ah, i’m not sure if this needs a TW. there’s brief mentioning of selfharm and a suicide attempt (not mine) though. also didn’t check for any spelling errors, so bear with me lmao
i remembered some stuff yesterday and i think i may have finally figured out what kickstarted my anxiety of school.
when i was in 4th grade maybe, one of my classmates choked me to the point i couldn’t breathe anymore. no one tried to stop him. several years later, and i’m still scared of him. fun.
it must’ve been towards the end of 5th grade, according to my mom; I got locked in the school washroom by older people for maybe 10 minutes, during lunch break. i didnt know them. they laughed at me, told me the janitor came by and locked the door. they had pushed a trashcan, that was right next to the washroom under the door handle. i cried and i think i had my first panic attack in that moment.
up until that moment i had never liked school, but from there on everything just got worse. my cousin joined our class; we didn’t have a good relationship at all. he’s a compulsive liar, just like his mom. i think i started to slowly develop depression in 6th grade.
In 7th it all only went downhill. all the stress made me get sick every now and then. my circle of friends had a lot of fights that carried over into 8th grade. things started to get bad at home, because i didn’t want to go to school anymore. i had no place to feel safe anymore. everywhere was a nightmare. i think around that time i started to cut myself for the first time.
cue 9th grade; the fights at school have calmed down. but the panic was still there. i barely went to school anymore. i was sick at least once a week now. my mom and i only got into fights. i was actively struggling with self harm now. one day i snapped at my friends, because they had another fight over absolutely nothing. i was crying and just fed up with everything. my one friend approached me, reaching out to touch me. but i just shook my head, i didn’t want to be touched now. she got angry and stormed off.
10th grade and the lockdown came. i was so relieved at first but it didn’t help me either. i had breakdown after breakdown, now that i was finally able to stay home. i tried continuing the school work the teachers gave us, but it was nearly impossible. i was too much of a wreck and had some heavy fights with my mom over it. multiple times i got so scared i had to lock myself in our bathroom and desperately try to not have a panic attack. my mom would bang against the doors, yelling at me to quit hiding and crying and continue my damn school work. i completely stopped going to school the second semester, after a very bad anxiety attack on the first day that i tried going back and a terrible fight with my mom over it. i just couldn’t do it anymore.
i got guilted into letting myself be admitted to a mental hospital, by my mother. though i left after a week and a half, because it really just made everything worse for me. i’m a very sensitive and introverted person; i need my space and my quiet time, which i absolutely did not have there. i easily pick up on peoples emotions and they impact me on top of my own, so i was basically miserable due to my own bullshit and then also because of how everyone around me felt. we tried to make arrangements for it, but they didn’t help me and when my roommate had the blame for her suicide attempt put on her, every little bit of trust i had for these people basically evaporated. i did not get a good night rest throughout the week and a half i was there, because of my hearing disability. i had to sleep with one hearing aid in, because i wouldn’t have heard the alarm otherwise at all, but it made me wake up a lot with every little noise there was.
I’m in 11th grade now and have only attended one day in the entire semester so far. i’m on sick leave now, until this school year is over.
A quarter year ago my mom fell very ill and was completely bedridden up until a couple weeks ago. my dad works 5 days of the week from early morning to evening. i was taking care of my mom throughout that time, cooking and taking care of the house. i had a few important appointments i couldn’t miss and a few of them were with my psychiatrist. he’s a man i don’t like to be around; he makes me very uncomfortable and anxious just with his presence. we had come to the agreement I would he put on anti depressants, though that was put on ice due to my mom’s sudden illness. he wasn’t happy with that, which is understandable, though the way he voiced this had me want to leave the room right there and then. he would not understand that at the moment, given all circumstances, i couldn’t get an EKG scheduled. i don’t live a city. i live in a tiny village with no bus connection to begin with, except school busses, and my anxiety makes it nearly impossible for me to take one anyways. last time my dad nearly lost his cool, trying to explain how at the moment things just couldn’t be done the way my psychiatrist wanted them.
i’ve still left a lot of stuff out, because otherwise i would still be writing tomorrow. today was a difficult day for me but i managed to not give in and relapse, so I’m proud of that. 1 month, 3 days and 23 hours :]
I am so proud of you for remaining strong and not relapsing. You are doing so well and I know you can keep it up. You’ve got this!