This will be long. I appreciate if you read it all, cause it's something that's very tough for me to talk about and I out a lot of emotion into it. If you don't want to, that's fine too lol. Just wanted to put it out there
Since kindergarten I was best friends with this girl. I'll call her Owl. Me and Owl were like glued together, inseparable. I'm autistic so for the majority of my childhood I never talked to any other kids, I was always "weird" and antisocial. It was a tough time for me. Autistic people here will understand. Owl was the one person it wasn't like that with. We both had wild imaginations, we did so much together, never ran out of things to do or say, like genuinely the best friendship you could ever ask for. We were always together. Every day at school. In kindergarten and then through elementary school, and then middle school too. When I was around 8-10 I got abused by someone but I never told my parents until years later. I actually just forgot about it for years, later found out that's called dissociative amnesia. It still gave me lots of problems. Looking back a lot of my mental issues started back then. That was not to mention that I was already autistic and that my family is just genetically mentally unstable. It's always been tense around them, even though we do have good and happy moments and I love them.
Then Covid happened. At that point I had the problems from the abuse, which were things like rudeness, anger issues, paranoia, trust issues, being really antisocial, always anxious. My family found it difficult with me being like this. The isolation from Covid amplified it by 10. I became REALLY toxic. When we returned to school a year later, Owl began having problems as well. She often talked about being suicidal, and that every Wednesday she would "attempt" (this was usually choking herself or something like that, but obviously it scared me). The thing with Owl was she was so much more open about it. She talked about it in class, with the teachers. Everyone knew. And everyone took her seriously. I forgot to mention that I had always felt very embarrassed about my suicidality and self harm at that point. I never mentioned it to any of the therapists my parents took me to. Seeing Owl be so open about it gave me courage, made me realise that it's NOT embarrassing, and that I can talk about it. But that had the opposite effect I thought it would. Because I began talking about only after Owl and the two of us were so close, I guess everyone assumed I just picked up from her. I was the second priority. Nobody took me quite as seriously. That made me so fucking mad and it STILL does, because her reason was so fucking stupid. It was because of GRADES FUCKING GRADES. I know I shouldn't undermine people's problems, but grades??? She had a perfect, supportive family, amazing childhood with no abuse. Now she's "suicidal" because she tries to choke herself once a week?? I'm sure she suffered too, she also had mental pain, but this feeling of being put in the shadows made me so fucking angry, and it still does. Her mom is very protective so when she found out she was put in a psych unit for a week. She got out, and was healed. Perfectly fine. Soon after I went to a psych unit too. And again, everyone was taking HER seriously. She would be taken out of school often, her tests didn't get graded all that, which is great because she felt a lot better and was healed. But nobody was taking me as seriously. That summer I plummeted down and became catatonic. I couldn't go to school anymore. I would randomly stop moving and talking. Basic things like leaving the house or taking a shower were so mentally exhausting they would make me go into an unresponsive state. I started going to psych units very often. I was diagnosed with BPD. Owl's mom decided I was a bad influence even before that, and cut off all contact with me and my family. After about 10 years of being the closest friends ever, they just pretended we didn't exist. She blocked me on Owl's phone and contacts. She didn't allow me at Owl's birthday party. When we saw each other at the birthday of another friend, she ignored me and my mom. Didn't even look at us. Only a few months ago I texted Owl again for her birthday after around 2 years of no contact. We don't talk often, and our conversations are usually short and superficial.
I think the biggest effect that left on me was always needing to show how bad my illness was. There was a big problem that I had been having for YEARS before mentioning it, and people didn't take me seriously. They took seriously my best friend with a perfect family who had ab existential crisis because of grades. And I hate this about myself. My stupid insecure ass always has to make it obvious just how bad my situation is. If someone I know starts talking about their own depression or what not, I start to panic and try to indirectly convince them that it's still worse for me. I pray that they don't go into a psych unit, that they don't get stitches for self harm like me. Sometimes I feel like maybe that's not because I care, but because my mind doesn't want to be in the same situation where I'm not taken as seriously because someone else has the same problem. Knowing I have it worse gives me a strange sense of security. This causes me to undermine people's suffering unconsciously. I still resent what happened. I know it's not Owl's fault, but it was way too painful being the second priority after being abused and living in a good but horribly tense and mentally ill family. I hate this about myself. I hate that this incident causes me to diminish other's suffering, and that it causes me to feel security through reassuring myself and others how terrible my pain is. I wish I wasn't like this. But you know what, I still really miss her. We had a really great childhood apart from that last year or so. I keep hoping maybe someday it might restore itself to how it was before
If you're still here, kudos to you. Thank you for reading this far. I appreciate it, cause this took me quite a while to write. I wish you a good day or night
Since kindergarten I was best friends with this girl. I'll call her Owl. Me and Owl were like glued together, inseparable. I'm autistic so for the majority of my childhood I never talked to any other kids, I was always "weird" and antisocial. It was a tough time for me. Autistic people here will understand. Owl was the one person it wasn't like that with. We both had wild imaginations, we did so much together, never ran out of things to do or say, like genuinely the best friendship you could ever ask for. We were always together. Every day at school. In kindergarten and then through elementary school, and then middle school too. When I was around 8-10 I got abused by someone but I never told my parents until years later. I actually just forgot about it for years, later found out that's called dissociative amnesia. It still gave me lots of problems. Looking back a lot of my mental issues started back then. That was not to mention that I was already autistic and that my family is just genetically mentally unstable. It's always been tense around them, even though we do have good and happy moments and I love them.
