The Bottom Line - and how I got here.

What I want is to go back to Scotland - to Glasgow and the Counselling Postgraduate Diploma couse at Strathclyde in particluar. That's the bottom line. Everything else is just a stepping stone on this path - at least until I hit an insurmountable obstacle. But also given my "Never Say Die" attitude about some things it will be a good while before I get to that point. (Tenacious is good word - obsessive might be more accurate.)

My plan for some time was a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology - but since May or June the idea of signing on to anything for a 5+ year course just doesn't feel like the right answer. I'm not in a position where I want to make that kind of a commitment - particularly not that kind of commitment to living anywhere in particular, and certainly not living somewhere in the US for 5+ years. Having come to that conclusion and knowing for years that while I enjoy research, my real love is in helping people (or helping people help themselves), my next thought was a Master's degree in Counselling. So I began doing some research...

I loved being in Glasgow for the all too brief 6 months I was there and I want to go back more than I think I've ever wanted anything in my life. So it isn't much of a surprise that though I was looking at local programs and programs in the US generally, I also kept skipping back over to .ac.uk sites in addition to the .edu sites. My beloved Glasgow Uni does not have any counselling programs and neither does Glasgow Caledonian (not accredited ones, anyway), but Strathclyde does. The way the course is set up, I would have do the Postgraduate Diploma course and then upon successful completion, take on the Masters course - which has now become my goal in life.