Christ_empowered
Member
- Oct 23, 2010
- 14,315
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OK. I switched to healthcare administration at liberty. I was thinking: get a good job in healthcare! Yes! Now I'm thinking...
...I've dealt with mental health--good, bad, inbetween--from a patient's end for a while. I've had rough times, too. Somehow, I not only got smarter (seriously: when I say I was a 95 IQ burnout, I'm not playing with you), I'm still a tad bit...well, something. My vote would go for a moody kind of relatively high functioning (on meds) schizophrenia, but I keep getting diagnosed with severe bipolar ("Bipolar I W/Psychotic features"). Doesn't matter. Antipsychotic, couple mood stabilizers...boom! You've got lucidity.
I thought I'd do drug treatment psychology initially. Then, I started reading the text book. NO! Too Puritanical, too harsh, too dogmatic. Also, a lot of the info was about what pills are and aren't "appropriate" for drug users, and I'm thinking...shouldn't I be learning how to *talk* to people? Aren't the pills the psychiatrist's deal, assuming there is a shrink involved? (These days, of course, drug abuse is handled by shrinks, and everybody seems to get Seroquel. God bless America.)
Now, I'm thinking, after I complete these classes (3 business classes first subterm), focus on counseling psychiatry, maybe do the M.Div. online and get an LPC on top of that? There are mentally ill counselors out there, and an M.Div would be good for me. I might even learn to read a bit in Greek!
Seriously. You can't do much with any psychology undergrad degree. My counselor--he's public health--said they used to have undergrads doing basic stuff, but then medicare/Medicaid changed the rules for pay outs, so that stopped. Everybody needs a masters, apparently.
I'd rather go the M.Div (Liberty has one in "Pastoral Counseling"), then get the Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) on top, which is do-able in my state. The M.Div would take longer than a counseling master's, but it'd help me personally (spiritual growth) and also spare me years of learning psychobabble. I'm not looking to diagnose and control people; I just wanna have a little conversation about how to live better, maybe one day do it from an explicitly Christian angle, and make enough to get by. Also, counseling degrees online require "intensives" at a campus, while M.Div degrees can be all online. The tuition for both would be comparable, even though the M.Div is a much "bigger" degree, in terms of credit hours (I think the one I was looking at was something ridiculous, like 90+ credit hours or something), because Liberty, as a Christian school, gives an incredibly fair price per semester of full time enrollment in the seminary, online or on campus.
Healthcare Administration seemed like a way to stay in healthcare (booming industry), but avoid psychology. What if, weirdly enough, I'm called to counsel?
Mental illness is so weird. I'm smart, I'm well-read, I'm increasingly normal, but...still schizo-whatever, you now what I'm saying? Or..I should say: I still *have* and/or *struggle with* schizo-whatever. May seem like hair splitting, but there's a real difference there.
High functioning schizo-whatever is still a challenge, and I feel like mental health might provide a way for me to "give back," get paid, get educated, and be autonomous at a higher-than-normal level for someone with my past and my diagnoses.
Ugh. Decisions, decisions, decisions. I feel lame for potentially wasting $$$ (not mine, eiter--Pell Grant monies) on 9 credits in business that I can't drop now. To be fair, one class, drugs in society, is pretty cool no matter your major, and would be nice for a psychology major. That would on leave 2--business law and accounting--that would be completely irrelevant to anything mental health-related. Oh well. Next subterm, I'm signed up for a math (applicable to just about any major) and a communications class (required for almost everybody). That's cool. I guess that means, total, my first semester I'd get 6-9/15 credits towards my new-old major, lol.
If I do psychology, getting the degree won't take long. I was a sociology major way back when, which is kinda like psychology for stoners. I'd have 72+/- credits towards the major (I had 69, then Liberty waived one of their classes for me), plus what I get this semester. I could potentially finish a 120 credit hour degree in 3 semesters, which is 1 calendar year the way Liberty schedules.
Advice?!?! If I do mental health, I'd want to do at least some work in public mental health, especially to start with. They've been good to me, all things considered, and it'd be nice to give something back (and be a state employee--hello, benefits!).
OK. Ramble over, lol. What do y'all think?
