Petition Letter
Hello Associate Deen (Academic),
I am petitioning the Faculty's decision that I must withdraw from Queens for a minimum of one year.
I would like to start off by apologizing. I am very sorry for my lack of focus during the past 2 terms. This past year has been extremely tough for me and that impacted my school life greatly. I will provide a timeline for everything below and if there is anything else I can provide please let me know.
July 17 - December 1: got taken advantage of at my workplace. got overscheduled, not listened to, and manipulated by my managers.
August - April: struggled a lot with my weight and eating. Developed an eating disorder and would go through phases of barely eating to binging, this impacted me severely, as I was always extremely upset with the way I looked and felt, and would take it out on the ones around me.
August - September: had a lot of family issues and fights with my mom due to the stress I was under at work and with myself, my lack of communication and attitude at the time almost got me kicked out.
August - beginning of October: My boyfriend got sick with an unknown issue that enlarged his spleen and made him very sick, which had me in the hospital with him for hours a day.
October - present: My boyfriend got arrested and charged due to false allegations
October 26: My best friend had a suicide attempt when driving home from hanging out with me.
November 14: found out my younger sister had been self-harming and had to guide her to seek help and work with the rest of my family to support her.
December 24 - present: My grandma had a heart attack on Christmas eve and had multiple heart issues for the following months where we were in and out of the hospital during visiting hours.
January 26: my younger half-siblings both transitioned and struggled a lot with their mental health, which required my sister and me to step in and help them whenever/however we could
February 19 - March 10: I got very sick with hives and couldn't do anything (resulted in believing it was an allergic reaction, but still unsure and was very bad for the first month while we figured out what was happening)
May 2022 - March 2023: I got stalked, harassed, and sent cryptic death threats online and at my workplace for months
Ongoing: My mother had a court case open with my father. my stepmother still does which involves my younger siblings, and this would sometimes include me having to speak to children's lawyers and relive that past.
On top of these few things, my father is very abusive physically and emotionally and my siblings and I just got out of it when covid started, so since then, we have been dealing with a lot of realizations to how we were treated (since my mom and him split up when I was 3. No one ever saw the way I was treated there), as well as unlocking memories and learning to find ourselves again which has a big impact on one mentally. Also, with this being the first year where I completely stopped communication with him it has been hard as I know how wrong he treated us and there is no excuse for his narcissism and manipulation however, it's still the small things, like my first Christmas where I don't celebrate it twice, or getting used to not packing a bag every other weekend, that takes a toll on me.
Obviously not each one of these things alone is enough to discourage me from prioritizing school, just the fact there was never a break and something was always going on, I never had the time to recover from the last event before a new one started. I understand I shouldn't have put my school as a last priority, however, I didn't know what to do or where/how to get help for my lack of motivation and focus. I fell into a depressive state and just could not get out of it, no matter how hard I tried. I didn't prioritize anything and that impacted my studies greatly.
However, During last year I also learned a lot about myself and when I need to ask for help managing my stress. With this new knowledge in mind, I have no doubt that I will be able to use that skill if my next semester becomes overbearing, to ensure I stay above a 1.6 GPA.
I am petitioning the Faculty's decision that I must withdraw from Queens for a minimum of one year.
I would like to start off by apologizing. I am very sorry for my lack of focus during the past 2 terms. This past year has been extremely tough for me and that impacted my school life greatly. I will provide a timeline for everything below and if there is anything else I can provide please let me know.
July 17 - December 1: got taken advantage of at my workplace. got overscheduled, not listened to, and manipulated by my managers.
August - April: struggled a lot with my weight and eating. Developed an eating disorder and would go through phases of barely eating to binging, this impacted me severely, as I was always extremely upset with the way I looked and felt, and would take it out on the ones around me.
August - September: had a lot of family issues and fights with my mom due to the stress I was under at work and with myself, my lack of communication and attitude at the time almost got me kicked out.
August - beginning of October: My boyfriend got sick with an unknown issue that enlarged his spleen and made him very sick, which had me in the hospital with him for hours a day.
October - present: My boyfriend got arrested and charged due to false allegations
October 26: My best friend had a suicide attempt when driving home from hanging out with me.
November 14: found out my younger sister had been self-harming and had to guide her to seek help and work with the rest of my family to support her.
December 24 - present: My grandma had a heart attack on Christmas eve and had multiple heart issues for the following months where we were in and out of the hospital during visiting hours.
January 26: my younger half-siblings both transitioned and struggled a lot with their mental health, which required my sister and me to step in and help them whenever/however we could
February 19 - March 10: I got very sick with hives and couldn't do anything (resulted in believing it was an allergic reaction, but still unsure and was very bad for the first month while we figured out what was happening)
May 2022 - March 2023: I got stalked, harassed, and sent cryptic death threats online and at my workplace for months
Ongoing: My mother had a court case open with my father. my stepmother still does which involves my younger siblings, and this would sometimes include me having to speak to children's lawyers and relive that past.
On top of these few things, my father is very abusive physically and emotionally and my siblings and I just got out of it when covid started, so since then, we have been dealing with a lot of realizations to how we were treated (since my mom and him split up when I was 3. No one ever saw the way I was treated there), as well as unlocking memories and learning to find ourselves again which has a big impact on one mentally. Also, with this being the first year where I completely stopped communication with him it has been hard as I know how wrong he treated us and there is no excuse for his narcissism and manipulation however, it's still the small things, like my first Christmas where I don't celebrate it twice, or getting used to not packing a bag every other weekend, that takes a toll on me.
Obviously not each one of these things alone is enough to discourage me from prioritizing school, just the fact there was never a break and something was always going on, I never had the time to recover from the last event before a new one started. I understand I shouldn't have put my school as a last priority, however, I didn't know what to do or where/how to get help for my lack of motivation and focus. I fell into a depressive state and just could not get out of it, no matter how hard I tried. I didn't prioritize anything and that impacted my studies greatly.
However, During last year I also learned a lot about myself and when I need to ask for help managing my stress. With this new knowledge in mind, I have no doubt that I will be able to use that skill if my next semester becomes overbearing, to ensure I stay above a 1.6 GPA.