Torn and confused

I'm studying for a psychology degree via distance learning. It's part time and I am due to finish it at the end of 2015. I started it towards the end of 2009 so am around halfway through.

Up until last year I really enjoyed it. It was everything I wanted to do and I loved it. I did well in the exam but crashed healthwise and ended up more ill (I have health problems) so I took 8 months out.

I started again in January this year and it's been a constant struggle. I'm just not enjoying it anymore. I've started to doubt what I'll even do with it. I'd really like to do a therapy course although I'm not sure I'm well enough yet. Eventually I'd like to do a post graduate psychotherapy diploma which requires a degree but I already have my first degree from when I was eighteen. Obviously psychology would be useful but I don't think the course in question requires me to be a psychology graduate. The difficulty is that currently I wouldn't be well enough to do this post graduate course but I can work towards it doing counselling certificate courses.

If I leave my degree after the second year (which I'm currently in) I think I'd be awarded with some sort of diploma.

I'm worried I'll regret this. The trouble is, due to fee increases I don't have any leeway. Currently I get financial help on the basis I will finish the degree when I do. If I leave and then return I suspect I will have to pay full fees which runs into thousands of pounds. It would be an expensive mistake to make.

How do you know it's the right decision? I know it has to come from my heart but I feel torn and don't know what my heart is saying. I feel tired and am putting so much into this which I'm not sure is helping me. I wonder if I've just moved on and it's not my thing anymore. Cognitive stuff is challenging and while I could probably do it, I don't find it interesting enough to study for hours over.

Follow your intuition... thats what I say. ANd although I don't usually like to give advise... I just felt compelled to write. THere are also lots of good life coaching programs available. MAybe something like this would be more inspiring for you.

It sounds like a tough spot to be in, Dreamy. First, I would say there is no "right" decision. I got my degree at 18-21 as "expected" but it was not in what I started in, my true love. I did not go back and get that, through distance learning as you are doing now, until I was 51-56! I retired at 55 so the degree was not "useful" in that sense but it was what I wanted to study. I continued on to graduate school but then, a year later, decided I'd rather spend that money on something else.

Life is about doing what we enjoy and working toward what we want. It is not all "fun", despite being what we want (I want to eat, wear clothes, and have a roof over my head :-) but, if it is what we want, we can make it work, no matter what it is. If what you are doing now is not what you want now, then change to doing something you want. You can change back later, I've done it several times! I was in "night" school (we're talking pre-internet :-) from when I was 22-51, I just was not focused on the degree (but enjoyed taking courses now and then).

It would not be a "mistake" to come back later and pay thousands of pounds, etc.; provided you had the thousands of pounds. We all have the impossible daydreams and the here-and-now ones and you can't know if you will have the thousands of pounds but you also can't know if you will want, need, be able to go back later. We cannot live in the future any more than we can live in the past? We just have now. You might have "planned" to get X degree and Y job but life rarely goes along with plans for the future other than in a general sense. Make a new plan for now and a little way into the future, some plan you can put your energy and interest behind. It will be more healthy than working at something you are not that interested in anymore for the sake of a "maybe" future you are uncertain of?

Perna that is really helpful, thanks so much.

You're right, all we have is now and there's no right or wrong. I've been thinking about the possibility of returning in the future despite the costs because assuming I had the money at least I would know it was what I WANTED even though expensive. I guess there is little point struggling through something if it really isn't what I want just for the sake of getting it paid for.

I've got a few more months to go and then another level 2 course which is optional and what I really want to do (therapy related) so I could play it by ear. Difficult for a person who wants to have a definite plan right now!

You've given me a lot of useful points to think about.