I was recently floating in the pool and found myself lost in my thoughts. I was thinking about what I would write next, read next, what I would do with my friends next week. Then I realized that two years ago I would not have been able to do that. Two years ago I could not be left alone with my own thoughts, it was paralyzing. I have never spoken of this, no one knew the Hell that was constantly running through my mind; which is why I want to take a moment and remind you now, during Mental Health Awareness Month, to check on your friends—all of your friends. We’ve all been informed of the warning signs, essentially any major change in personality, but not everyone shows these signs. I know this because I spent at least four years hiding these and hiding them well.
No one noticed, no one would have. I was involved in everything—I played two sports, I worked two jobs, I was a part of almost every club imaginable, I was the top of my class, and I laughed and smiled and I was always around people. What no one saw was how lonely I was underneath it all. No one was aware that my involvement in school was a desperate attempt to make friends. Playing two sports and working two jobs was a desperate attempt to stay busy. My grades were good because I spent all my free time working on school work and I had an agonizing fear of failure. And my smile and laughs, they were genuine but it was never more than a giggle, and it always faded quickly.
And you know, I thought I was fine. I knew I was lonely, I knew I was escaping everything, but I lived in denial. But when I was alone, when I had no one or nothing to distract me, my mind didn’t quit. I struggled with feeling loved, I knew my parents loved me but with everyone else I convinced myself that I was a burden. I was the annoying girl who came around and they were thankful to get rid of. I thought this because I was the girl who was always with everyone, but never invited anywhere. If I was invited it was often because people made plans right in front of me and then realized it, or I invited myself, especially to big school events, I just wiggled my way into a crowd. “Friends” always told me they loved me but they were never there when I needed them, I was always used as their backboard. I was the girl that people could come to but I never had anyone to go to. I was convinced that I was simply a burden in everyone’s life. I was convinced that people only put up with me because if they truly cared about me I wouldn’t be at home alone every weekend. I convinced myself that I was so unloved that no one (other than my family) would miss me if I were gone.
My mind was a dark place, and sometimes it still can be. I never had suicidal thoughts, I never attempted self-harm, but I did often think about death. I wondered what would happen if I died right then, or didn’t wake up the next morning. I often wondered who would attend my funeral, or what they would say about me. I wondered how many people would claim they knew me when I refused to open up to anyone. I was bitter, I hated people, but I never let it show because I was desperate for friendship, I needed a companion. I did not want to die, but I spent my high school years simply existing.
Most people cried on graduation day but to me, it was the most freeing day of my life. I no longer had to pretend. But then, that left me to a summer of my thoughts. I worked 40-50 hour work weeks that summer to avoid how lonely I was. I didn’t have friends to go to the pool with, I didn’t go on any awesome summer vacations with my closest friends, I couldn’t even go out to lunch with anyone, I simply did not have anyone. I could not sit at home and watch tv or go outside and go swimming (at home) without thinking about how I had no friends, how I didn’t know who I was, or how I had no idea what my future would hold. I was ecstatic to go to college because I saw it as an opportunity to start over, as a chance to escape but that was not the case, not immediately.
My first semester of college came and went and I found friends, true friends who are still with me a year and a half later. But I was still just as miserable inside. Moving away from my family, from my only support system was hard. I didn’t want them to know how much I was struggling in college. I HATED half of my classes, I had to put in 1000x more effort than I was used to, and I was not sleeping or eating right, I was very homesick, and often I was just miserable. Then Christmas break came and I decided that I needed to change. I wanted the joy I felt when I was with my friends to be what I felt when I was alone. I wanted to be happy most of the time, not just the few hours each day that I was surrounded by friends.
It was not moving away from home that helped me change. I could have found the support I needed back home. It was finding supportive friends, trying new things, creating routines, rediscovering what I was passionate about, and more importantly, it was the FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students) missionary who introduced me to the Litany of Trust and it was praying it often. It was trusting God, trusting His plan, and trusting that the people he put in my life were out there for a reason.
I still do everything I mentioned above but for different reasons now. I do everything with a passion that I don’t even think I could fake before. Now I work two jobs simply for income, I am a part of many clubs because it is what I enjoy and my friends are involved in them, I take 18 credit hours because I LOVE what I am learning, and I laugh and I smile and it is so genuine that it leaves me nearly rolling on the floor with tears streaming out of my eyes, and I surround myself with people because I am an extrovert who has found people that love me. Now I can handle being in silence by myself and I am not burdened by my thoughts at all times. I have peace within my mind.
This is not to say that those thoughts and that isolation are not still there sometimes (my roommate called me out on it recently and I greatly appreciate that), but it is to say that it got better. It got better because I have people looking out for me. I have people who will say “you don’t seem happy” or “something’s changed, can we talk?”. I’ve gotten much better at opening up and being honest with myself and others. It got better because we check on each other and genuinely care about each other. A simple text will do the trick if nothing else.
So this post is to remind you that even if someone seems okay, check on them, they might not be. And if no one checks on you, find someone you trust and confide in them—no one deserves to be a prisoner to their own mind.
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