Crystal Genduso:
CLASS OF 1996
Dixie Hollins High SchoolClass of 1996
St. petersburg, FL
Embry - Riddle Aeronautical UniversityClass of 1999
Daytona beach, FL
Madeira Beach Middle SchoolClass of 1992
Madeira beach, FL
Seventy - Fourth Street Elementary SchoolClass of 1989
St. petersburg, FL
Tyrone Elementary SchoolClass of 1984
St. petersburg, FL
Crystal's Story
As an adult, I struggled in school, specifically while I was a student at George Mason University (G.M.U.). This caused a lot of anxiety for me and my Obsessive Compulsive Disorder was the only way I could cope. It worked well for a while, but it eventually incapacitated me.
All along my studies at G.M.U., I had frequent and paralyzing panic attacks. What follows are some symptoms of my struggle in school. I procrastinated starting assignments as long as possible as they made me anxious. The longer I procrastinated, the more my anxiety mounted and so assignments took tremendous effort for me to force myself to start and complete. My mind would wander, which adversely affected my ability to comprehend what I was required to read. The only way I could cope with my wavering concentration, was to cover the material more times than any of the other students I asked and I consequently compared myself to. To motivate myself to study constantly, I used a mantra I made up myself: If you do not study every waking moment, you will fail. It also maddened me that I made multiple mistakes that only came to my attention after I had submitted my assignments. I knew all along that these problems, I alone seemed to experience, were not at all a matter of inadequate intelligence.
I ignored addressing the mental anxiety and it manifested physically, in the form of migraine headaches, which had abated for several years. One weekend, while I was working on my take-home exams and studying for those that would be held in class, during the coming week. I had the mother of all migraines. It lasted from Friday to Sunday. The aura was so intense, I was not able to see my computer screen anymore. I waited a day for it to abate and when it did not, I went to a walk-in clinic. There, I received two shots of Immitrex, which only works well when taken at the first indication of an imending migraine. They had no effect on my migraine. At this point, I was absolutely panicked and all I could do about it was accept that I wouldn't be capable of completing my take-home exams or s...Expand for more
tudying for any of the others that were coming up.
My professors made accommodations for me and I started to see a neurologist. He prescribed a small amount of a Tricyclic, called Nortryptyline, as a prophylactic measure. As a result of taking the medicine, my migraines were fewer and farther apart.
Fast forward to five years ago, I achieved status as senior w/a staggering G.P.A. (3.98), but because I had become so afraid of failing, it gradually incapacitated me w/fear and eventually I felt as though I had no other alternative than to withdraw from all my classes. I immediately set the earliest appointment available w/a psychologist in my school's counseling center and it was two weeks away. I waited as long as I could, which was up until the day of my appointment. I had already withdrawn from my classes when I saw the school psychologist, even though I wasn't supposed to because I was no longer enrolled as a student and that was the rule. Despite that, he still saw me and he diagnosed me w/Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (O.C.D).
Over the next few years, I saw several psychiatrists, one after another in an attempt to identify the root of my problem. Earlier this year (2010) I was at last diagnosed w/Adult Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD /HD or A.D.D.) by the third psychiatrist I saw. I determined that I have the inattentive type as opposed to the hyperactive type, which is what my husband has. This same psychiatrist also diagnosed me w/ Impulse Control Disorder (I.C.D.), which is covered under the O.C.D. umbrella, and my O.C.D. diagnosis was changed to O.C.P.D., which is a personality disorder.
So, for the past five years, since I withdrew from school, I played what I came to call the "Drug Lottery." A little later this year, I was lucky; my new psychiatrist prescribed me a winning combination of medication to treat my O.C.P.D. and AD/HD. At this moment, my O.C.P.D. is mostly managed and my AD/HD is improved with stimulants. For the first time, since I left school, I finally look forward to finishing my last year left of school.
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