Warning, very long post ahead. Serious matter.

Thanks for the well wishes I got. I'm feeling better today, I don't know what was wrong yesterday since I felt fine in the morning but after lunch I just started feeling crappy. It also probably didn't help that I only got about four/four and a half hour of sleep the night before. My body just wasn't feeling tired I suppose as I didn't fall asleep until close to 3, and at 7am my body (with help from my siblings running around trying to catch the bus) woke up and just would not go back to sleep for a few hours. Oh well. I slept well last night to make up for it. And I had a very nice dream (NO NOT that kind of dream!). But anyway, I am back and feeling more "bloggy" today.

Before I started feeling ill yesterday, I wanted to write this post that started forming in my head after seeing those comments people have left me saying they didn't believe I was shy.

But the truth is...I'm really shy "in real life". I have always been shy. I have a tape here at home of my kindergarden "graduation". I went to a private school back then, so things like that were a pretty big deal and the graduation was professionally taped and sold too the parents. Before the graduation, the guy that was taping the graduation came to the school during the recess time came and tapes all the kids running around on the playground, and this footage was also used on the tape. While most of the kids were doing everything in their power to get noticed by the camera, I was doing my damnedest to get the hell away from it. I actually faintly remember the day this was being taped. I didn't want to be in the picture, and I felt really uncomfortable with the idea of being taped for this "movie". So I spent all of that recess time trying to stay away. So when all the other kids were surrounding the camera man vying for his attention I was hiding...but no matter how hard I tried to hide, somehow I'd always find the camera lurking around, and I would leave and find a new refuge and yet again I would find myself having to leave. When the tape was finished, my mother of course bought a copy and I remember watching it. It's actually painful to see me trying to run away from the camera. But it wasn't my thing. That sort of thing scared me. Still scares me in fact. I don't like cameras very much. And video cameras...forget it. Last year while vacationing in NYC my mother dragged my sisters and I out at the crack of dawn to get in the crowd for the Today show. And while there I was on the phone with my dad who was watching the Today show on tv watching for us...and he said that I had gotten on for like two seconds. Now, while the "normal" person would probably feel excited about being on national tv...all I could think was...god, I hope no one noticed me.

I had a physical difference, which always made things hard. I have some type of genetic disorder that affects their hair on your head. Where as a normal hair root is strait, mine is kinked up in a way that affects hair growth. I have hair, but it's very short. When I first meet people for the first time, it can make things a bit difficult. Some think I have cancer and am going through chemo. And some probably think that my hair is that short for a reason...mainly that I'm a lesbian. I kind of have to have a laugh about that. Unless they are the mean sort and make derogatory comments about being a lesbian. Then I get mad, because that's just really uncool and uncalled for. But because of this "physical affliction" probably plays in to my shyness more than I would like. And yes, I have considered my "options" and the truth is...I'm too proud for that, at least right now. My thinking is, if you are too shallow to see past this, than you aren't the type of person I would like around me.

Believe it or not, in preschool/kindergarden/elementry school I was fine. I think most people would assume that I'd get teased, but to be honest, I only rememeber one incident in the cafeteria of my elementery school...some kid made some comment and immediately one of the boys from my class stepped in and told the other boy to shut up. I don't remember who my "protector" was, but I always remembered that incident. I was shy back then...but I had friends and overall I was a pretty happy kid. Fourth grade was kind of crappy, my one best friend had moved on to the next level of school that year, and my other best friend moved to a different part of town and transfered schools...so it was a lonely year. And looking back it was probably the first indication I had that I suffered from emotional/ mental problems. I was still a happy kid at home, but at school I often times just felt really lonely and sad and didn't understand why.

In my school district 5th grade was the start of middle school (it's now 6th grade, which was just started this year). I was in a new school with many new kids. At the time there was something like five elementry schoools, so I was in with a whole new mixture of students. At first it was traumatic for me, as I was expecting to go to another middle school so I had been mentally preparing myself and had visited that school back during the previous year...so when I found out that I was instead going to a different middle school it was hard. But I got there and many of my old friends were at that school so soon I felt secure there. Sixth grade was fun. I had a huge group of friends in class, and though I didn't always "like" my teacher, she understood me and really encouraged me to let my bookwork/geeky self come out.

