I’ve been living here since last April going to language school with intentions of looking for work after. I love it here, I love my life here and I don’t miss home a bit.
My attendance was always around 85% until in June I had a huge health problem (gastrointestinal perforation) and I was in the hospital for a few weeks. School couldn’t let it slide for some reason, attendance absolutely tanked. Luckily I applied for a visa renewal just before June, so I got my new visa postcard in the mail.
Anyway, my June attendance is terrible (~15%), my July attendance was also bad because I was still in a lot of pain and I got covid, and this months attendance is no good either because all of this has been giving me extreme anxiety and I sort of had a nervous breakdown.
I’m feeling so awful I can’t even leave the house and I’m in constant severe anxiety. I’m just rotting in my apartment. I need to go home and be around loved ones and family for awhile and recover, but i’m afraid I’ll never get a visa for here again and I love my life here. I had a great part time job I loved, I loved school, I’m social in my neighborhood, all my friends and girlfriend are here. I really don’t want to leave but I just need to be home and rest, i can’t study and work right now like this.
Other problem is, I’m behind on bills now, apartment is turning into a mess, and I don’t even know where to start.
I feel like if I leave and go home, I’ll never get a visa to live here again and that thought is heartbreaking to me.
Will the low langusge school attendance impact my ability to get a work visa in the future? I can account for June because I was in and out of the hospital and inpatient for 2.5 weeks, and I can account for some of july because of covid, but I can’t account for some of the other lower attendances. Im thinking my overall average will probably be like 70-75% after this.
Thank you for reading and have a good weekend/summer break everyone. Also if anyone knows any reliable english speaking mental health services here please let me know. I will look for old posts on that topic in this subreddit right now but I just figured I’d throw that in there. The anxiety i’ve had is so bad I can’t even function.
15 comments
meant to clarify, april of last year. I’ve been here about 16 months
> I’m just rotting in my apartment. I need to go home and be around loved ones and family for awhile and recover, but i’m afraid I’ll never get a visa for here again and I love my life here.
Going to be honest but no matter if you go now or stay until the end of your studies, it’s going to be impossible to raise your attendance to 85%+ Especially if you are having mental health issues that are making you not leave the house/able to pay bills etc. You may miss more school between then and now. Your current projection is likely based on if you never miss another day correct? You don’t love your life here if you are having this bad of anxiety you can’t leave your house or do basic everyday functions to be honest. You love the *idea* of being in Japan but you’re not thriving by any means.
It may not be what you want to hear but in your case it may be better for your physical and mental health to return to a country where you can better navigate your medical issues and have a proper support network without your status of residence demanding that you commit to something or you lose it.
The language school attendance thing is pretty strict because it’s a visa that is regularly abused since it’s so easy to get, essentially no per-requisite. People get the visa and dip to do other things.
Edit: Also do you have your bachelors or equivalent? You wouldn’t qualify for a work visa after language school if you don’t anyways.
I mean, your language school visa isn’t related to any future work visas. If your qualified to work here (that’s like.. just a bachelors) then you can get a CoE.
Don’t skip out on bills and apartment rent tho, that’s a douche thing to do.
I don’t think your language school attendance will matter for a work visa, if you’re going home and plan to return at a later date you’ll essentially be applying like any other foreigner coming from outside Japan. It would be different if you were hoping to apply for university from language school.
Go home, look after yourself, get yourself in a better position physically and mentally.
You don’t miss home one bit but you need to be around family and friends? Sounds like you’re in denial. Be honest with yourself and go back home if you need to give yourself time. Japan isn’t going away.
Leave and find a way to return in the future. Fuck the language school, what’s important is getting some support from family back at home where your not going crazy in a 1LDK.
Get a flight booked and then start doing some small exercise and building on your eating routine. Small steps build yourself back up.
You sound young so you have the future what’s important now is your physical and mental well-being.
All the best!
even at your best, your attendance was only 85%? and even after this, the best you can do is 75% what are you doing? that is not acceptable for most jobs.
If you cant get proof from a doctor note excusing it, or at the very least if you get a VERY nice officer working with you other good proof then you are kinda screwed.
