dot-com bubble had burst, my employer canned us all, hiring outsourced employees to maintain their systems and most of the tech sector here (other than ones contracted by the military) either went completely bust or moved out of the area.
I spent the next three years trying to find a job, any job, and kept getting repeatedly denied. Either I was "overqualified" for jobs like retail stocking or retail clerk, or I was "underqualified" for tech positions with the government or with government contractors. By then, however, three years without medical insurance and without access to any medications, my medical conditions, both physically and mentally, began to compound and get increasingly worse. But since I'm married and my wife works and gets child support, I failed to qualify for any social help (eg. Medicaid, Community Clinics, et cetera). Eventually these issues forced me to completely stop looking for work.
Which brings me to current day. I sit around the house playing house husband, hoping that a panic attack doesn't creep up and hit me out of the blue, and hoping that my stomach doesn't go haywire on me and keep me in the bathroom for most of the day. I feel useless, like I'm just wasting perfectly good oxygen. About the only things which have kept me sane have been my pets and my games.
So, I've decided I'm just going to send my friend a congratulatory card and a wedding gift, but I'm probably not going to his wedding.
I certainly wouldn't be in a very festive mood.
After High School, I had a very clear idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I was your typical Computer Geek, destined for a job in the Information Technology sector. And I ended up there, too. With a whole bevy of acronyms behind my name, I spent several years doing what I loved doing and getting paid decently for it. But everything started to unravel around 1998. In 1998, my medical problems began to appear. Nothing major, and I had insurance so I could afford to see doctors and what not. For a couple years, the problems were just a minor nuisance, but in 2000, the downward spiral went into full effect. The dot-com bubble had burst, my employer canned us all, hiring outsourced employees to maintain their systems and most of the tech sector here (other than ones contracted by the military) either went completely bust or moved out of the area.
I spent the next three years trying to find a job, any job, and kept getting repeatedly denied. Either I was "overqualified" for jobs like retail stocking or retail clerk, or I was "underqualified" for tech positions with the government or with government contractors. By then, however, three years without medical insurance and without access to any medications, my medical conditions, both physically and mentally, began to compound and get increasingly worse. But since I'm married and my wife works and gets child support, I failed to qualify for any social help (eg. Medicaid, Community Clinics, et cetera). Eventually these issues forced me to completely stop looking for work.
Which brings me to current day. I sit around the house playing house husband, hoping that a panic attack doesn't creep up and hit me out of the blue, and hoping that my stomach doesn't go haywire on me and keep me in the bathroom for most of the day. I feel useless, like I'm just wasting perfectly good oxygen. About the only things which have kept me sane have been my pets and my games.
So, I've decided I'm just going to send my friend a congratulatory card and a wedding gift, but I'm probably not going to his wedding.
I certainly wouldn't be in a very festive mood.
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Comments
Submitted by TDrag27 on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 13:56
Submitted by CapnHun on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 14:00
Submitted by siege912 on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 14:02
Submitted by whiskey_spraggs on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 14:04
Submitted by Slider1003 on Tue, 10/02/2007 - 15:12