This is Home Chapter 2: Taking the Abuse

This is Home Chapter 2: Taking the Abuse

            Prior to my experience I was dealing with and suffering from depression and very bad social anxiety.  Along with these I was dealing with many outside conflicts regarding who I had chosen as my friends.  These people were not the ones that I wanted in my life.  They would complain about me when I wasn’t around.  They would trash about me behind my back.  They would lie to me.  They would constantly exclude me from things, but yet I still knew that this wasn’t who they were.  At least I didn’t want to believe that it was who they were.

            I had always known them to be my strength and to be the ones that would help me when I was down and I would in return do the same for them.  I knew them to be the people that I could pal around with and be “myself” even though I knew in my heart that that wasn’t who I was.  I was the one that didn’t fit in and they all knew that.  Maybe they tried to get rid of me or maybe it was unintentional.

            They knew everything about me.  They had seen me at my best and worst and had helped me through all the hard times, but now they weren’t there.  When I most needed them they had vanished from my life.  I had lost connection and when we did speak it was only harsh words that brought me back to the reality of the situation.  I knew that they weren’t who they used to be.

            When I needed them the most they weren’t there.  I didn’t have anyone to replace them with either.  I was alone or so I thought at least.  It was like everything had crashed around me.  All these strong solid walls I had built were being demolished right before my eyes, and I couldn’t do anything about it.  My friends were gone, my boyfriend had left, and it appeared as though I was alone.

            The one I had done so much for and in return he had done the same was gone now.  He couldn’t deal with my depression and my constant low self-esteem.  He didn’t try to help me.  He only got mad at me so I decided he wasn’t what I needed.  No one was what I needed.  I had decided that I only needed to be alone.  Unfortunately for me that was the last thing I needed.   I had grown used to being alone and all the emptiness I felt in my heart as it became heavier and too much to carry.  I was used to crying alone in the darkness of my room giving myself terrible headaches which would often return during school.  Sometimes I think to myself if things might have been different if I had people that I could depend on.  Unfortunately they didn’t enter my life until after I had done the worst.

            I needed to surround myself with loving people that cared about me, but at the time I didn’t think such a person existed.  I was very wrong, but at the time all I could think about was how to make the pain ease.  The pain of being abandoned once again and feeling alone was stronger than ever before at this time.  The one two faced friend I had left was talking to me on the night I decided I was going to try and do it.  I was torturing myself emotionally thinking no one loved me and I was abusing myself physically.  I can say that I at least owe him that much credit.  If he had not been there for me that night I might not have been alive to write this.  That was my mistake because what was to come months later changed my life.

            I was completely set on dying.  I thought it might give me an escape from all the crap of each day.  I knew how my friends had done it in the past and how I had always been there to help them when they needed to talk, but for me I was on my own.  I was alone.  I never knew at this time that the whole time I was never truly alone.  It was before I realized that I had people that loved me and that people could come to like me.  I knew that it wasn’t the answer as I had told so many people the previous years but it was all I could think about. I brought a pair with me to school every day in case I needed them.  I was constantly in the bathroom crying alone just hoping someone would find me.  I have gotten so good at silently weeping that people could be in the same room as me and I could be crying and they wouldn’t know unless they saw me.

            Some of the only people that reached out to help me were a school psychologist that I talked to on occasion when I just needed to cry after I realized putting an end to it all wasn’t the answer I was looking for.  A few of my teachers knew I was talking to the psychologist and offered to help or to just listen if I needed to talk, but how do you tell a teacher something like that?  You couldn’t just say “I tried to commit suicide a while ago…”  How do you communicate that to someone?  So I didn’t.

            During this time in my life I felt more alone then I ever had felt before because I became lost in my own thoughts since I couldn’t say them outloud.  I was down at the bottom and I couldn’t see any way out of the darkness.  What was worse was that I let everything get to me.  I let myself fall into the trap and didn’t seek any help.  Who was there to help me?  My friends weren’t, my parents were unaware of the situation until a while later so who else did I have?  Although I was dumb to think that I was alone.  It took me a while to find my place and the people that I belong near and am worthy of knowing, but I feel as though I found it.  I found the place for me to call home.

Author's Note

The main part of what will most likely be my retreat speech. I love constructive criticism so go ahead and critique! Next section will be the last. Like I said it's short and in the last section I will try and make it meaningful to my retreat family.