I'm a 16-year-old senior in high school, tied for valedictorian, applying to college. I find myself getting more and more burnt out as time goes by. I signed up for so many classes this year, instead of deciding to "take my senior year easy" like everyone else- I have six AP classes and orchestra, which is actually one more bell than is in my school day. I have to tape lectures in my last class Friday so that I can go to orchestra once a week. I didn't think I would be overwhelmed- I've always dealt with everything just fine before. Yes, sometimes it got to be a lot or too much, but I always just dealt with it and moved on. I've been depressed before, too, but never this badly or this long. It's been on-and-off since late July, now.
Right now I feel like I've lost control completely. There are two weeks left before first semester exams, and I have to turn in seven college applications, write a ten page research paper on tulipomania, write a short paper for psychology (oh, the irony), study for my exams, and go to a model UN conference the weekend before the actual exam week. I get my college decision from Harvard back December 15th (in the middle of exams- at least it's only the preliminary round of the application review). I know what I need to do in order to make it through this- just buckle down and do my work- but I'm so sick of everything that I can't find the energy to do anything. I've started to overeat (though it actually doesn't make that much of a difference, since I've always been very underweight), to slack off on schoolwork, and to get into more arguments with my parents.
I feel like I don't have any friends- I have classes with a grand total of ONE person I actually hang out with, and the people I have the opportunity to see most are people who I don't always get along with- while we've been friends in the past, we had a really bad falling out in 8th grade, and I haven't been very close to anyone since. While we're in all the same classes and extracurriculars now, I feel like they whisper about me behind my back (and have some evidence that they actually do), and I'm definitely not considered a real friend by them- which just adds more stress. I have club meetings at lunch times, and I don't have time after school or on weekends to do much of anything besides homework and volunteering. The people I used to be best friends with are just sort of drifting away.
It's not going to get any better before the end of the year. Over Christmas break, I'll have to do eight financial aid applications, scholarship applications, homework, produce the first semester issue of the school literary magazine, and get ready for February and March. Third quarter [January, February, and March] is always the hardest academically at my school, and at the same time I'll be dealing with organizing a 1300-person convention for one of my extracurriculars. When -that's- finally over in late March, the other college decisions will come in, and I'll have to figure out where I'm going to school (if I even get in anywhere I applied), before suddenly it's time to study for six AP exams. Then I have two weeks of APs, a week of school exams, and graduation.
The only way I can see to make things better is just to drop something, but there's nothing I can drop. It's literally impossible (by school rules) to back out of classes after first quarter, and I wouldn't if I could- I love my classes, they're just a lot of work. I can't back out on any of my extracurriculars, they depend on me. And I can hardly stop applying to college.
Sometimes right now I feel like I'm holding myself in- like there's nothing to do or be done, like I have nothing left in me to pull out. Half of me is happy, and half of me is sad. There are moments when I sit in class and things suddenly make sense, or when I get a few moments to talk to friends, or just to be by myself, when I'm really satisfied with who I am and what I'm doing. But most of the time, I'm just sick of the whole process. I tend to get depressed in late July and early August every year, right before my school starts, because I usually have a lot of summer homework and activities- my actual "relaxation" summer amounts to a few weeks in June, and then it's back to responsibilities. Usually, though, once I've settled into school again, I'm fine- stressed, yes, but fine. Now, I'm stressed and utterly depressed.
I wanted to take all these classes so much- I was so excited about school this year, about everything I'd learn and do and accomplish, about being a senior and finally getting ready to go to college. But now that I'm here, everything seems like a giant grey puddle- I suddenly feel like I've been misleading myself all this time, like I don't really care about anything but having enough for my college resume. Yet at the same time, I know that's not true. I love JCL. I love working at the museum. I love the lit magazine (well.. no, not really, but I used to, still would if I didn't get laughed at for working on it, and now I'm obligated to work on it..). There are so many things in my life that I used to always be so happy about, so -excited- about, that I lived for and cared about and would do anything for. But now I'm never sure what to think or believe. I don't feel like I care about anything but sleeping and the computer- escaping first one way, by letting it all go, curling into myself for dreams, and then in another, by being someone else, putting distance and the cool hard certainty of words between my emotions and someone else's ears. I don't know what I'm trying to do any more. I thought I wanted to go to the best college, to drown myself in academics, to learn and strive to know and to succeed. But I feel like all that I'm discovering is that it's only in books that someone saves the girl who walls herself away- that in the real world, you have to reach out for anyone to care- because no one notices when you start to hide. No one's noticed how much I'm crawling away, pulling into this shell of a self, putting all my heart and emotions into characters in games and characters in books, into schoolwork and dinosaur bones. I spend an ungodly amount of time on roleplaying games, where at least I can pretend to be some other character with much simpler problems- or, at least, problems much less my own. It distracts me from how much I've started to hate my life.
