SUBMISSION NO.1
I spent much of my life being told that to open up and talk about my feelings was an irrelevant thing. That to talk about what I felt was not a necessity. I was told countless times that crying was for the weak and feeble-minded. And when I did cry, I would be told that my tears were just crocodile tears: cries of a drama queen who wants attention.
I didn’t have a childhood as a result. All this by the one person who is supposed to love and cherish me. The one who gave birth to me and was supposed to raise me. Throughout much of my childhood, maybe starting when I was 4 or 5, I was depressed. I never told anybody. I smiled through the pain. If I wanted to cry, I'd wait till nobody was in the room to cry softly to myself. It was taboo: the crying, the feeling, the depression. Around middle school, it started to get worse. It was then the little voice in my head appeared. A quiet whisper that said “do it” or “it wouldn’t matter” or “you think anybody cares?”. I desperately wanted to tell somebody, but I couldn’t. I didn’t want anybody else involved. If they got involved, they might resent me, they could be threatened, and I never wanted that for anybody. As time flew, the voice got stronger and worse, compelling me to “end it”.
By the time I entered high school I was trashing myself. Cutting and telling myself that this was for the best. That little voice cheered me along. It was around this time that my treatment got worse. She would yell at me, point out my every flaw, call me names, call me fat, call me ugly. I would take it all in. She would then tell me how people who are depressed and suicidal are faking it, just for attention. I took it all in. It would elevate and on multiple occasions, I would get kicked out of the house because my mom would get angry at me for misplacing my phone, getting text messages, eating, getting 89% on tests, wanting friends, for not being the perfect daughter. When I came home happy, I would be berated with every reason why my happiness was irrelevant and why I should do everything in my power to make her happy. My mother wasn’t only horrid to me, but my dad and my eldest brother. Our life was a collective nightmare.
It wasn’t until one class period freshman year, we were had a class period dedicated to knowing our stories. I planed to tell the usual story: my life is so so, it's okay, I love my family, nothing bad. But the people before, they cried, they laughed, made jokes, they told their story. And when I went up to speak, that’s when it happened.
The first time I cried at school in 8 years. I let out just the surface and by the time I finished, I was a sobbing mess that felt 50 pounds lighter. Up until that point, I closed myself off from making friends because everything I cherished could be threatened and taken away from me. But people were crying with me. They came up to hug me and comfort me. I couldn’t stop myself from crying. I guess I was 8 years overdue.
I started going to school counseling and therapy in secret of my mother because if my mother found out, I don’t know what I would do. On October 18, CPS got involved. My mother basically wanted to disown me and I spent a whole week not at home except from 12-6 am. She lied to CPS and she rubbed salt in my wound every time she talks about it. I wanted to end it. I told myself that if I stopped eating, stopped talking to people, stopped being me, she would finally love me. But she never stopped and I still blame myself. I wrote letters and kept them in a drawer so, in the chances that I did it, it would be explained.
But I met real friends, people I could talk to. They cared. They listened. I could breathe a little better. I was opened to the world of listening and people who knew how to love. They became my family and escape. I stopped because of them. I tore up those letters because they convinced me I mattered. I became better, took up a job, learned so many aspects of friends my mom had “protected” me from. I still get yelled at, threatened to have my job taken away by her, forced to pay for her expensive meals when I've eaten nothing but a bowl of rice. But I know my friends are there to help me back up. I still avoid telling them the full story because what if she finds out, I'd be moved or worse: kicked out, disowned. I wake up every morning and fight my own head and my own flesh and blood. I sometimes wonder, if I hadn’t opened up, where would I be? Six feet under or swinging on the fan in my room?
On my worst days, I still think about doing it, but I’ve learned that regardless of how the world may treat you, to be heard, to be understood, to interact with people who know how to love, to feel safe at school, that means the world. I know my world will never stop trying to drown me, but I know that there will be people there to help me, to pull me out and make me laugh and smile.