In a previous post, Bowie asked how I managed to get through my BYU experience without going crazy.

It was a close shave.

And really, I didn’t get through BYU at all. I left during the first part of my sixth semester. I just couldn’t take it anymore. But still, I survived, and it wasn’t easy.

I was miserable at BYU, and I could go on about all the ways and reasons I was miserable for hundreds of pages, but I think what matters is how I dealt with it, how I made it livable. I write this blog primarily for myself, because it’s therapeutic to get this stuff out, because I want to tell my story, and because I just plain enjoy writing, but in the meanwhile, I also hope to help other people in similar circumstances, to help people feel that they aren’t alone, that they aren’t crazy, and perhaps give advice or serve as a cautionary tale. Let’s start with things I did wrong, shall we?

I retreated into myself.

I became very shy and withdrawn. I avoided social contact with most people. This is understandable, given that I didn’t have a whole lot in common with most of the people at BYU, but I also didn’t really try to look for like-minded people. I let my bad social interactions keep me from searching out good ones. I existed very much in my own little world. In some ways, I think this was a good thing, because it protected me. I created a safe place for myself and wouldn’t let anybody in. It was a coping mechanism, and in some ways it worked well for me, but now I realize that everything would have been much more bearable if I’d had a friend with whom I could have been completely honest.

I got angry and developed a horrible attitude.

I felt that I’d been cheated out of the college experience that I’d always dreamed of, and I was pissed off about it– and rightly so! I became very cynical and critical of BYU. I was cranky and bitter about everything, and allowed that to color the way I saw the world. There are good things about BYU, and there are marvelous oppportunities there, and I wish I had taken advantage of them instead of throwing up my hands and saying, “This place is horrible.”

I accepted the status quo.

I really was never an apostate at BYU. That came later. I had so many doubts, but wasn’t brave enough to investigate them. I accepted BYU, and the inevitability of marriage and housewifery, and all of the things I hated about the church because I couldn’t imagine any other way, at least not without feeling horribly guilty. I wanted to transfer, but I let the church and my parents convince me that what I wanted was somehow wicked. I accepted my own misery. I accepted the fact that I didn’t have friends I could be honest with. I just sucked it up and dealt with it, instead of taking steps to change things. I think if I’d been able to say, “This isn’t ok and I’m going to do something about it!” I would have had a vastly different and much more enjoyable BYU experience.

In terms of things I did right, or things that helped me:

I actually liked school.

I had some wonderful professors at BYU. I’ve always maintained that I loved BYU as a school (aside from religion classes and American Heritage), but hated Provo. I am honestly so grateful for my BYU professors and the many things I learned there. I am so thankful for all that I learned about the humanities, Latin America, Spanish, acting, film, biology, music, and all the other subjects I was lucky enough to study. Of course, at the time I was stressed out beyond belief, but looking back, I really am grateful for my studies, especially since the university I’m at now doesn’t have half the resources that BYU did.

I was surrounded by some truly lovely people.

My dear old friend, Leah, who hassled me about skipping church, watching R-rated movies, and not doing my visiting teaching, was also the one who cheered me up after a hard day, baked me a birthday cake, made me laugh until I cried, listened to me bitch and moan constantly, made soup for me when I was sick, and who took care of me and showed me love in a million different ways. Most of my roommates were wonderful people, and I’m glad to have met them. Even though some of them made my life more difficult in some ways, in other ways they were the reason BYU was bearable.

I tried my best to take care of myself.

While my student diet left something to be desired (like protein and fruits and vegetables), I took pretty good care of myself at BYU. I exercised fairly regularly. I tried to do things just for me. One of my favorite things to do was to take the train to Salt Lake City and sit in the Cathedral of the Madeleine and try to absorb the peace and beauty there. I tried to take time to do things that I enjoyed. I went for walks. I wrote quite a bit. I went to see the foreign and old films shown on campus, went to free concerts, and enjoyed the occasional clandestine Moo’latte from Dairy Queen.

I did most of this alone. Although I previously listed “retreating into myself” as a bad thing, I also think it may have been what saved me. Solitude is necessary, and I had things that I had to work out for myself. I did some of that work at BYU, and some of it after I moved to another country, away from the spectre of church and family. I was terribly lonely at BYU, and there were steps I could have and probably should have taken to find friends there, but I also needed a lot of alone time to process how I felt about the church. I needed that solitude so that I could think everything through. I needed to create a safe place for myself, where I didn’t have to pretend to be anything other than what I was. This is still a helpful thing to do, by the way.

So there you have it. How to get through BYU without going crazy. But really, the best way to survive BYU? LEAVE. As soon as possible.