No one seems to pay attention. I know, in abstract, that my parents surely care, but they don't seem to. My mother is a workaholic- I tried telling her how frustrated I was yesterday, and she just told me that I needed to get back to work. When it turned into an argument, with me trying to get at least a little free time for myself, she was furious- she told me that if I had so much time to waste (she used the same expression when I went to go see friends home from college who I hadn't seen in months), I could at least take a break by doing a little housework. My dad genuinely cares, but doesn't have any ideas of what to do- I tell him how upset I am, and he just hugs me and tells me it'll be ok. It turns into an empty platitude- nice to hear, but it doesn't mean anything, really. I don't feel close enough to my friends any more to really talk to them, and the one time I tried, they just sort of laughed and told me I brought this on myself. I know they must care, surely, but I don't think they can tell how upset I am, because I physically can't talk to them in real life, leaving just the computer. I'm too afraid of what they would think to do much more than lash out, and when that happens, I at least get a few moments of sympathy (they know me well enough to know I don't mean it), but it quickly goes back to me walling myself in. I haven't had a boyfriend since eighth grade- I feel like people whisper about me all the time, and since I've never made a habit of reaching out to talk to people, I've built up a little wall of expectation that it's not something I do. Now, if I talk to a boy, it's an -event- in the eyes of others. The whispers start. People stare at me when I walk through the halls. I go to my locker in the morning and the eighth graders sitting outside their classrooms laugh at -me-. I've no idea how much worse it would be if I actually tried changing myself- wearing something other than jeans and a singly-drab-colored long sleeve shirt, talking to people other than the teacher in class, having *gasp* fun in school. I can only imagine the stares.
And no one is going to take pity and pull me out. I don't have any way of finding someone who will actually talk to me, without just digging myself deeper into procrastinating (because, after all, according to mother I'm "wasting time" on friends) or attracting attention (I -hate- being stared at or whispered about, and it happens all the time- it's one thing I absolutely cannot stand). If there were something I could do, I would. But overachieving and perfectionism are like an endless treadmill- if you start out doing well, you only raise the bar higher and higher, until it's so completely unattainable that you have to sacrifice yourself to even come close. My parents always tell me that they'd love me no matter how I did in school- so why did I get a half hour long lecture for getting a B on one test earlier this year? There's no way to go back or stop what I'm doing- I'd feel like I was sacrificing everything I had done for everyone. And in the end, that's all I -am- doing: everything for everyone. I don't know what I want, anymore- it's been so long since I had a genuine interest that was solely my own, unshaded by any measure of expectation or guilt, that I really don't know what I would care about. I apologize compulsively. Every time my parents talk to me, I feel guilty.
I don't really have any options. I can't change my classes or my extracurriculars. I should talk to my parents, but I can't- it hurts too much to try to explain something, and be constantly interrupted with suggestions or "well, Kate, if you spent less time on the computer, maybe you'd be less stressed!" (especially when the computer is currently my only outlet for emotions) or "wait, who is this person? You participate in what now?". I should talk to my friends, but I can't- I feel like I hardly know them well enough any more, and even if I did, I don't want to burden them, and even if I -did-, I wouldn't know where to begin. I don't want to change their opinions of me- I'm just barely holding onto the friendships I have without starting to whine to them constantly. I wish there was a professional I could talk to, but that would require either seeing the one at school (who is, reportedly, a wonderful person)- which I can't do because other people would find out and the gossips would spread it all over the school in hours- or telling my parents that I wanted to talk to a psychologist/psychiatrist, which would necessitate talking to my parents.
That's all I wanted, really, to know that someone cared enough to reach down and bring me back to myself even when I'm at my worst, when there's nothing lovable or worth loving in me. But the proud and cold and alone are only saved in books- in the real world, I'll just keep walling myself off, until there's nothing left to breathe. It's too late to go any other way, isn't it? I don't know how to reach out from myself any more. Social atrophy.
I don't know what to do. At least online, I don't have to face anyone and be judged and weighed and measured, go abruptly from receiving all of the approval and commendation to receiving pity and worry. I don't have to fear that my relationships with classmates or parents are going to change. All I have to do is type away aimlessly, rant about how miserable I am. I'm not even sure I have a right to do this- goodness knows I'm not as deserving of pity or help as some. I've always done well and succeeded when so many other people are struggling to do that. And here I'm sick of it- is that even fair? What right do I have to complain about anything, when I do well?
