Eighth grade year was a rollercoaster for me. It was my first year in high school. I went to an all girls Catholic high school, and the girls I went to school with were very catty. I became closed off again. I had a group of friends, but I still felt distant from everyone. I was very quiet, and I never spoke. One morning it was raining and my dad was bringing me to school. I got out the car, puddles hitting the bottom of my shoes, and ran towards the cafeteria. I sat by my group of friends, and all of a sudden my group of friends turned on me. They shut me out. They blocked me off the circle. I sat alone, outside the circle, and I watched them laugh. So, I got up, and I went to find my friend who was in choir with me.
She took me under her wing for the rest of the year. I was no longer in contact with my group of friends. Things only started to escalate from there.
A girl (let's call her -A) started to bully me. It was random in all honesty. I didn't know what I did. I started to think something was wrong with me. I couldn't find a break at home or at school. My parents were always arguing about money at home, and at school I was getting picked on, but I didn't let my parents know.
-A and her friend found a way to bully me in any way they could. They would make jokes in class, they would laugh at me in the hallways, and they even turned their whole group on me. I was alone. I felt like everyone was against me. I felt like I could do nothing right. Was something wrong with me? Were they picking on me because I never spoke? Was it because I was a Miley Cyrus fan? Was it because I never went to school dances? My self esteem started to decrease. I didn't feel confident in anything I did. I became socially anxious, and I started getting nervous over every little thing. I cried myself to sleep almost every night, and I didn't tell my parents what was going on. I didn't want them to have one more thing to stress about.
One night I went on formspring.me (yes, that used to be a thing). It was this website where people asked you questions and you answered them. -A and her friend started cyberbullying me. I was afraid. I was told to not go to school or something bad would happen. I was told ugly names and horrible things about me. Someone even wrote me saying that they wouldn't care if I died.
I became depressed. I felt like I didn't have a purpose. All these questions were running through my head. I was depressed from the moment I got out the car to go to school until the moment I got home. It was an every day routine for nine months. I felt like the world was turning against me. Was all this my fault? If I didn't exist, would the world be better?
I had to stay after school one day, and I was waiting for my mom to pick me up. I was sitting on a bench waiting for her to call me saying she's here. -A and her friend came to sit by me. They started to make fun of me, and the next thing I knew -A slapped me across the face and pushed me off the bench. I didn't cry. I tried my best to stay strong, and I tried to play it off, and then all of a sudden her friend took a dead lizard and threw it on me. I looked around and saw people laughing, and I saw a teacher who was standing by watching, and she didn't say a thing.
I walked away and went to find my friend in another building. We sat on a bench, and I cried my eyes out to her. I couldn't understand why they were being so mean. I constantly had to ask myself if something was wrong with me. What did I do? Why do these girls hate me so much? I had to leave. I couldn't be at this school.
When my mom picked me up I collected myself. She asked how my day was, and the next thing I know I broke down in the car. I told her what they did, and my mom was shocked. She said she'll call the principal which gave me even more anxiety. I began to panic. My hands started to sweat, my heart began to race, and my head began to pound. I was really crying. I immediately said, "No, mom. You cannot call the principal. It would just make things a lot worse. The principals daughter is in that group. You can't say anything! Please, don't say anything."
My parents took me out of the school, and they enrolled me in a new school for my ninth and tenth grade of high school. This school was a coed school, and I found myself doing better in a coed school than an all girls school.
Ninth grade was a good year for me. I didn't have any problems. The only problems I had were at home. My parents were constantly fighting at home, and I tried to tune them out, but it was impossible. They still went out drinking with their friends whenever they could. They would leave me and my siblings at home, and sometimes they would yell coming back home at five in the morning.
Tenth grade came around, and I found myself sad again. My house situation never changed. I felt like it was just getting worse. My parents were constantly on edge with each other. I remember my mom wouldn't let my dad in after work one night. He sat in his car all night, and he eventually fell asleep in his car. It was terrible to witness. I became overwhelmed at home. I went to school, came home, and still felt alone.
I remember being in a bad state of mind. I was blaming myself for everything. I would have suicidal thoughts. I wasn't myself. I had demons inside of me that I was fighting, and it was starting to get harder every day. I became really closed off. I always had a habit of throwing my emotions to the side and trying my best to stay happy. Eventually I hit a breaking point because I wouldn't deal with my emotions in the beginning. I knew what I was doing wasn't healthy. One night I was in my room, and I sat on my bed trying to figure out where in my life things started to go wrong. I felt like a burden to everyone. My thoughts were making me feel worse. Would anyone care if I was gone? I started tearing up, and that's when I discovered self harm. I went to sit on my floor, and I grabbed my scissors and started cutting my arms. I had to numb the pain, and harming myself just felt right.
I had school, and I wore my sweater all the time. I made sure I was still very happy in school because I couldn't let my friends know I was hurting inside. I couldn't let my sister know I was falling apart. I played it off well, and no one questioned me.
One night my parents had another argument. My mom went out, and my dad was coming home from work. My mom called me frantically saying, "Daddy is on his way home. I need you to take all my bras and anything else and hide them in your room. You need to hurry because he's almost there. Let me know when you're done." My heart started racing, and I felt sick to my stomach. I ran to my moms room and did what I was told. I was sixteen and still confused of why my parents acted like kids when they fought. I took everything I could and stayed in my room. I picked up my phone and called one of my good friends. Panicking I said, "I'm tired of doing this every day. It's getting to be hard. I'm not happy. My mom called me freaking out and she made me hide all of her belongings. I hid what I could. I'm just tired of living like this. I don't know what else to do. I feel like nothing I do is good enough."
She had no words. She knew how my parents were, but she didn't know they could act like this. She finally said, "I don't know what to say. I don't really want to get involved. You just have to try and stay strong. You can get through this. Don't let them tear you down."
When we got off the phone I walked in the living room. I saw my dad cutting the wires to my moms TV. When he was done he took my moms iPad, went outside, took a huge brick, and smashed it until it shattered. I quickly went to my room, closed my door, and cried myself to sleep.
The next day I collected myself for school. Guys started calling me fat, and I knew it wasn't true because I've been thin all my life. I started to watch what I ate. I went on four different diets for about five months. My mom started to get concerned. She said, "You shouldn't be watching your calories at this age. Going on all these diets can really harm you and it could turn into an eating disorder."
I didn't care. I didn't care about anything anymore. I stopped self harming for a while. I just felt numb, and to make it worse my mom dropped the bombshell that I was switching high schools-again. I was going back to an all girls high school for my junior and senior year. I became really nervous. I started to panic every day. What if the girls there treated me the way the girls did at my other school? What would I do?
My first week at my new school was the worst. I couldn't function. Everyone already knew everyone, and here I was trying to find my way around like a lost puppy. I eventually made friends, and I realized it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I actually found myself to enjoy it. When graduation rolled around in May of 2014, I knew my journey with high school was coming to a close.
Graduation night wasn't all that bad, except for the part when I had a panic attack and couldn't breathe the whole night. The room was spinning for hours, I felt pins and needles going into my head, my heart couldn't stop racing, and my hands and feet couldn't stop sweating. The girl sitting next to me congratulated me when I walked across the stage and came to sit back down. She said, "I'm so proud of you. I know you were really anxious, and you did it!" I was excited when the night was over, and I could go eat and lay down.
High school was a journey for me. I had a lot of downs, but I also had some good things happen. I learned a lot. I made some life long friends, and I survived. The important part for me was that I survived when I knew it was going to be hard. Where life planned on taking me next made me worry because I had no idea what was coming next.