Life. Is. Not. Fair.

I have been fighting with my parents for weeks now. All along I have been planning to go to U of I. I signed up for classes, talked to my roommate, and bought dorm stuff. However, my family cannot afford college- at all and my financial aid was pretty crappy. Two grants, two federal loans, and one university loan still only covered about half the total cost for a year. But I decided, it would be totally worth it to go and I was completely willing to take out a private loan to the amount of $15,000. Private loans are something to be scared of. Variable interest rates, fees, and co-signers are not things to be taken lightly. So my parents have been trying to convince me to go to community college for the first two years- WHICH I REALLY DON'T WANT TO DO!!! So I was going to go through the grueling process of asking a relative of mine to co-sign my loan for me because my parents' credit isn't good enough. It was a tough decision to make, and I did consider community college, in the end I made a pro/con list, made a system to rate it and in the end the scores were U of I: 7, community college: -3.

Well, today I get an e-mail. One of my grants, provided be the lovely state of Illinois, wasn't budgeted enough money and now everyone with that grant only gets it for fall semester, not spring. And now, with another $2000 left unaccounted for, I just don't see how it's going happen. I'm in tears right now. I really wanted to go to U of I this year. It's going to be like putting a knife through my heart to go head and cancel all my U of I stuff and call the community college. But I don't see how I have a choice.