"Really?"

I'm 17. In the eyes of many I seem like nothing; and perhaps I am. Chances are you'll read this and will then follow the next link (or not even finish this paragraph), and quite frankly I do the exact same. We don't actually ever sit back and look at people for who they are. I mean if we had the oppertunity to sit down with one person and openly listen to them tell their story, people's eyes would change from focusing on themselves to focusing on others. For example when you see someone walking down the street, do you ever ask yourself, 'I wonder what he's been through?' But I'm not here to preach, I'm here to tell a story.

It began July 2011. I fell in love with a girl; Jane. She seemed so friendly on the outside and happy not to mention she was beautiful. But I had no idea how to get her attention. For weeks I struggled with feelings for her but always being to shy to approach her. Then they slowly faded and for a while I completely forgot about her. Jane was gone and I wasn't obssesing over her anymore. Then one day in November I accidentally clicked her instead of my friend and wound up sending her a message. We ended up talking for only 15 minutes but in that time all my old feelings flooded back. Through December and January I grew some balls and forced myself to talk to her. We began confiding in eachother and our relationship grew.

February 24th, 2012. That was the day I first kissed her. I couldn't stop thinking about it as I walked home. It felt magical, my head was spinning and I couldn't believe I'd actually gotten a girl to like me. I was on top of the world.

February 26th rolled around and she left town on a family vacation. She asked me to look after there house. I don't know if I regret or am glad about my actions but I went into her room a took a quick look around. I found 2 things. One, absolutely nothing about me. Two, she was with another boy, and they were frequently having sex.

My world fell apart. It may seem over dramatic but up until then I'd lived a very sheltered life. I lost my innocence. I stood on top of a school rooftop for hours begging to have the will power to jump. But as I'd step on the edge something always tugged me back.

My parents quickly noticed and had me go see a therapist. I remember for the entire first session I didn't say a word. Two times in the following week I had to go see a crisis nurse because I wanted to end it all.

Then she came back. I hadn't been at school for three weeks and she quickly noticed that I wasn't talking to her. She begged me to talk to her so finally one night I went and told her everything. At first she denied it. Then tried to lie and say it wasn't ALL true. Either way I wanted it to be over; but it wasn't.

Somehow over the course of 2 months we were dating again. I felt happy on the surface but deep down I was rotting away. Our relationship turned sexul very fast, something that I deeply regret. But nonetheless we were faithful to eachother and seemingly happy.

Then I got the s**t kicked out of me.

He ex-boyfriend found me with one of his friends and knocked me cold out. Jane, her ex and I all go to the same school and to this day he still makes a point of "bumping" into me in the hallways.

Jane felt horrible and said she'd talk to him but I said it didn't matter.Life moves on; and it did.

Meanwhile, I'd been going regularly to theray and mental health clinics. I was perscribed anti-depressants and it was announced to my family that I had clinical depression, severe anxiety and most likely (my favourite) ADHD. Suddenly A LOT about my childhood made sense to my parents.

Summer came along and things looked alright. Jane and I were in a good place and I was about to be awarded for a piece of music I'd written. July 21st was my ceremony and it was brilliant, Jane was so proud of me and my parents were beaming. Life was good.

Until August came and fucked me.

Jane left for B.C to visit her cousins for three weeks. The cousins that were notorious for one-night stands, drinking, and partying beyond common sense. To put it simply, I got 2 emails from Jane in the three weeks she was gone, both saying I wish you were here is suuuuper fun, luv ya hun. I felt reasonably pissed off so one night I skyped her and got upset. She ended up crying to which one of her cousins came in, told me to f**k off and shut the computer. I felt terrible for having ruined her vacation, so I decided to get her a gift.

I gave her a promise ring. S**t.

We eventually made up as we always did. Then one night for no clear reason I had a panic attack. Esentially what happened; I was in my basement, started hyperventalating and then came too on a street 5 blocks from my house. Fair to say my parents were freaked out, to the point actually that for the next 2 night I had to sleep in there walk-in closet. (It's ok if you laughed at that, I still do)

For a couple weeks after that my parents wouldn't let me out of their sight. The feeling of insecurity led me to do something I've only done 3 times. I cut myself. I wont describe the sensation it gave but I do know thatthe scars it left on my body will be there forever.

Jane was freaked out and told me it anything happened to me she would comitt suicide. (not the best way to show affection ladies) Anyways, summer had ended and school was here again. But October 2012 Jane had developed into a needy, semi-psychotic girlfriend. If I didn't reply she'd assume I was cutting her out (to which she'd send me pictures of herself crying/cutting herself) And if we didn't hang out at least everyother day she'd send my long emails about how I'm unfaithful. Needless to say I was depressed.

So I did the only rational thing I could do. Late December 2012 I finally sat my parents down and told them the whole story. They were angry at me for not being honest, upset that I let things get so bad with Jane, and concerned about my mental health. At the end they told me I should break things off, because she was bringing me down to an "unsafe" level. And so I did.

The thing that killed me was her looking directly in my eyes and saying, "I will NEVER get over you." I think it hurt so much because I had been over Jane for the past month. But I got through it, and finally felt at ease.

But we still have the rest of January and early February of 2013.

Mid-January an old friend and I went to go snowboarding. We had an amazing day and I really felt a strong connection with him. On our way home we stopped to grab something to eat and while we were inside it started snowing. We continued our 3 hour drive home at about 12:30pm. The roads were packed with snow. I'm sure you've guessed it. We swerved off the road and smashed into a telephone pole in a ditch.

I spent 2 nights in the hospital severly concussed. The doctores were afraid I had a blood clot close to my brain. (I think an actor died skiing because of one...something like that) Anyways I also broke my foot so that was fun. But as I've learned life still goes on.

Throughout all my appointments and Jane and just not feeling up to it, my social life had pretty much vanished. I never considered myself popular but I did have friends. When the realization hit me that none of them had even noticed all the s**t going on with me I felt alone.

Then my fish died, but let's face it, most people don't care about fish. Maybe I should have said it was a dog. Yeah, pretend it was a dog.

To make things worse in my 4th period class I started liking another girl; Jenna. But I forced my feelings for her on the back burner. But you know when something just keeps shoving itself at you? Well life kept shoving Jenna at me; not that I really minded.

And now we hit February 2013. Finally being declard fully fit by my doctor was a victory. I no longer have a class with Jenna so she's not constantly on my mind. But life's not perfect.

On the 10th of the month I fell down the stairs. Funny enough and I DID laugh about it as I got up. But when I got up I noticed my heart was racing. For the next 45 minutes I walked around, I drank water, I did yoga breathing but it wouldn't stop. So my dad brought me to the hospital. My heart rate was 250bpm (beats per minute, that's 4 beats per second. Average heart rate is just over 70bpm) the doctors had to literally STOP my heart twice. Some could now officialy call me a zombie since I had no pulse for a few seconds. Anyways I had another lovely 2 day stay at the hospital.

When I got out I found about 50 texts on my phone from facebook.

Jane is back with her old boyfriend.

But life goes on.

The point of this isn't to sound whiney or get pity. The point is to say "Look at how fucked up life is!!!" in the last year my life has been so up and down. We don't know the full story of other people but if we did we'd all be a hell of a lot more sympathetic to eachother. Hell if I asked Jane to write something like this you'd probably hear a completely different story. So I guess what I'm saying is the next time you get the chance and ask someone "Hey, how are you?" and they respond with the cliche "I'm fine." Look them dead in the eye and ask, "Really?"