Petition Letter
This past academic year (2016 ¿¿ 2017), my grades have suffered due to extenuating personal circumstances. The classes that I am appealing are WRIT 120, RELS 226, RELS 235, RELS, 237, RELS 368. About a month prior to me starting at Queens on July 25th 2015, my uncle (my mothers¿¿, sister¿¿s husband) took his own life. At the time, I was unable to deal with the grief and therefore attempted to push it aside, as I needed to start school. Not only was I to start at Queens in September, But I was intending on trying out for field hockey, which started 2 weeks prior to actual classes. I tried hard not to put my life on hold, and therefore start school just as I would have done before the tragedy occurred. During the second semester of my first year, the neglect of my emotions started to set in and I began having some mental health issues. I had not yet sought professional help; in an attempt to make myself believe I was okay; but it was when I personally harmed myself around April of 2016 that I finally accepted that professional help was necessary. I reached out to Freeman Woolnough who was one of the Residence Life Embedded Counsellors of my residence Victoria Hall, and had a couple of sessions with him to ensure my health, personal safety and well-being. I only had a couple of sessions with Freeman before exam season started and it became much harder for me to get an appointment with him, and I became encompassed by the stress of exams. June of 2016 is when my mental health issues started to worsen and that is also why my summer course WRIT 120 was affected. I chose to remain in Kingston over the summer in order to attempt to deal with my problems myself, but unfortunately this had the opposite affect on my health. My parents were going through a very difficult divorce. By May of 2016 I had not spoken to my father face to face in a little over 2 years and my only source of communication with him was through my mother. The marriage ended due to adultery on my father¿¿s end and following the news coming to light, I received several verbal attacks from my father which affected me both emotionally and psychologically. In March of 2016 I was asked by my mother if I wanted to testify on her behalf in court for her divorce case. There were many false allegations made by my father not only about me, but also my siblings, as well as my mother¿¿s ability to care for us that I felt I needed to set the record straight about and therefore testify. I did not realize at the time how greatly this would affect me, but it took a toll on my personal health. In preparation for court, I was grilled by my mother¿¿s lawyer with possible questions I would be asked by my father¿¿s lawyer. Preparing to testify emotionally drained me and forced me to relive all the negative events surrounding my father. I still had not got professional help beyond those few sessions with Freeman as I even found it difficult to leave the house. I didn¿¿t want to burden my mother with my issues as I knew she was already dealing with enough of her own issues. My fall 2017 semester wasn¿¿t too bad as I attempted to make myself busy with social and academic activities, but the neglect of my mental health care resulted in a series of breakdowns in the winter semester of 2017 (the most recent semester).