The major I loved, ghosted and maybe still stalk on Instagram…

You know that weird “talking stage” where you’re not sure if it’s love, codependence, or just fear of being alone? Yeah, that’s how I’d describe my relationship with my university major—a two and a half year long situationship with computer science. 

At first, it was exciting. The kind you uncontrollably giggle over with your friends and make joint plans for the future. In casual conversations, I started to use the word “algorithm”, thinking I was all in. I thought I had found the one. 

But like all toxic relationships, the red flags were there early on. 

My first year I like to describe as the honeymoon phase. I still remember my first coding class, CMPT 141: Introduction to Computer Science with Dr. Jeff Long. We learned to print “Hello World!” in Python, and I thought I was five lines of Python away from founding the next billion-dollar startup (ethically, though and with a focus on improving the communities I call home).

Computer science made me feel powerful with its potential. Everyone kept telling me “You will never be unemployed,” which, let’s be honest, is basically the university equivalent of “They have a good job and own a house.” I ignored the fact that I didn’t love it. I mean, who loves their major? That’s not a real thing, right?

Wrong. 

Year two is when the cracks start to show. Sure, computer science still brought me joy, the kind you get after working so long and hard on trying to solve an assignment question and having it finally compile. But most days? It was a lot of crying and frustration sitting in Spinks because I couldn’t figure out why my code wasn’t working. 

My relationship with my degree turned into one of those toxic dynamics where you’re constantly second-guessing yourself. My thoughts would be filled with “Am I just bad at this? Would I like it more if I understood recursion? If I switch majors, am I quitting or redirecting?” 

But like any situationship, computer science kept stringing me along. Every time I considered leaving, something pulled me back: a great midterm grade, submitting an assignment that worked or the best one being the occasional compliment from a professor that made me feel like maybe, just maybe, I could make this work. 

We were on and off for months. I’d swear it off during finals, only to enroll in harder courses the next semester. 

The breakup happened in my third year. 

Like most situationships, the end came quietly. It wasn’t some dramatic falling out. It was me, sitting in a computer science lecture halfway through third year, realizing I’d been dissociating for the past 20 minutes and had no clue what the professor was talking about. I looked around at my classmates with their eyes lit with passion (or maybe it was the caffeine) and fingers flying across their keyboards and thought, “Wow, I don’t belong here.” I realized, sitting in that lecture theatre, that I don’t love computer science the way my peers did. I wasn’t loving computer science the way it deserved, and in return, computer science was not giving me the relationship I knew I deserved. 

That was my breakup moment. I dropped computer science faster than I’d debugged any code, which in reality was never fast, pivoting to something that had always lingered in the background: Economics. 

Switching to economics was like dating someone your friends describe as “safe”. It made sense and was structured. It didn’t give me panic attacks every time an assignment came around. 

At first, I felt a bit like a sellout. Had I wasted two and a half years? Should I have tried harder to make it work? 

But then I started to take economics classes on topics like labour economics and environmental economics, and I actually understood it. Like fully. I didn’t need to Google “What is marginal utility” in the middle of class, after the professor had sped through the explanation, trying to cram the entire slide deck into the 50-minute lecture. I even started looking forward to assignments. Who was I? 

For the first time in my academic life, I felt secure and like I wasn’t constantly being gaslit by a compiler. Sure, maybe economics wasn’t as sexy as computer science in the eyes of Reddit bros, but I wasn’t crying every Friday before 6:00 pm anymore (why does the computer science department choose that time as the deadline to submit?. That’s got to count for something. 

Now the million-dollar question: do I still check computer science’s Instagram? 

Absolutely. 

I still catch myself browsing through computer science course syllabi like I’m stalking an ex’s vacation pics, and linger a little too long on the special topics courses offered this term in the registration channel in PAWS. I tell myself, “I’m just curious.” But we both know I am zooming in on those descriptions like they are selfies with someone new. 

Sometimes I get caught in the what-ifs, wondering “What if I’d just stuck it out? What if I’d learned to love BASH and assembly instead of resenting it? 

But then I remember burning the midnight oil for assignments worth only two per cent of my final grade, the imposter syndrome and the way Canvas notifications felt like passive-aggressive texts from a toxic ex: “Hey, just a reminder your assignment is due tonight. But I know that you haven’t even started.”

Economics might not always be riveting, but it’s healthy. I get it, and it gets me. We vibe. Most importantly, I don’t leave lectures feeling like a hollow shell of myself. 

I hope readers can learn from my lessons from the academic trenches. If you are currently in a major you are not sure about, just know that you are allowed to change your mind. 

You are not a failure. You aren’t “giving up”. You are evolving. Our society makes our majors out to be a lifelong commitment, but sometimes it’s just a rough draft. 

I spent two and a half years in a situationship with computer science, but now I am in a stable relationship with economics. Do I miss it? Sometimes. Do I regret leaving? No. 

Because at the end, your degree should challenge you and not emotionally drain you like a bad Tinder date. 

So here’s to choosing majors that treat us right…or at least don’t crash every time we hit “run”.