Hi there friends. I’m noticing that I’m starting to internalize lots of things from my past. I also know that I’ve been very quiet recently on many platforms. So bare with me as this post will be a lot and very long.
For about the past 10 years I’ve been told that I’m the reason my dad left that one night when I was 6. I saw him leave so I was very sensitive to that, still kind of am, but not as much. As I was hurting it was easier to believe it when people said that I wasn’t good enough for him and I drove him away. All throughout elementary school the level of bullying that I experienced fluctuated. I became pretty quiet when it got bad, but was pretty bubbly otherwise. The worst part was people ignoring me and saying that I was the reason for the struggles my family was going through other than my dad leaving.
Fast forward to middle school where I thought that the blaming would stop. It didn’t stop, but it did lessen while jokes and stuff started ramping up. I had people going to my friends and telling them that they were making the biggest mistake being friends with me. They said that I would only bring them down. Some people listened to them and left me, but some stayed true to our friendship. It got so bad at one point that when I would walk through the hallway people would jump out of the way as to not get close to me. If they did bump me they would act like they touched something poisonous. I would go out to the courtyard after lunch and people would run away to the other side so that they weren’t close to me. The guys started coming up to me saying “This person likes you” (I won’t say names because that’s not needed). I stood up for myself a couple times, but I got talked down to by them. I would then get warnings from the staff because they only saw the part where I was talking. When I would try to explain myself they wouldn’t let me speak. So I stopped standing up to them and just let it happen. I told my parents, they talked to the administration, and nothing changed. When I tried my parents again I got met with “well the administration said that it was solved so don’t push it further”. I had told the administration that it was still going on just less and they told my parents that it was fixed. That’s when I knew I couldn’t go to them anymore. That wasn’t the first time the school did that and that fact that my parents believed the school more than their daughter hurt.
Fast forward again to high school. Freshman year people stopped avoiding me in the hallways so there was that. I thought that I was going to get a break for at least a semester, but within the first month I had jokes being thrown at me that were made in middle school. I was able to easily ignore those because I was so used to them, but then they started poking fun at what I enjoyed to do. I then had people saying that I wasn’t welcome there. That led to people telling me that I wasn’t worth it or that all I did was either hurt or annoy people. For a while it was once a week, but then ramped up to once a day. On days where it was after every class I would come home so hurt that I would either cry in my room until I couldn’t anymore or just sit on my bed not being able to feel anything. Sophomore year I was getting jokes and all that right off the bat. I was called nasty things and it got to be too much on top of beginning of school stress. I cut my wrist for the first time. It hurt for a bit, then stopped hurting after a minute or two. Nobody noticed even though it wasn’t that hard to miss. Finally a couple of my friends took me aside and talked to me. They listened to what I was thinking and going through. They supported me. They encouraged me. My dad was then diagnosed with cancer as a lot of you know. That fueled so many more jokes and stuff that I cut again 5 months after my first time. This time there was no pain. I saw the blood running and that was my only indicator that I had broken skin. I was so hurt and afraid that I couldn’t feel anything emotionally or physically at the time. My friends that supported me the first time were right there the next day at school to hear me out.
I haven’t cut since then, but I was thinking about it today. I’m just done with the turmoil going on inside. When I try to tell my parents that I feel like I need help because it’s getting to be too much I get told that I’m fine. I get told that it’ll pass and that there’s no reason to be worried. It’s getting to the point where I’m not bothered by the thoughts of self-harm anymore. I’m getting less and less bothered by the thoughts of death that cross my mind from time to time. When I showed my cuts I asked them “If I’m fine on the inside then where do you think these came from?” I got told that they came from cats or wood or something. I told them that I did that to myself because it made the pain on the inside go away and they didn’t believe me. So I’ve been reluctant to go to them with what I’m thinking because to them since there’s no evidence to show that I’m thinking this way it’s not true. This all stems mainly from my dad, but my mom does tell me these things sometimes. I don’t see my mom often enough to be burdened by these thoughts and emotions around her. I still have those friends supporting me and giving me a place to be able to just lean on them and cry if I need to. One of them knows the behaviors of my dad and knows that if I tried to do get help for myself without going through him while I live under his roof it wouldn’t end well for me emotionally. Just today I thought that I was gonna grab that blade and end my streak. I didn’t. I had someone I could talk to. I didn’t have that for so long. I feel like if it was that easy to almost break that next time I will. I don’t want that to happen. I want to stay clean. I fear the day that I can’t say that I’m clean. I’ve been clean from self-harm for 168 days. I have hope that I can continue to count for a very long time, but I have fear that I may not get to 200 days. My friends took the time to know me and listen to me. Know you guys know the real me and what I’ve gone through. Thank you for taking the time to read this enormous post. It means a lot to me. You guys are family. I feel at home here. I feel safe. Safer than in my actual house. I love you all. Thank you. 