...I've dealt with mental health--good, bad, inbetween--from a patient's end for a while. I've had rough times, too. Somehow, I not only got smarter (seriously: when I say I was a 95 IQ burnout, I'm not playing with you), I'm still a tad bit...well, something. My vote would go for a moody kind of relatively high functioning (on meds) schizophrenia, but I keep getting diagnosed with severe bipolar ("Bipolar I W/Psychotic features"). Doesn't matter. Antipsychotic, couple mood stabilizers...boom! You've got lucidity.
I thought I'd do drug treatment psychology initially. Then, I started reading the text book. NO! Too Puritanical, too harsh, too dogmatic. Also, a lot of the info was about what pills are and aren't "appropriate" for drug users, and I'm thinking...shouldn't I be learning how to *talk* to people? Aren't the pills the psychiatrist's deal, assuming there is a shrink involved? (These days, of course, drug abuse is handled by shrinks, and everybody seems to get Seroquel. God bless America.)
Now, I'm thinking, after I complete these classes (3 business classes first subterm), focus on counseling psychiatry, maybe do the M.Div. online and get an LPC on top of that? There are mentally ill counselors out there, and an M.Div would be good for me. I might even learn to read a bit in Greek!
Seriously. You can't do much with any psychology undergrad degree. My counselor--he's public health--said they used to have undergrads doing basic stuff, but then medicare/Medicaid changed the rules for pay outs, so that stopped. Everybody needs a masters, apparently.
I'd rather go the M.Div (Liberty has one in "Pastoral Counseling"), then get the Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) on top, which is do-able in my state. The M.Div would take longer than a counseling master's, but it'd help me personally (spiritual growth) and also spare me years of learning psychobabble. I'm not looking to diagnose and control people; I just wanna have a little conversation about how to live better, maybe one day do it from an explicitly Christian angle, and make enough to get by. Also, counseling degrees online require "intensives" at a campus, while M.Div degrees can be all online. The tuition for both would be comparable, even though the M.Div is a much "bigger" degree, in terms of credit hours (I think the one I was looking at was something ridiculous, like 90+ credit hours or something), because Liberty, as a Christian school, gives an incredibly fair price per semester of full time enrollment in the seminary, online or on campus.
Healthcare Administration seemed like a way to stay in healthcare (booming industry), but avoid psychology. What if, weirdly enough, I'm called to counsel?
Mental illness is so weird. I'm smart, I'm well-read, I'm increasingly normal, but...still schizo-whatever, you now what I'm saying? Or..I should say: I still *have* and/or *struggle with* schizo-whatever. May seem like hair splitting, but there's a real difference there.
High functioning schizo-whatever is still a challenge, and I feel like mental health might provide a way for me to "give back," get paid, get educated, and be autonomous at a higher-than-normal level for someone with my past and my diagnoses.
Ugh. Decisions, decisions, decisions. I feel lame for potentially wasting $$$ (not mine, eiter--Pell Grant monies) on 9 credits in business that I can't drop now. To be fair, one class, drugs in society, is pretty cool no matter your major, and would be nice for a psychology major. That would on leave 2--business law and accounting--that would be completely irrelevant to anything mental health-related. Oh well. Next subterm, I'm signed up for a math (applicable to just about any major) and a communications class (required for almost everybody). That's cool. I guess that means, total, my first semester I'd get 6-9/15 credits towards my new-old major, lol.
If I do psychology, getting the degree won't take long. I was a sociology major way back when, which is kinda like psychology for stoners. I'd have 72+/- credits towards the major (I had 69, then Liberty waived one of their classes for me), plus what I get this semester. I could potentially finish a 120 credit hour degree in 3 semesters, which is 1 calendar year the way Liberty schedules.
Advice?!?! If I do mental health, I'd want to do at least some work in public mental health, especially to start with. They've been good to me, all things considered, and it'd be nice to give something back (and be a state employee--hello, benefits!).
OK. Ramble over, lol. What do y'all think?
..... look historically how the doctors cured szo and bipo ---- nutritionally. this doesn't mean at all to stop taking what the doctor gives, (until he or another doctor agrees to help you do so, gradually, if at all), 
