I think I understand now. Why people say that the longer you stay out of school, the more likely it will be hard for you to go back.
I can say, from my experience right now, that if I had chosen this route right after finishing high school, or even after my Diploma, I would have found everything easier. I would be in the right set of mind, in the habit and routine of being a student, and have the background knowledge more easily retrievable.
But what I'm feeling more keenly right now, is how much your priorities and values change after you come out of school and how that change affects you when you jump back and seemingly get into a phase you were in before. For me, furthering my education has always been my dream. And believe it or not, I love studying. I thirst for new knowledge. Which is why I hung on to making studies my main priority after so many years of not studying. And I believed that my strive for studying would never diminish.
It feels a bit surreal now that I'm doing what I have longed for. Now that I'm actually away in another country, away from familiar surroundings, friends I care for and my beloved family. Doing what I am now makes me happy because it is what I wanted. At the same time, I can't help feeling selfish, at the expense of the people I love and care about. I no longer have the time I would want to talk to them and be concerned for their daily happenings. I sympathise and wish to listen, but I have a billion other things to do and think about. Things that concern me, and the education that I wished for myself. It feels like I am failing to be there for them in times when they are down, cry, see them grow and change.
I always knew it wasn't going to be easy, going back into school. And now... I can only say, perhaps this was something you were never going to understand unless you went through it yourself.
After all, there is another thing people always say.
In every gain there is a loss.