Then Covid happened. At that point I had the problems from the abuse, which were things like rudeness, anger issues, paranoia, trust issues, being really antisocial, always anxious. My family found it difficult with me being like this. The isolation from Covid amplified it by 10. I became REALLY toxic. When we returned to school a year later, Owl began having problems as well. She often talked about being suicidal, and that every Wednesday she would "attempt" (this was usually choking herself or something like that, but obviously it scared me). The thing with Owl was she was so much more open about it. She talked about it in class, with the teachers. Everyone knew. And everyone took her seriously. I forgot to mention that I had always felt very embarrassed about my suicidality and self harm at that point. I never mentioned it to any of the therapists my parents took me to. Seeing Owl be so open about it gave me courage, made me realise that it's NOT embarrassing, and that I can talk about it. But that had the opposite effect I thought it would. Because I began talking about only after Owl and the two of us were so close, I guess everyone assumed I just picked up from her. I was the second priority. Nobody took me quite as seriously. That made me so fucking mad and it STILL does, because her reason was so fucking stupid. It was because of GRADES FUCKING GRADES. I know I shouldn't undermine people's problems, but grades??? She had a perfect, supportive family, amazing childhood with no abuse. Now she's "suicidal" because she tries to choke herself once a week?? I'm sure she suffered too, she also had mental pain, but this feeling of being put in the shadows made me so fucking angry, and it still does. Her mom is very protective so when she found out she was put in a psych unit for a week. She got out, and was healed. Perfectly fine. Soon after I went to a psych unit too. And again, everyone was taking HER seriously. She would be taken out of school often, her tests didn't get graded all that, which is great because she felt a lot better and was healed. But nobody was taking me as seriously. That summer I plummeted down and became catatonic. I couldn't go to school anymore. I would randomly stop moving and talking. Basic things like leaving the house or taking a shower were so mentally exhausting they would make me go into an unresponsive state. I started going to psych units very often. I was diagnosed with BPD. Owl's mom decided I was a bad influence even before that, and cut off all contact with me and my family. After about 10 years of being the closest friends ever, they just pretended we didn't exist. She blocked me on Owl's phone and contacts. She didn't allow me at Owl's birthday party. When we saw each other at the birthday of another friend, she ignored me and my mom. Didn't even look at us. Only a few months ago I texted Owl again for her birthday after around 2 years of no contact. We don't talk often, and our conversations are usually short and superficial.
I think the biggest effect that left on me was always needing to show how bad my illness was. There was a big problem that I had been having for YEARS before mentioning it, and people didn't take me seriously. They took seriously my best friend with a perfect family who had ab existential crisis because of grades. And I hate this about myself. My stupid insecure ass always has to make it obvious just how bad my situation is. If someone I know starts talking about their own depression or what not, I start to panic and try to indirectly convince them that it's still worse for me. I pray that they don't go into a psych unit, that they don't get stitches for self harm like me. Sometimes I feel like maybe that's not because I care, but because my mind doesn't want to be in the same situation where I'm not taken as seriously because someone else has the same problem. Knowing I have it worse gives me a strange sense of security. This causes me to undermine people's suffering unconsciously. I still resent what happened. I know it's not Owl's fault, but it was way too painful being the second priority after being abused and living in a good but horribly tense and mentally ill family. I hate this about myself. I hate that this incident causes me to diminish other's suffering, and that it causes me to feel security through reassuring myself and others how terrible my pain is. I wish I wasn't like this. But you know what, I still really miss her. We had a really great childhood apart from that last year or so. I keep hoping maybe someday it might restore itself to how it was before
If you're still here, kudos to you. Thank you for reading this far. I appreciate it, cause this took me quite a while to write. I wish you a good day or night
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