A Dead End

I had my meeting with the admissions office who told me I'd better find a way to get Syracuse to agree that I withdrew from the semester or else I won't be attending college next semester. I won't be able to get any financial aid if I am not in a degree program which means I can't afford to go to college. My father says he will help me deal with them when he gets back from Florida this week, but its been a pretty frustrating time for me.
I have had trouble getting out of bed in the morning because I feel like this is all a big waste of time. Why do they make it so hard for people to change their lives? I feel like I would be better off sitting on my ass collecting welfare and living in a section 8 apartment than truly trying to be an asset to the world by bettering myself through education.
I feel like there should be someone out there who can help me figure out a way out of this mess, but I haven't found it yet. Not even after I had a meltdown in the admissions office last week. To make matters even worse the kids have been sick (I'll discuss that in another blog).
Like my Nana says all I can do at this point is pray!

Transcript held hostage by SU is preventing my admission to a degree program at UMB

Thursday I have a meeting with the admissions office to deal with a problem that has been slowly eating the lining of my stomach away all semester. I am finally dealing with a crisis that first reared its ugly head last July when my loan consolidation was approved and my loans were finally taken out of default. All holds were supposed to then be lifted so that I could have copies of my transcripts sent to UMB and they could decide whether they were going to admit me. I should have known that nothing in my life could ever be that simple.

Especially given that UMB is now the third university that I have attended. After graduating highschool in 1996, I attended two full years of college, four semesters that earned me 54 credits. My freshman year was at Syracuse University and sophomore year was at Boston College. I made several attempts to return to school between 1998 and 2000, but severe clinical depression forced me to withdraw four to six weeks into the semester.


I carried those failed attempts with me like a backpack full of bricks. Throughout the eight years I was out of school completely, I regularly had the same nightmare. In the dream I would beg, borrow and steal my way back into college and once I got there I would be unable to leave my bed or I would suddenly come into a class that was about to take a final exam on a subject I knew nothing about. I also would get progressively older, and be laughed at by students that just kept getting ridiculously younger. Usually I am a coward, but in pursuit of a better future for my children I walked through my fear and trauma and began a two year long process to straighten out financial circumstances so I could come back to school.


When I got the letter from the loan consolodation company, I immediately drove to BC and got my transcript for the 1997-98 school year. I felt like dancing on air! I couldn't believe this might actually happen for me. The bubble burst later that afternoon when I learned that SU had not lifted the block on my account. After a few phone calls I was told that in addition to a $100 library fine, Student Debt Management was looking for $8,000 for a tuition bill from the fall of 2000. That year my ex boyfriend moved us out to Syracuse, New York with the proceeds from an overpayment from one of his own student loans. He did it "to make things up to me" since he had been the one who had persuaded me to leave my dream journalism school that I had earned a 4.0 at in my second semester, so I could be back in Boston near him. Unfortunately he was still the same control freak he had always been and I had had enough of it.

Unable to afford school on my own, I withdrew from my courses. SU, however, claims that I never actually withdrew, since I received a grade of C+ in one of my courses. The grade was from my writing professor who not only knew and liked me but was very sympathetic toward my situation. I am sure she thought she was doing me a "favor". SU will hold my transcript until I pay the total balance. I never took out any loans to pay my tuition since I thought I withdrew. Therefore the tuition can't be consolidated with my loans.

When I brought this issue to UMass Boston, I received mixed messages. First I was told they couldn't do anything for me without a transcript from every college I'd ever attended. When I was told that, I thought the hold on my transcript was awaiting slow paperwork. I called back after I knew I couldn't resolve the hold situation and was told to come down that day and register as a non-degree student. I enrolled in five courses, full time, the same as I would have otherwise, except I wasn't eligible for financial aid or to meet with a real advisor. I exhausted my father's savings and received limited one time funds from a state agency to pay per credit for the fall semester.

The counselor who registered me in August told me to successfully complete 12 credits so I could be admitted without a transcript. She also said that without the SU transcript I would obviously lose those credits but that I could still get credits for the courses I took at BC.


It doesn't really matter to me at this point I will do anything to finish school. The courses I took my freshman year at SU were lame anyway and so long ago that I wouldn't really feel like I was repeating anything. The stomach aches didn't start until I spoke with a college loan counselor I had been working with who believes its against either academic policy or the law for students to be admitted without transcripts from every institution they have attended. He urged me to obtain written confirmation of my admission pending the 12 credits.


Along with the washing of my kitchen floor, I have delayed doing so until now. No matter what happens I am sure that I won't regret this semester even if it is my last. Although I really hope its not. I will be devastated if they don't admit me to a degree program.