However if you leave country and return with a COE sponsorship from a company you’ll probably be fine.
How do i know? I swapped to spouse visa from a student one years ago. My attendance was not good on the last semester and i was freaking out. Lucky the average attendance for my entire year was at the bare minimum of 80% but my last semester was like 40%. Was almost screwed.
Immigration are the most strict with students. By far. They are the highest risk group for abuse. I thought being from the UK would make swapping to spouse visa easy but i was very wrong. They really scrutinised things.
If I were you I will just forget about japan. You just went sick and then “need” to be with your beloved? Cmon dude, what you think to live at another country is like?…
you should head home asap. Japan is NOT for you
There’s still way out from this, provided you managed to deal with anxiety issues.
I switched from student to work visa with 70% attendance, but you would need someone to do explanation letter on why it is happening. So explain that there’s covid and such.
In my case I just use lawyer for that purpose, as they can communicate better than me.
Visa process took longer than usual, cursed with 1 year visa, but it works at least.
Generally working here is quite taxing on mind, unless you found some gems.
Also another alternative is to pursue tokutei ginou, sucks that the work field is limited to arubaito like of work. But it will just feel like your regular day arubaito, but fulltime and without school.
When I studied in Tokyo I also went to a language school. This was also when my anxiety started to flare up and I was having panic attacks. I missed a lot of school, and then decided to go home and finish my degree. I wanted to give Japan another go and have had a 3 year, 3 year and 5 year visa so far. So don’t give up hope. Just go home, rest and finish your degree if you haven’t and you’re basically set.
A lot of people here are picking on you and I think that is really unkind to dump on someone who is clearly in distress. I am going to offer some advice that I hope you will find useful.
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>I need to go home and be around loved ones and family for awhile and recover
I agree. At this point staying in Japan is only going to make this situation worse. What you need to be thinking about is how to manage your recovery. There are ways to do this that will lesson the impact on your future and other ways that will significantly impact your future.
If you stay, and are still unable to attend class, you run the risk of being expelled from school. If you get expelled your student visa is immediately cancelled and you have 14 days to leave the country. Failure to leave within that time frame and you will have overstayed your visa. Overstaying is a crime that is very difficult to recover from. Only in the most exceptional cases will immigration issue another visa. But, even if you leave within the 14 days, immigration will not look kindly on you when you go to reapply for another visa. They take expulsions very seriously.
If you wish to return to Japan in the future, you need avoid being expelled at all costs.
You can avoid being expelled by either withdrawing from your school or taking a leave of absence. The process for doing these will vary from school to school so you will need to talk to them about your options. I work at the university level so things are a little different from Japanese language schools.
Generally speaking, if you withdrawal your student visa will also be cancelled and once again you will need to leave Japan within 14 days. However, when you go to reapply for a new visa, immigration will be far more lenient with someone who withdrew for medical reasons (and you will be able to show them proof of that) then someone who was expelled. I cannot speak for immigration, but I think think that it is highly likely that they will issue you another visa to resume your studies if you withdrew for medical reasons and can show that those issues are resolved.
However, if you take a leave of absence, it may be possible to keep your student visa and return home with a re-entry permit. This will allow you to recover at home and when you are feeling strong enough come back and resume your studies. Now, I’m not 100% sure about this, but I think there might be a three month limit on leaves of absence. You will need to check with your school about this. But three months at home may be all the time that you need.
I’m sorry that this happened to you, and I wish you all the best for your future.
Sir, whatever you do, take care of your health first.
If it means leaving for a while, do so, you can always come back.
I think this is what you want to hear : No, it wont affect your chances of getting a work visa. Language school student visas are a different status, quite abused thats why requirements of attendance are strict. But when they are done, you are done and go back. Having bad grades or attendance can affect your renewal of student SoR or applications to new ones, but will have almost no impact on other SoR like humanities, dependent, HSP etc.
Also if you can proove with documents your illness as the reason of low attendance, I believe immigration will take it into account too.
If you are worried about your health and need support from loved ones, go home, its a no brainer. You can always find later an employer, get a CoE and then a “work visa”.
Your attendance to a language school is irrelevant for a work visa.