Vassar College drop out. What now?

I have to cut this in half because apparently it's too long. I'll put the second half below in a comment.

I feel I should write a disclaimer before you proceed to read this, if you choose to do so. This will be long, emotional, graphic and uncomfortable for some of you. I don't expect many people to read it thoroughly, but if you do, thank you kindly and please let me know if you have anything to say.

There were three points in my life where I put myself in extreme danger. The first was when my fifteen year-old self wouldn't let a 102F fever stop me from hiking up and down Masada on a scorching summer day; the second was when I was twenty-one and had a severe case of pneumonia yet refused to see a doctor; and the third was when I was twenty-two and went without food or water for four to five days at a time, every week for nearly three months.

I want to write about the final one in more detail, because I'm still getting over the whole ordeal and I'd like some advice regarding where I should go from here.

I've been an extremely shy person my entire life. Prior to college, however, the signs were too subtle and insignificant to worry anyone including myself. For example, I dreaded phone conversations regardless of who was on the other end; I trembled and choked when delivering speeches; and my mind went blank under the pressure of another's attention. The circumstances of my childhood, though, allowed me to sneak by without addressing these fears and insecurities. I lived a sheltered life surrounded by friends and family who truly loved and respected me, creating a wide comfort zone within a bubble of sorts. And to further complicate things, there existed another bubble within that bubble - I often escaped life through the medium of online roleplaying games (i.e., World of Warcraft), where I developed virtual personae with high self-esteem, popularity and skill. So much of my identity became wrapped up in these online worlds that my real and everyday social skills suffered an arrested development.

My lack of real-life social skills did not adversely affect my academics, though. I graduated among the top of my high school class and led a number of impressive student organizations, which eventually gained me admission into Vassar College.

Life was good and everything was on track for future plans. Freshman year went along nicely enough; I met quite a few friends and my academic standing was more or less fine. Who doesn't go through the emotional strain of late papers, right?

Then, in sophomore year, my social life took an abrupt turn. I was always a loner at heart, but now the lack of friends made it all so very real. I began to understand that the people I had met during the previous year were more acquaintances than friends as they grew more distant and gravitated toward newer friends they had made. I remember going entire weeks without speaking a word to anyone beyond "hello," and eating meals alone in the privacy of my dorm room day after day because I was afraid of being known as that guy who always sits by himself in the dining centers.

I began to hate my college experience. My heart ached and my breaths were heavy as the loneliness consumed me. Although I don't particularly believe in god, I prayed every night that he take my life as I slept, or else give me some kind of life-altering illness that would allow me the opportunity to leave Vassar without the burden of judgment or guilt from my friends and family back home. Little did I know the prayer was unnecessary, because I was already living with an illness that would have a similar effect.

Indeed, the underlying cause to my loneliness was anxiety. I distanced myself from everyone I knew - including my parents - so that I might take refuge in the safety of solitude. Making conversation or otherwise having the focus of another's attention made me very uncomfortable, so I avoided social situations entirely. Even leaving my dorm room merely to use the bathroom became an issue, so I began urinating in bottles to avoid any form of interaction unless absolutely necessary.

I tried fighting the fear every day of my life at Vassar with little victories like eating alone in public regardless of the time of day, or volunteering my thoughts in class despite my trembling voice and constricted throat. Still, I perpetually felt like a deer in the headlights. A sense of anxiety weighed on me everywhere on campus except in the privacy of my dorm room. I would often count the number of stairs I was climbing or call home while walking across campus just to gain some control over and distract me from these overwhelming feelings.

It was at this point that I returned to the virtual world to help me escape from all these hardships. I renewed my subscription to World of Warcraft and threw myself into raiding. For five to ten hours a day, I was back in control of my emotions and commanded the respect of many other players. I mastered the intricacies of my class and honed my skills to the effect of suppressing the emotional distress I felt in the real world. I created for myself a safe place in this raiding guild of fourty-some players and once again began to nourish my social life through the friends I made there. I effectively dealt with my anxiety by not dealing with it.

Then came second semester of my junior year. I ran into a serious problem with one of my courses where I simply stopped showing up because I had inadvertently missed one too many classes. It was an unfortunate situation that created a vicious circle: Just as that college senior meme says, "I skipped class because of anxiety caused by skipping too many classes." And I responded to the anxiety in the same way I had always done; that is, by not dealing with it. I ignored the e-mails from my professor and advisor because, frankly, I was scared out of my mind. Because I made no attempt to rectify the situation, the professor was forced to fail me and I was placed on academic probation going into my senior year at Vassar.

Before the conclusion of my junior year, however, I was met with a pleasant surprise. A friend I had made in my first year and with whom I had maintained a measure of communication asked me to live in his terrace apartment (TA) for the following year. These homes were a privilege for upperclassmen and for the longest time I accepted the inevitability that I would simply remain in the normal dormitories because I didn't really have any friends close enough to arrange anything of the sort. So I agreed and, at the very least, I was glad I might finally experience some friendship in my final year.

I soon found out what a mistake I had made in agreeing to live in this TA. From the very first day I felt like a prisoner of my room: I felt too afraid to enter the common area where my three fellow housemates usually hung out and entertained their friends; the bathroom issue was the same as before - I could only go when I felt the coast was clear; the walls were so thin you could hear every little movement made by everyone else, so I would often just turn off my lights and lie in bed as motionlessly and quietly as possible; and my isolated eating habits remained the same.

Then I ran into the same problem I had in the previous semester. I began to skip too many classes and fall behind on assignments, so I stopped attending classes and assured myself that I would reach out to my professors as soon as I had completed the requisite work. Unfortunately, that time did not come soon enough and a few weeks later campus security came by to have a word with me. As soon as I heard the knocking on the door I knew it was for me, and I began to have the most serious panic attack I have ever had. I suddenly became extremely disoriented, my breathing grew heavy, my throat constricted and that feeling of anxiety intensified to an unprecedented level. I pretended not to be home as they returned to the TA everyday that week and my housemates reported they had not seen me.

Meanwhile, I had begun an extremely unhealthy pattern of behavior where I felt I could not leave my room for a period of four to five days at a time. My hair became increasingly greasy to the touch from the lack of showering. My teeth were covered in plaque and my breath smelt like a rotting carcass from my inability to brush. But most of all, I grew increasingly hungry and thirsty with every day that I neglected my nutrition. I became thinner than I had ever been and canker sores began to develop in my mouth from malnutrition and starvation. Many times during this three month experience I wondered what would happen if I allowed myself to just wither away and never wake up one day. In retrospect, I'm sure no one would have found my body until at least a week later.

About one week after their first visit, campus security decided to take a more aggressive approach to finding me. I had a feeling they might, so early one morning I walked across campus and escaped to the lower levels of the library, essentially hiding with my computer in one of the cubicles. I later learned security unlocked my room to see what's become of me, and not having found me, turned to the computer department to see if they could help track me down through the student login name required to access wireless internet. Obviously, this pointed them to the library and they found me shortly after canvasing the building.