I'm sorry for how long, whiny, and pointless this will feel. I have not been able to find anyone aside from therapists to discuss any of this with, and I need advice from people who actually know what I'm asking. (I tried to put the concise questions I need answered below-they are the numbered points)
I was raised by two really awful parents who both failed their med school entrance exams and chose to live vicariously through me. Growing up I was told that being a neurosurgeon was the only feasible career choice- my father's father had parkinson's, and he would tearfully explain how his dead dad would be so sad if i didn't become a doctor. I was told that I would recieve no support if I did not go to medical school. There's way worse that they've done, and way worse i've had to deal with, but i digress. The only reason this matters is that after 15 years of absolute hell the depression I had been fighting with exploded and three years ago, I attempted suicide. For the next three years I fell deeper and deeper into depression. I only got taken seriously when I started failing my classes, after which i was pulled out of highschool. For the last year and a half, while I've been finishing everything I needed to do to graduate and get some sort of college application together my parents have finally shut their mouths and let me figure out what I actually care about. Somehow I pulled through with a 3.92 GPA, which led me to scrap whatever strength i had left in me to take the sat and try and piece together my life and go to college.
But I lost my entire highschool career to depression, and have only starting feeling hope in the last 5 or so months. SAT results came out today, I got a 1550- which made me happy, but I started looking at undergrad programs, and now I'm sad again. My intial plan was to study pure math in undergrad, and go to graduate school and get a phd in something more specific to do with signal processing or acoustics. I've loved making and listening to music since I was a kid, and once I was given space by my parents, I've found that I really like studying signal processing, and sound perception (I'm not sure how to describe this, sorry if my language is incorrect). I did a brief computational neuroscience internship regarding the latter, and I have a decent project proposal to show for it, but I was never able to find the motivation to actually find results. It is very amatuerish, but if you are interested i can send it to you, because I have no objectivity on how much it would actually matter in a college application process. In short, I don't know if this is enough. I wasn't even able to take AP calc BC, which I keep seeing people say pure math majors need to take. I don't even know how to apply to college, and my parents are no help. All I want is to do research. I don't care if it's the worst paying career in the world, because this is the only thing I know how to do. All I've ever been good at is music and math and I would really appreciate some guidance on the following
- Is it feasible for me to apply for a pure math undergrad program when my highest level math course is AP Calculus AB?
- If I work hard enough will I be able to find a research job somewhere where I can get paid at least enough to live decently? Money is not an issue, I don't care about buying a house or getting a vacation every year or anything. anything at all would be better than how i've spent the last 18 years.
- If there is anyone that has any advice or is willing to give me some direction towards schools that might be good to look into,and this process in general I would also appreciate that.I am currently paralyzed with doubt because there is simply too much to sift through and too much i don't understand how to do.
and as if this wasn't mopey enough, footnote-
I also really want to find friends. I've never had a social life, and because of my depression i've never been able to keep friends. are there nice people in this field? or is it sort of like highschool premium, if that doesn't sound like too naive a question?