It’s been just over fifteen years since my life imploded, sending me into an unexpected and dark trajectory.
Fifteen years.
February 17, 2008, in the British Midlands, I walked out of an academic office after an hour of two examiners thrashing my thesis to a pulp.
My supervisor was confident of success. After all, of his 150 previous postgraduates that he supervised, only one had been rejected.
I was number two.
I so vividly remember the numbness and fog walking off that campus for the last time.
My wife had been planning a big celebration the day after I returned home. I remember the pain of calling my —the middle of the night back home—to tell her it didn’t go well.
So much time wasted—years, money, effort—up in smoke.