But I can't stand how it feels to always be isolated. I've poured everything I have into meeting expectations, and they only ever get higher and more contradictory. My parents want me to do well. My teachers and counselors want me to do well. My peers want me to be normal (subconsciously, at least, that's what we're all being herded towards). My friends want me to be happy. I want to be happy, I suppose. But I can't -do- all of that. I can't be happy when I'm doing well. I can't be happy when I'm normal. I can't do well and be normal. Everything is mutually exclusive, and I just wind up running in circles. My whole life ends up concentrated in textbooks and grades and just doing well enough to get a smile from my parents occasionally. I've always gotten straight A's in all advanced classes (except for a B in third quarter chemistry in 10th grade, but since I got the highest grade on the exam, it sort of balances out), but my parents just tease me about "no improvement". The day my AP scores came this summer, and I found out I'd gotten all 5's (a big achievement), there wasn't any fanfare or excitement. I was ecstatic because I'd met my parents' expectations, and they just said "Nice job, Kate" and went back to talking about Mom's work.
My sleeping has gone all strange. I overeat. I don't take showers or wash my hair as often as I should any more. I spend hours slaving over homework one day, and then none at all the next. I can't seem to be consistent or to settle down. I don't think my parents have noticed (well, mom complains that I stay up too late, but that's only because I supposedly keep -her- awake). Sometimes I try to go an entire day without talking, so that at least someone will notice something is wrong, but I always find myself slipping back into my usual "smile-and-nod" patterns so that people don't stare. I hate being watched and stared at, and it seems like it happens all the time- I walk through the halls at school without meeting anyone's eyes, head down, watching my feet. I move as quickly as possible, as if the less time I spend in the hall, the less attention I'll attract.
I'm not sure why I'm writing this. I'm just as afraid of receiving platitudes from strangers as I am from parents and friends- I know I'll be told that I need to talk to someone (probable suggestions: parents, friends, therapists of various sorts), that it'll be ok, to stop stressing so much, to focus on what I want instead of what everyone else wants. It's what everyone tells me. But I don't know how to even begin. So here I am, writing an endlessly long, rambling stream of consciousness as though it will do me some good or as if anyone here will care. Goodness knows no one in the real world seems to.
I'm not suicidal- I've been there before, and I know how it feels, though I haven't actually attempted to kill myself (I always stop right at the balcony railing- it's more fear of heights than anything that keeps me alive, I think). I feel suicidal when I have a bad week- when I get bad grades at school for a little while and my parents get angry; when I have problems with the few friends I've got left. Now it's just this endless sludge of emotion that's turning everything grey and brittle as glass. I can't deal with anything for fear that the scarce little structure of sanity that I've built up is simply going to break. I can't live because there's nothing of interest- I can have fun for an hour, two, three, but sooner or later I start to worry about what others think, about what I'm not getting done, about what mom will say when I come home. There just isn't anything here.
I don't know what to do anymore. I'm not sure why I'm writing here- I don't know what there is to be said. But there it is.
I'm not going to go back and re-read or edit this; if it's redundant, at least it's true to what I felt when I wrote it. I'm sorry it's so long, and to have bothered you.
-K
Right now I feel like I've lost control completely. There are two weeks left before first semester exams, and I have to turn in seven college applications, write a ten page research paper on tulipomania, write a short paper for psychology (oh, the irony), study for my exams, and go to a model UN conference the weekend before the actual exam week. I get my college decision from Harvard back December 15th (in the middle of exams- at least it's only the preliminary round of the application review). I know what I need to do in order to make it through this- just buckle down and do my work- but I'm so sick of everything that I can't find the energy to do anything. I've started to overeat (though it actually doesn't make that much of a difference, since I've always been very underweight), to slack off on schoolwork, and to get into more arguments with my parents.
I feel like I don't have any friends- I have classes with a grand total of ONE person I actually hang out with, and the people I have the opportunity to see most are people who I don't always get along with- while we've been friends in the past, we had a really bad falling out in 8th grade, and I haven't been very close to anyone since. While we're in all the same classes and extracurriculars now, I feel like they whisper about me behind my back (and have some evidence that they actually do), and I'm definitely not considered a real friend by them- which just adds more stress. I have club meetings at lunch times, and I don't have time after school or on weekends to do much of anything besides homework and volunteering. The people I used to be best friends with are just sort of drifting away.
It's not going to get any better before the end of the year. Over Christmas break, I'll have to do eight financial aid applications, scholarship applications, homework, produce the first semester issue of the school literary magazine, and get ready for February and March. Third quarter [January, February, and March] is always the hardest academically at my school, and at the same time I'll be dealing with organizing a 1300-person convention for one of my extracurriculars. When -that's- finally over in late March, the other college decisions will come in, and I'll have to figure out where I'm going to school (if I even get in anywhere I applied), before suddenly it's time to study for six AP exams. Then I have two weeks of APs, a week of school exams, and graduation.
