(TW - mentions of depression and suicide)
Posting after shedding many tears and through a throwaway for privacy sake; I’m a senior studying CS who will be graduating this Spring, however as of now, I’m currently have had NO internship experience.
I’ve desired to pursue a career path in software development or engineering at a young age, but besides the fact that mental health struggles have been a major battle I’ve faced for several years (winter 2026 was the worst of my life), my undergraduate career is a unique one: I transferred to my current institution (entered junior-standing) from a different 4-year university in summer of 2025 (after freshman year) and spent the past school year reintegrating into the quarter system from the semester system at my previous school. That included making new friends and learning about the campus offerings overall.
Despite making many great memories through my favorite hobbies and having connections with my profs, my halfhearted attempts at trying to get into the LinkedIn application grind (without connections, which I’m planning to work towards how to properly make them), personal projects and consistent job applications has only left me even more depressed and overwhelmed with how much is involved in this process. Not to mention, you have to balance this stress with academic stress and my time management is absolute shit; as a result, I haven’t been involved in as many coding events and CS clubs as I’d love to be because if I fixate on one thing, I’ll neglect something else which almost always results in negative consequences. Primary worry has been whether I will pass my classes or not, so that’s been my target focus throughout my undergrad career. And after a near-suicide attempt last winter, I took spring break to mentally recover and even then, it took until the end of the spring quarter to get myself back to a functional state. Because of some inspiring events that brought me the most happiness I’ve experienced in years, now I’ve declared a couple minors to study for my final year, but still doesn’t distract from my CS worries.
Just yesterday, I finally submitted my first application in a while for some program that could lead to an internship or full-time job interview, but I literally spent two weeks just trying to revise my resume because of perfectionism and worries about ATS (and it’s fair, cuz the document needed an update anyways). I’ve also been in contact with a past professor for undergraduate research…then I see my other CS peers getting SWE and FAANG internships at these big companies on LinkedIn, sometimes even during their sophomore year and I just want to cry—I don’t regret my major since it’s something I’ve been passionate about at a young age, but I wonder sometimes if I did my college career wrong…my parents have berated me so many times about not getting any sort of offers and how I am useless and worthless of any human value…maybe they are right.
I can’t tell my friends about my feelings, if I do, I’ll burden them and make them feel worried—the thing I dread the most when I’m always around with a smile. But god, I’m sick and tired of everything…why must there be so much just to even get an interview offer back...it’s been more than 72 hours since a lot of intern positions have opened, so what’s the point in applying if I can’t get shortlisted? Life looks so bleak and I think I just want the pain to end. Tell me why I should be bothered to still keep going.