I spent the weekend researching online and found some legal articles where former students have unsuccessfully sued the universities that held their transcripts. I learned that I have a decent chance to discharge the debt by declaring bankruptcy since its a tuition debt owed to the school and not an educational loan. Federal laws make it next to impossible to erase student loans either federal or private through bankruptcy.


The happiest news came from an article that appeared in The Boston Globe "Colleges Playing Tough on Debt" http://http//www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2006/11/19/colleges_playing_tough_on_debt/


The article quoted a single mother in basically the same situation as I am. BU was taking her to court to attach her wages in addition to holding her transcript. At the time of the article she was attending UMass Lowell and complaining that without her transcript she was being forced to take the same courses for which she had paid and taken at BU. Rather than commiserating, I felt relief when I heard her complaint. Just let me in, that's all I want!


I am sure that if I am admitted I will eventually be bitching too, but hopefully I will look back at this blog and remember why I should instead be grateful! I will be keeping my fingers crossed for Thursday's meeting, and prepared to dish out my very saddest single mother sob story if need be.


I wish this system was easier and better supported single mothers getting college degrees. My experience has been anything but simple. I would love to hear about your experiences in your comments.

What's for Dinner? Besides Pizza!

In the coming weeks I hope to post some quick, convenient recipes. Its so hard not to give in to the tempation to order a pizza or another even less nutritious option when you are exausted and still have four hours of homework to do after you get the kids into bed. I have more Happy Meal toys in my house than clean socks.

If you have a recipe you would like to share, please do. My son will not eat anything except pizza and chicken nuggets so its even more difficult for me to find the strength to make a meal that he will certainly refuse to eat. My daughter on the other hand, will eat anything so its getting easier. Mr.Stubborn however eats cereal on those nights. So if you have any suggestions for picky eaters then let me have those too!

Tabitha Learns how to Walk

At just shy of fourteen months and motivated by her brother stealing her spoon Tabitha took her first steps. And it didn't happen at daycare!

She sat up two months later than average and seems to do everything in her own time. I predicted that she would walk around November 7th. Since she is still just taking a few steps here and there, maybe thats when she will make it her primary method of getting around. I know she isn't delayed though because the things that interest her she does right away. She held her own bottle at four months old and said Mama at about ten months. Patrick didn't say mama regularly until he was about sixteen months, and he never learned to crawl as well as she can.

Happy Halloween

So I somehow managed to survive a very difficult week. I literally made my self sick trying to edit my Chaucer paper. Even after I went to the academic support center for help revising it. I stayed up all night Monday and rendered myself useless on Tuesday and never fully recovered for the rest of the week. Friday I had an exam on Latin word roots that I would have done much better on had I not spent so much time trying to write the Chaucer paper.

I don't think professors should give exams on Halloween day. It isn't fair to parents. I had a breakdown at BJs Whosesale Club on Thursday night after the cashier refused to look up my card number without my license.

She sent me to the service desk where I burst into tears and told him that my little girl wasn't going to have a Halloween costume because of my disorganization. Fortunately, the customer service manager took a pity on me and looked it up anyway. I really don't see what the big deal was since I had three other forms of photo identification.

Halloween was a success as far as I am concerned. Patrick was a happy camper and we went back to Charlestown where we got to see some old friends. We brought my aunt who lives in the neighborhood but had never seen how everyone really gets into things around there.

Patrick dressed up like one of the Incredibles from the Disney movie. This is one of the houses near the Bunkerhill Monument. The decorations were unbelievable.

Depressing Day on Campus

Today was one of those days, I wish I could revise! I had a major project due for the play writing class that I am taking, we had to turn in a draft of a ten minute play. This weekend I had huge plans to get "caught up," whatever that means, and as usual I was out of commission most of the weekend. I don't even drink, so if that is where your mind is going turn that car back around. I push myself so hard all week long and then when we get to the weekend, I am completely useless. All I can do is lay on the bed or couch and take basic care of my children. In other words they have everything they want and need, but there is no housework and the apartment now looks as if it had been raided. To be specific there are toys everywhere, groceries nowhere and dirty diapers anywhere that I can't smell them.
This weekend in fact, I was so wiped out that I let my 13 month old daughter eat cookies on my bed. Damage control: I took everything off the bed except the white sheets, that I can bleach anything out of and let her make a serious mess. During which I was able to sleep for an extra thirty-five whole minutes.