7th and 8th grade were the worst. It's when the "shit hit the fan" so to speak, started, and when instead of just being shy I became very shy and began to have serious depression issues and unfortanately screwed up the little amount of self esteem I had managed to build up. I came into 7th grade feeling good. I had spent the summer attending this summer program playing around with multi media equipment and singing in a music class and attending a 4-H sleep away camp for a week and had had a lot of fun, and had even built up the courage to get up in front of the camp and sing at the end of camp talent show. Then probably about midway through 7th grade an incident occured (that I don't feel comfortable talking about), and as in the case of many similar incidences I became the victim of a lot of bullying. Often times I'd be walking down the hall and from out of nowhere someone would pass by muttering some derogatory statement in my direction. Or playing some cruel joke on me. I tried to laugh it off, and find refuge during the school day in my classes and in my friends but it was still hard. I never told my parents what was going on. Instead, after the school day was over I'd come home and go up to my room where I'd usually try to lose myself either in a book or writing angsty poetry...and always I would listen to the music I had recently discovered through my friends. I was never happy. I'd pretend to be happy when I "should" have been happy but really, I don't recall really feeling happy about anything. I was just going through the motions of being a 13-14 year old. The scary part (now) was the fact that my unhappiness felt normal. I honestly thought that everyone, at least all teenagers, felt sad and lonely. Which is probably why I didn't say anything. When I finally started seeing that there was something wrong, I was too scared to admit to it...I didn't think anyone would take me seriously, or just blame me for feeling bad. I don't know. A few years ago I talked to my best friend from back then (we had lost touch when she moved out of state) and she told me that during the time we were friends, she was really scared for me, because of how, everytime we were together, or talked on the phone I'd always make comments about being unhappy or hating myself or whatever. I don't actually remember this. But then again, like I said, at the time I thought it was normal to feel bad.

My depression followed me throughout high school. I very rarely went out and hung out. I did colorguard for four years, so during the fall I stayed busy with practices and football games and competiotions and all that but the rest of the year I didn't do anything. I had a few friends inside school, that I would talk to between classes, or sit with at lunch but outside of lunch, until my senior year...I very seldom did anything after school or on weekends, as I did during those last few years of middle school, when I'd come home from school I would just disappear into my room and try to forget who I was. When my grades suffered freshman year, I blamed it on adjustment issues, even though a lot of it was probably due to my depression and inability to concentrate on my school work. That was the only time I remember my mother commenting about depression, asking me if I was depressed. She had picked me up from school and was upset that I had failed yet another math exam and asked me if I was doing so poorly in school because I was depressed. And I denied it. Sometimes I wonder how things would have been different if I had said yes.

I'm not going to say high school was hell because it wasn't THAT horrible. I wasn't bullied much (on occasion I'd see someone from middle school that would say something to me), but by that time my self esteem was shot to hell. I had a hard time making friends because I was scared I'd be treated badly like I did in middle school, so for most of high school I tried to be as invisible as possible. And I think a lot of people thought that I was stuck up...when the truth was I just didn't know how to act in that sort of social situation. I never went to parties. I did attempt to go to a school dance but hated it (and when a dance ends and there's about four cop cars outside watching the people leave and breaking up fights, it's usually a turn off). I had a few boyfriends but none of them were good relationships really. Out of the three I had, two of my boyfriends were pretty emotionless and the one that was somewhat normal, I couldn't deal with because the guy really liked me, and as I hated myself I couldn't understand how he could like me. I still have some issues with this. I get really uncomfortable when someone tells me how much they like me, or how much they appreciate me...because I really can't see what they are seeing.

I wanted to go away for college, make a new start away from everyone that knew me. That didn't happen. My parents didn't have the money to send me to college, so I literally worked my way through my degree at a college close to home. They bought me a used car for graduation and several (five to three) times a week I'd make the 45 minute drive to and from school...and work evenings and weekends to pay for tuition. I was pretty resentful at not going away but now I'm glad I didn't. I don't think I would have been able to handle it. I don't think my mental health would have been able to handle it. I was still the same type of person in college, no self esteem....didn't make many friends, at least that I'd talk to, hang out with outside of school, etc. I didn't even make an attempt very often either. By college I was so used to feeling depressed that I didn't really notice it anymore. I didn't have a name for it, I just knew that something wasn't right. I think the first time I realized that there was a name for what was going on when I was sitting in my abnormal psych class. We were doing a unit on depression based mental illness and I was sitting there, learning the symptoms and going...that's me, that's me, that's me...again and again. I remember saying this for most of the list of symptoms. In a way it shocked me and in another way it didn't shock me. I think I had known for awhile that I was "sick" and I think that in small ways I had been trying to tell people for years but when I'd get close to actually verbalizing I'd chicken out.

I've been at this stage for awhile. I know (at least partly) what's wrong with me. I know that I have depression and I know that I should get help for it...and at the same time I don't want to admit to this. I want to tell my parents but at the same time I don't want them to worry about me. I just don't know how to go about talking to them, and telling them.

This is the first time I've gotten so indepth with this. I've mentioned before that I have sufferent from feelings of depression before, but I have never sat down and really put it into words. Looking back I didn't even realize it was this bad. Like I kept saying, for the longest time I had always assumed that how I was feeling was "normal" and that I would eventually get over it...but now I don't think that that's going to happen, at least not without help.