Entering graduate school at 51 years old may not have been my most brilliant move in life. At least, it doesn’t feel that way right now. As I scratch and claw my way to the finish line by May 2018, I will have been working on my MS in clinical mental health counseling for 6 years. Six years. Of course, it is a 60-credit-hour degree program, and adding the 15-credit-hour concentration in equine-assisted psychotherapy (the reason for the MS in the first place), I now realize that the expectation I had set for myself to finish 75 masters-level credit hours in 3 years was blatantly ridiculous. Especially while maintaining a full-time job. Add to that the time and expense of traveling to Arizona 6 times as required for graduation, plus the strain of having to be away from home for 9-day stretches as I attended mandatory three-day colloquiums and four-day equine intensives (sandwiched between a full day of flying on each end). What was I thinking?!?
Never mind what the degree program required of me; I could never have imagined when I started this journey what the Universe would require of me, which was a far greater test of my mettle. [Read more…] about Grief and Grad School: The Untold Story
