Am I wasting my time going for TS?
I was in grad school smoking too much weed to cope with depression during the pandemic. I ended up 5150'ed in inpatient psychiatric care. Undiagnosed bipolar. 2 years later I'm on the right meds, make the deans list for my MBA, become a data scientist and genuinely want to do good for our country. I quit smoking weed for about 8 months, relapsed maybe 3 months ago, but went sober again in January and feel great. No cravings or anything like that, hitting the gym every morning, even stopped drinking socially. Maybe 1 beer a week but I don't even want it since i've gotten into noticeably great shape. On one occasion in the last 6 months I took a harder recreational drug.
My old boss is the COO at a data company doing implementation for three letter agencies. I have a second interview tomorrow. Although I don't necessarily NEED TS, it would be harder for me to work with the data without it.
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I appreciate the candid feedback! If anyone can give me more insight into why their experiences lead them to believe this, please share as well. For context, I am making six figures in a pretty cool job already. This new opportunity popped up so I thought I would explore it!
Further questions:
- If not TS, is there another kind of clearance I might consider?
- Technically the 'relapse' was delta 8 and 'legal' cannabis in my state. Actual weed was only a couple of times when I went back to visit my home state where it is legal.
- What is the timeline where it might be more reasonable to say it's all behind me? 3 years out?
To be clear the 5150 is kind of BS because I walked myself into a hospital and was like 'something's not right with me.' So the 'involuntary' aspect is really dumb.