Transition back to school

Once she was released from the hospital, Rachel received aid from school counselors when she returned to campus. 

“The counselors gave me a certain pass that whenever I feel anxious, whenever I get stressed, I can use that pass, like show it to a teacher, and it lets me go straight to the counseling office whenever I feel anxious,” Rachel said. “And people are like ‘you have a pass where you can leave the class whenever you want, are you going to abuse it?’ Absolutely not because this is something they gave me as a resource for me when I’m feeling anxious.”

Leaving the safe environment of the hospital, Rachel’s transition back to school sparked feelings of fear, as she was hesitant to share her story so soon.  

“I was legitimately terrified,” Rachel said. “I worried that people were going to think, ‘she was in the hospital for a week. She must be insane. I don’t want to talk to her’. I made up this whole thing about stomach flu, and I was grounded, something like that. Just an explanation why I didn’t have my phone and why I wasn’t at school.”

However, once Rachel’s close friends questioned where she claimed she had been, she decided to open up to them in private. 

“I told them truthfully,” Rachel said. “And then I realized when I was telling them, I wasn’t ashamed of what was going on with me. I wasn’t ashamed that I had been in the hospital because of it, like trying to deal with suicide. I was thinking, this is me, this is my story. I’m not ashamed that people hear that I was struggling with mental health because it’s something that millions of people are struggling with as well.”