Hi everyone, I've wondered if I should make this post or not, and I've finally worked up the courage to do it.
Long story short, I've wanted to work in Japan since before I was even in college and absolutely fell in love with the country when I spent some time there pre-pandemic with some friends. I graduated last August and immediately signed up with a popular dispatch company as well as JET. I didn't get into the latter but the dispatch company was willing to sign me on for this August.
At first, I was absolutely elated, I've had an incredibly rough past couple of years after losing basically every member of my family except one to Covid, and this felt like the first good thing to happen to me in awhile. However, as the date to head out started approaching, I had a couple setbacks occur that I feel like have damaged my self confidence and mental health, and as a result I'm not sure if I'd succeed in Japan or not.
I got very sick earlier this April with Covid, and had a massive resurgence of Anxiety and Depressive symptoms that medication have mostly covered for awhile. I've been in therapy since then, but recently my last living immediate family member got very ill, and while they've recovered now, there's a good chance that if I go overseas to Japan that I might not ever see them again. This was something I discussed with them way back when I applied and they were fine with it, but now I'm losing my resolve.
All of these things compounded together with the fact that basically all of my friends and what little family I have left are so proud of me going off to Japan makes me feel like an absolute abject failure when I think that I might not be strong enough to tough it out in a foreign country. To make matters even worse, a medication that I require to basically function in day to day life is illegal in Japan and I'm having an incredibly difficult time stomaching the alternatives, which has completely tanked what little happiness I feel like I have left.
I just feel like such a failure right now, I dreamed about going back to Japan for so long and really wanted to be an ALT, but now thinking about August coming around the corner fills me with nothing but complete and utter anxiety and depression. It feels like I'm supposed to be happy and excited for this new chapter in my life but instead my mental health isn't even remotely where I'd like it to be and I don't even have two months left to fix things.
Is there anything I can do? I don't want to disappoint everyone in my life and really want to go to Japan but I've been leaning on my support group at home to just be able to function in the past couple weeks and don't know if I can do it without them. I just feel like a complete failure of a human being, and I'm scared that if I don't take this opportunity I'll regret it for the rest of my life. I'd be willing to ask my ALT company if I could come over in March instead because of the circumstances, but they already moved me from last March to August because of a miscommunication and I doubt they'd be willing to do this even though it's a pretty extenuating circumstance.
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Edit:
I just wanted to thank everyone for their honest advice and support. I wasn't expecting this post to get anything more than one or two people calling me an idiot, but everyone has been incredibly supportive and helpful.
I think the best possible thing I could do for myself right now is take some additional time to work on my physical and mental wellbeing back here in the states where I have friends, a good roof over my head, a support system, and try and get my anxiety and depression under control with the help of my therapist. I think I definitely underestimated how difficult going to Japan and teaching would be, especially since my only other experience has been on a vacation with some of my closest friends.
I think I might use the money I had saved up in order to fly and get situated in Japan to take a longer holiday there by myself after I get a bit more stable and see how I handle things. I forget what commenter said this, but I'd hate to waste a ton of time and money to go to Japan, have a mental breakdown after a couple weeks to a month, and then move back in a worse state than I left. I don't want to lose the love I have for Japan and it feels like right now going over there might be the easiest way to do it.
I have a couple more people I want to talk to and now I need to think about what I'm going to do in the immediate future, but I just want to thank you all again for taking the time to speak to me.
by Ok_Efficiency_7260