Posted 9/15/2005 12:37 AM (GMT 0)
Alright, i'm not sure what i'm going to say here. I've been depressed on and off since I was pretty young, about 10, when my father was killed. However, that seemed normal, and I was never in any constant state of depression. It was just when I had to think about it. I had a few really great years in middle school and my Freshman year of high school. I had some of the greatest friends anyone could ask for, and I never really felt all that sad. Then I moved halfway through my Sophomore year, to a nearby town. It didn't seem like a bad thing, I was actually looking forward to it. I wasn't far from my friends, and i'd be going to a better school. As someone who is very intelligent and had always wished for a better opportunity to learn than the school I was at, that was a great thing.
However, since i've moved I just haven't been able to express myself. Even the simplest conversations seem like huge tasks. It's not that people are cruel to me, they're not. The people in the neighborhood are always trying to talk to me, but I just can't think of anything to say. I've never been extremely outgoing, but I used to be a very opinionated and fun person, I certainly never had problems talking. I can't even do that now, no matter how hard I try to be outgoing or form relationships with these new people, I just feel awkward. None of them have a whole lot in common with me, i'm a year or more ahead of most of the people in the neighborhood. Those that might, I just haven't been able to approach. I spend the vast majority of my time now on the computer, and the problem is it's nothing new. I've always enjoyed computers, and so nobody is realizing how sad I am. I talk to my old friends all the time on the computer and that makes me feel great, but I certainly don't want to ruin that by talking about how sad I am. We were never that kind of person anyway, we mocked those kinds of people. We didn't understand how people could let themselves become like this.
I feel like I can't talk to my grandparents about it because it's far too uncomfortable. It wouldn't feel right with my grandfather, and my grandmother takes things way too hard, or just gets the wrong impression. She'd either think it was some phase I was going to, or if she realized it was serious, she'd never forgive herself for not noticing. All that would do is make two sad people. I have no real friends anymore, just people who are friendly to me. Certainly not the kind of relationships to discuss something like this. I'm a junior now, i've been at this school almost a full school year and can't find anyone I feel comfortable talking to. It's getting worse, too. I should be, according to test scores, a straight A genius student. I've always been a bit of a slacker, but done well enough to get by. Like, Bs. Now I'm getting almost straight Cs, and it has gotten gradually worse and worse. This adds the stress of trying to get my grades up and I feel overwhelmed. I snap at my parents and say things I don't even have a reason for. I'm not making up cruel things to say, but I constantly get frustrated about something and pick away at their flaws. I've probably made them feel terrible and I don't want to. I don't even think about it, or remember why I did it an hour later. I don't want to do that. They've been the nicest people to me in my entire life. They've raised me since I was a small child when my father and mother couldn't handle it. Even more recently when I was reintroduced to my mother who I hadn't seen since childhood, I couldn't bring myself to bond with her, and I could tell she was trying. She's made some terrible mistakes but she really tried to form a relationship with me and I just didn't let her. She gave me a calling card to call her with and I never do. We haven't spoken in over a year now. The only two strong relationships I have with people I see regularly are with my aunt and her girlfriend. I grew up with my aunt, and idolized her, she's the closest person to me in the world and now she's found the most wonderful person. It's the best thing that's ever happened to her, and I bond with this person too, we have a lot in common including political views and computer knowledge. Not to mention, she's extremely intelligent and we bonded over that. They're probably the only people who keep me going at school because they know how much potential I have and expect so much from me, so I don't want to disappoint them, but I am. They're moving away to Massachusetts in April, because one of them got a job at Harvard University. I'm supposed to move in with them when I graduate so I can go to college up there, but I feel like at the rate i'm going now i'd be lucky to get into a community college. It's a similar situation there as with my old friends, when i'm around them i'm the happiest person in the world. I don't think to, or don't want to, discuss those things around them.
I do well at putting on a mask. It's true that I don't talk to anyone anymore other than the casual hello or when I talk about school work, but I don't think anyone could see how sad I am. They just think I don't talk a lot. That's not true, I used to be full of conversation. I don't know what it is or why, but even when I find people I have things in common with I just can't have a decent conversation with a new person.
I feel like I might want to move back to my old school, but if I did that, not only would I lose a great school but some of my old friends went to a special academy for gifted students this year, so it wouldn't be the same. There's pretty much one close friend left there anyway, and that is my best friend. I haven't seen him in forever though, we talk on the internet sometimes and he seems so happy, he wants to get together sometime but it never fits into either of our schedules.
I just can't seem to catch a break, or perhaps it's that I don't give myself one. The only person i'd feel 100% comfortable talking to is my father, and I can't do that. I was just starting to form a great relationship with him when he died, and we're very similar people. I feel like because of that I might have even built him up to this god-like status in my mind that he wasn't.
I've covered a thousand different problems and it's pretty all over the place, but i'll come back later and try and make sense of all of this. I just don't know who to talk to about it, or what to do. Today was a really bad day (and for no reason in particular, I just felt sad the entire day) and I had planned to throw it all out there with my grandmother tonight but I just couldn't do it, so I looked around for some place where I could just get all of this out. I guess that's a start.