I am usually on the Asthma boards of this forum, but I'm so depressed and alone right now.

I am 43 years old and have severe asthma. I have been sick for weeks, with wheezing, shortness of breath, chest tightness, coughing, etc. I am on many medications for my condition. I also have been diagnosed as being bipolar II and depressed and have hypothyroidism and type II diabetes.

I have over $250,000 in student loan debt hanging over my head. My monthly payments on student loans alone totals almost $2000, and that's on a graduated payment system. I went to law school and have a law degree, but I didn't pass the Bar exam in my state and so can't work as an attorney. The bipolar diagnosis doesn't help much in the work department either. I also went to graduate school to become a counselor (how ironic!) but I did not finish. I have been trying to go back to school for health information technology, so I can work as a medical biller and coder, but I don't really have any interest in the career. It would just be a way to pay my loans. (It would only pay about $22,000 a year, which doesn't help much with my debt load.) Now I don't know if I'll even be able to go back to school, much less work.

I don't know what to do. I've dug myself a hole and now I have to lie in it. I've got all this student loan debt, and now I'm sick, and I don't know how I'll ever pay it back. I am married, but my husband is of no help or comfort at all. He just says that he doesn't exactly feel healthy either, and that he doesn't want to go to work, but that's the way life is and I'd better just suck it up.

I feel so alone-no one else could possibly have been stupid enough to rack up so much student loan debt. I feel hopeless, like there is no way out of this mess. I don't know where to turn. I am sorry if I sound like I'm wallowing in self-pity. I just feel as if I'm at the bottom of a pit, and there's no way out.