Not 'Graduating'

I just went into the campus bookstore and was bombarded with graduation stuff.  Everything from shirts, to stuffed animals, glasses, key chains - everything.  And the realisation that I'm part of this year's graduating class hit me hard.  I can't breathe, my heart is racing, and I'm sitting here outside the library crying.

I will not be walking in two weeks with the other graduates.  I will have 'earned' my diploma but refuse to join in commencement.  It's suppose to be a celebration of achievement.  I don't think this is an achievement, at least not a good one.  It's quite the opposite, a horrific event.



I am going to have to find a job (been looking like crazy) and working 40 hours a week is no big deal.  But along with this comes leaving my baby.  It tares me apart every time I have to leave him to go to school and I've only be going part time.  The thought of leaving him for so long is horrible.  I am handing him over for someone else to raise.  The day only has 24 hours in it, with 10 spent sleeping and another 9-10 spent away (work + commuting) while I'm working that only leaves me 5 hours.

FIVE FUCKEN HOURS!!!

That's not even part time parenting!  What insane person does this willingly????  You have a kid to spend virtually no to time with them and have someone else raise them??  It's my right, as nature intended it, to raise my OWN kid especially during the early years.  No one can care for him like I can, no one can love him and put up with him and be as beneficial to him as I can.  Graduating is celebrating me abandoning my own kid.

Let me make sure the facts are set straight: I did not return to school so that I can get a diploma.  I didn't want to leave him this long then and I knew I could get student loans and government aid and make do for a while.  Stupid government and their lack of basic money handling skills have cut back money to schools.  I attend a public university.  So I am being forced to finish my degree and leave.  Ideally I wouldn't stop school until he was going to school full time himself.  A degree was never in the top reasons for going back.  I'm not stupid, a degree won't get me a better job or better pay.  It just gives me an excuse for not applying at McDonald's.

So please stop pestering me about commencement, it's a slap in the face every time you do.  And stop telling me about how great an achievement graduating is, it makes me wonder if you really know how much I love my baby and what my parenting philosophy is.