This exact same situation happened to me, it seems very common. I got soooo lazy. It's very difficult to adjust to living on your own, in terms of running your own life, motivating yourself, plus work is kinda harder once you hit college, so it's a lot at once. Plus it's the first time you're free from parental supervision, so it's verrrrrry difficult to be focused, so just know that this is a big step you're adjusting to and a lot of normal people kinda have a freshman burnout crisis.
First, I would say if you're having any issues with excessive drinking/drug use that's sort of causing the crisis, try to stop that entirely if possible and get help if necessary. Marijuana and alcohol really sabotaged my attention and kept me stuck in a total doom spiral on top of the situation you describe, so that's not good.
Second, I would agree with Yotaka, what you need right now is a caring, helpful adult to help you get under control. If I were in this situation again, I would carefully pick someone older and responsible to open up to and help me solve my problem. Otherwise you're just trying to manage it on your own, and it's just so overwhelming, you feel so tired, guilty, it's too much for anybody to manage. Try to find some adult who, if you're really struggling, will sit and listen to you cry. Maybe it's a teaching assistant, or a teacher, or advisor. Meet in person over Zoom, because you need support, online interactions don't stop you from feeling isolated.
Also important to know is a lot of campus mental health services are abysmal and useless, so try it out but don't necessarily count on it.
That older person is just who you need to help get you sorted. I would also try to just tell some person on campus so you don't feel alone and have someone to talk to.
Try to start going to bed and waking up on time, try to go to class, all that. But also bottom line BIG ADVICE I wish I had followed- if you can't easily fix this on your own, prepare to share it with your parents that you're struggling. The earlier you do it the more understanding they'll be, and the longer you wait and hide it, the more likely they'll be somewhat upset, because if you are struggling, assuming they want the best for you, they'd want you to get help with that as soon as possible.
I know it feels like if you tell your parents you're messing up in school, you will literally die, it feels like the biggest blackest doom thing that you want to avoid at all costs. That's why I recommend finding some adult on campus who you can befriend and be pretty open with and is really a nice person and will support you. That's kind of rare to come by, but try to pick a good one, just someone who seems nice, maybe a counselor, maybe a TA. And maybe this person can help you talk to your parents, because it will show that you're serious about changing things, but you're generally overwhelmed and struggling, and they'll believe it and be less mad if you involve a responsible adult who can defend you and sees this a lot and will back you up.
Like straight up, tell the counselor I'm worried about flunking out/getting put on probation, and I'm absolutely terrified about telling my parents, and see what they say.
Now, I would avoid bothering your parents by crying to them that you're totally failing IF POSSIBLE, with help and discipline on your own. It is a real hassle to go through this confession with your parents because they'll trust you less for a while potentially, and it's just a pain to work to restore your reputation. BUT it's a BIGGER pain to try to restore your parents' trust after hiding academic difficulty for a long time while wasting more and more of their money. Don't avoid telling your parents out of fear of confrontation and waste their money in the process. Don't snitch on yourself if you really can avoid it, but be smart, you might have to at some point. I think I wish I had gotten the third party adult to confide in about my problems, because it feels like a tsunami of fear to deal with this on your own or just with your parents.
Another thing with missing classes is- be afraid of how quickly your patience for doing school diminishes. Assuming you had to try in high school to get into college, maybe not, but regardless it's important to know: Just a few months of not doing school makes it exponentially harder to get the motivation and discipline to go back and keep up with school tasks. You (you meaning all humans) get soooo lazy soooo quickly. Once you've tasted not doing school, it becomes much harder to start it up again. Be aware of that, the rate of decay is insane. Try just showing up to class and being present, don't put pressure on yourself to take notes or understand, but start with the baby step of showing up and casually listening.
But seriously, to summarize, this situation is a ticking time bomb because of how much harder it gets to do school again the longer you don't do it, and also if you wait too long to tell your parents or otherwise resolve things, that also makes it corresponding degrees of worse. You are probably just overwhelmed with stress, guilt, exhaustion, sloth, and it's just very very difficult. Take a breath, you're not a bad person or anything, this burnout is really common. Like just forgive yourself for being in a hard situation. Be easy on yourself and don't carry a big weight on yourself for this. But also, don't avoid, seek some way to get out of this pit you're kinda stuck in right now, and I think the easiest way is to be honest with someone who will help you manage this very overwhelming situation. It's scary to be honest, but you'll be relieved. Don't hide and avoid, it's getting worse if you do that more. Find a chill TA, teacher or counselor, and just say, "hey I am kind of struggling academically and could really use some help to navigate it". And someone will really want to help, and you feel crushed anymore by having it all on your back. Find someone nice though who seems like they give a fuck and will relate to you as a person and not a number. Take action to solve this bad feeling you're in.
The alternative is what I did, where I just told no one, became terminally depressed and stressed out, and literally went insane, because I was too ashamed and scared to tell anyone, and couldn't admit to myself that it was just too much to try and fix on my own. I made good efforts to hustle and fix it on my own, but it's not necessary. You went from being a child living at home with your family to protect you to a scary, overwhelming, independence. This crashout is so normal and understandable in that respect. If your parents aren't crazy they'll understand, assuming you really want to turn things around. It's also possible you just don't want to do college, which might be the case, idk if you're one of those people for whom the whole childhood was based around college.
Definitely rambling, but in summary- just try not to hold this struggle all inside of yourself and manage it by yourself, don't do nothing about it, talk to someone so you can at least get the awful feeling off your chest and think a little more clearly (world of difference, just do it), and last resort- talk to your parents with third party if that's necessary. I get trying to fix it before your parents find out, but if that's not going to be possible, don't prolong it more than necessary.
