i wanted to weigh in on public schools and how they affect, um, 'unconventional' children and teens.

i was a gifted, straight-a kid until i got hit with depression. i was diagnosed with depression at uh, 11? 12?

in retrospect, i realize that my mental illness was the reason i felt like i couldn't keep up with the other kids.

the stress from school *deeply* influenced this. i felt like the idiot in the gifted program, like it was some kind of mistake that i was there. so the gifted kids sort of left me out, and the non-gifted kids didn't like me much either

in other words, the environment was so hostile & alienating & distracting that it was difficult to learn. which is what you go to school for, right

fast forward to when i was in high school. this part is kind of hard to talk about.

i was 15 when i started hallucinating. panic attacks. paranoia. to the point where i would hide under the seat of the bus because i was fully convinced people were coming to kill me.

i was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

the school was *terrible* at handling it. i failed high school geometry because they told me to stop working on it, i could just take it online over the summer, but later changed their minds and went "oh no we're not offering that over the summer now"

one time i went to the school nurse in the middle of a paranoid episode (i had some awareness, at some times, that it wasn't real) -- i showed them my psychologist's business card to try to explain what was going on

the vice principal searched me & my bag for drugs

eventually in senior year, i attended school for like 2 weeks and then just. stopped. it was all too much. i was hospital/homebound all year. other students apparently thought i died. i was okay with this.

i had a tutor come to my house 2 hours a week, 2 times a week. he basically gave me a bunch of work to do on my own and we went over anything i was struggling with.

without any distractions, being able to focus purely on learning, i got straight A's for the first time in years.

*furthermore*, my mental illness got a lot better. i didn't have to stress out about being around other people. the environment felt a lot more controlled and comfortable.

eventually, my mental health issues... sort of went away. well, schizophrenia doesn't just. go away.

my diagnosis was changed to "major depression with psychotic features", and i absolutely believe that the stress of school contributed to this for me

they didn't let me come back to school after i left. i wasn't allowed to show up to get my work. my mom had to go alone to pick up the packets.

i wasn't even allowed to attend my graduation. they said that if i was too disabled to come to school, i was too disabled for that too

tl;dr: public school sucks if you aren't a completely healthy "normal" (ugh) kid, and some kids learn better in independent environments and should absolutely be given the opportunity to do so

it may be worth noting that i have not had any psychotic issues since just after i finished high school and was able to wean myself off of abilify a few months later (with lots of dr's visits). I still have mental health issues, but not of that type.

oh and one more thing: the tutor always assigned me my work for the week

i finished the week's work in a *few hours* after he left

school does not need to be 6+ hours a day, 5x a week!