I don’t even know where to begin. The weight on my chest feels unbearable, and every time my phone lights up with a message from my parents, I feel like I’m suffocating.

I’m 22 now. I was supposed to be three years into law school, on my way to becoming a lawyer—at least, that’s what I told everyone. My parents. My friends back home. Even my younger cousin who once told me I was his role model.

But the truth? I never even went.

I enrolled the first year just to show them a receipt. After that, I stopped showing up. Never registered for exams. Never took a single credit.

Instead, I partied. I drank. A lot. Every semester, my parents would send over tuition money—money they worked hard to save. My mom picked up extra shifts. My dad skipped vacations. They thought they were investing in my future.

And what did I do? I spent it on drinks, on clubs, on god-knows-what. I let myself spiral deeper and deeper into this fake version of life where I could escape the pressure of being the “first lawyer in the family” and just... disappear into the night.

At first, I told myself I’d fix it next semester. Then the next. And then it just became easier to lie. I learned how to fake grades, how to talk like I was taking legal courses, how to nod and smile when my dad asked about constitutional law or my mom asked when they could come to my graduation.

Now I’m 22, with no degree, no real job, and a lie that’s stretched over years like a trap I set for myself.

I’ve thought about coming clean. A thousand times. I even started writing an email once but just stared at the blinking cursor until I cried.

I see people my age graduating, moving forward, figuring out their lives. And I’m here, still waking up at noon with a hangover and an inbox full of reminders that reality is closing in.

They’re proud of me. That’s the worst part. They still think their son is out there doing something meaningful. I look in the mirror and don’t recognize the person staring back.

What am I going to do?

How do I fix this?

How do I tell them I threw away their money, their trust, their dreams for me?

I wish I could say I have a plan. That I’m turning it around. But all I have right now is this sick feeling in my stomach and a silence that gets louder every day.

If anyone’s been in this kind of mess… how do you start over?

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