Anyway, I had some kind of mini-breakdown/anxiety attack while I was writing my play. The same thing happened two weeks ago when I wrote my first Literature paper on Chaucer. I began to scrutinize every word so closely that I can't put the whole thing together the way that I need to. The result is a literary nightmare.
Tomorrow, when I see my therapist I plan to bring this up. It all stems from the reason I originally left school when I was 19. There was a literary professor at BC who pretty much told me I was not a very good paper writer. I basically heard in my twisted translations of criticism That I was not a very good writer. He may have even said that. Whether he had the right to say anything like that to student is another topic entirely. Shortly after that I left school and have never felt confidence in my writing since.
Today, I felt like I was back in that same professor's class room not measuring up, only this time with two children depending on me to make us a better life. I want that better life! I am thirty years old and am out of fresh starts. This is it for me. I need to go to school every semester until I drag my two children on to the lawn at UMass and collect that coveted diploma I should have received in 2000.
But back to today, I get to class with a 12 page play, not edited as well as it could have been, and because of a daycare situation, I ended up being ten minutes late. That was the first thing that went wrong. Then I compared notes with the guy next to me and learned that his play is only five pages, and the guy to his left is 3 pages. In other words, my play is way too long and it is now way too late to do anything about it. For a good couple of minutes I considered fleeing the UMass Boston like it was Auschwitz, never to return again. But oh wait, I have done that before actually, and more than once.
My stomach felt like I had just been thrown down a six story roller coaster ride. Finally, the other students finished their plays and it was my turn. I told the professor my play was too long but she told me to go anyway. In other words I better read it now or get an even worse grade, than the grade I am going to get for exceeding the time limit. So I read it and the longest piece of fiction that I ever created sounded so horrible to me. Then they critiqued it and I wanted to again grab my scripts and run far, far away.
She told me that it was 15 minutes long, it was very redundant at times, and it seemed like the parts she liked were the ones I had not written. And then the worst part of it all. I got called after class by the professor who told me that I basically could not have done anything worse than come in ten minutes late on the day of my own presentation. It would have felt better if she just belted me across the face. I am so sick and tired of explaining myself. I was not late because I slept in or because I chose to grab a latte on the way to school. I work my ass off and my being ten minutes late because of a childcare conflict was unavoidable today. I almost missed the entire class.
I really feel like a piece of trash right now. I have been writing some miserable poetry that I might use for creative writing.
After the play writing disaster I went upstairs and got my Chaucer disaster back, C+ was the verdict. I told this professor my literary life story so I honestly feel that the C+ was a complete pity grade. The paper more than sucked. I love writing, but am starting to wonder if writing loves me. I have no idea what else I would want to do with my life. This has always been what I wanted to do. I love writing!
Right now I am mood swinging from devastated and crying to angry crying. No one is going to tell me that I can't write! Even if I suck I still will. I deserve to write just as much as anyone else does. But I need to get better at writing papers and projects for course grades. I think I might just sign up for some extra help tomorrow at the student support center. They might not cater to mothers down there, but I am in need of some other kinds of help that I never needed before.
Am I the only one who has days like this? Is this normal? How do you all deal with these kind of days? How do you deal with daycare conflicts or any other single parent crisis?
This is my first official post, but I plan to have some neat content up soon. I have a couple of interesting interviews with other Single Moms in school arranged and a bunch of ideas, but am always open to suggestions as well. If you have anything to contribute such as words of advice, poems, letters, essays, or any other type of information that might enlighten another single mom in school please share it!
As for me, I am going to bed earlier tonight than last night and will do my best to keep my head above water. Until next time, mamas.

Calling all Single Moms in College

Dear Mamas:

I am a 30 year old single mother of two, who recently went back to school fulltime. Its been a challenge to say the least and last weekend I was ready to throw in the towel.

I wanted to hear that other mothers like me have done this successully. I wanted to know how. I googled and all I could find were links to commercial scholarship websites and a domestic violence website. The more I look for resources and support the more obvious it becomes that there just arent a lot of resources for single mothers in school.

I know we are out there though. I know what you are probably thinking. Who has time to blog?

Well I am going to make that time and since I am going to school to study writing it can only help me. I want to hear from other moms though. I am interviewing a few this weekend, and will hopefully have them posted soon.

My mission is to provide a source of support and inspiration for myself and other moms in the same boat.

So if you are interested in sharing your story or have any ideas as to how I might make this blog work, let me know. I am waiting to hear from you. I promise to do my best to make this a worthwhile experience for everyone involved.

Together we can!
Yours Truly,
Rebecca Hurley