The only way I can see to make things better is just to drop something, but there's nothing I can drop. It's literally impossible (by school rules) to back out of classes after first quarter, and I wouldn't if I could- I love my classes, they're just a lot of work. I can't back out on any of my extracurriculars, they depend on me. And I can hardly stop applying to college.
Sometimes right now I feel like I'm holding myself in- like there's nothing to do or be done, like I have nothing left in me to pull out. Half of me is happy, and half of me is sad. There are moments when I sit in class and things suddenly make sense, or when I get a few moments to talk to friends, or just to be by myself, when I'm really satisfied with who I am and what I'm doing. But most of the time, I'm just sick of the whole process. I tend to get depressed in late July and early August every year, right before my school starts, because I usually have a lot of summer homework and activities- my actual "relaxation" summer amounts to a few weeks in June, and then it's back to responsibilities. Usually, though, once I've settled into school again, I'm fine- stressed, yes, but fine. Now, I'm stressed and utterly depressed.
I wanted to take all these classes so much- I was so excited about school this year, about everything I'd learn and do and accomplish, about being a senior and finally getting ready to go to college. But now that I'm here, everything seems like a giant grey puddle- I suddenly feel like I've been misleading myself all this time, like I don't really care about anything but having enough for my college resume. Yet at the same time, I know that's not true. I love JCL. I love working at the museum. I love the lit magazine (well.. no, not really, but I used to, still would if I didn't get laughed at for working on it, and now I'm obligated to work on it..). There are so many things in my life that I used to always be so happy about, so -excited- about, that I lived for and cared about and would do anything for. But now I'm never sure what to think or believe. I don't feel like I care about anything but sleeping and the computer- escaping first one way, by letting it all go, curling into myself for dreams, and then in another, by being someone else, putting distance and the cool hard certainty of words between my emotions and someone else's ears. I don't know what I'm trying to do any more. I thought I wanted to go to the best college, to drown myself in academics, to learn and strive to know and to succeed. But I feel like all that I'm discovering is that it's only in books that someone saves the girl who walls herself away- that in the real world, you have to reach out for anyone to care- because no one notices when you start to hide. No one's noticed how much I'm crawling away, pulling into this shell of a self, putting all my heart and emotions into characters in games and characters in books, into schoolwork and dinosaur bones. I spend an ungodly amount of time on roleplaying games, where at least I can pretend to be some other character with much simpler problems- or, at least, problems much less my own. It distracts me from how much I've started to hate my life.
No one seems to pay attention. I know, in abstract, that my parents surely care, but they don't seem to. My mother is a workaholic- I tried telling her how frustrated I was yesterday, and she just told me that I needed to get back to work. When it turned into an argument, with me trying to get at least a little free time for myself, she was furious- she told me that if I had so much time to waste (she used the same expression when I went to go see friends home from college who I hadn't seen in months), I could at least take a break by doing a little housework. My dad genuinely cares, but doesn't have any ideas of what to do- I tell him how upset I am, and he just hugs me and tells me it'll be ok. It turns into an empty platitude- nice to hear, but it doesn't mean anything, really. I don't feel close enough to my friends any more to really talk to them, and the one time I tried, they just sort of laughed and told me I brought this on myself. I know they must care, surely, but I don't think they can tell how upset I am, because I physically can't talk to them in real life, leaving just the computer. I'm too afraid of what they would think to do much more than lash out, and when that happens, I at least get a few moments of sympathy (they know me well enough to know I don't mean it), but it quickly goes back to me walling myself in. I haven't had a boyfriend since eighth grade- I feel like people whisper about me all the time, and since I've never made a habit of reaching out to talk to people, I've built up a little wall of expectation that it's not something I do. Now, if I talk to a boy, it's an -event- in the eyes of others. The whispers start. People stare at me when I walk through the halls. I go to my locker in the morning and the eighth graders sitting outside their classrooms laugh at -me-. I've no idea how much worse it would be if I actually tried changing myself- wearing something other than jeans and a singly-drab-colored long sleeve shirt, talking to people other than the teacher in class, having *gasp* fun in school. I can only imagine the stares.
And no one is going to take pity and pull me out. I don't have any way of finding someone who will actually talk to me, without just digging myself deeper into procrastinating (because, after all, according to mother I'm "wasting time" on friends) or attracting attention (I -hate- being stared at or whispered about, and it happens all the time- it's one thing I absolutely cannot stand). If there were something I could do, I would. But overachieving and perfectionism are like an endless treadmill- if you start out doing well, you only raise the bar higher and higher, until it's so completely unattainable that you have to sacrifice yourself to even come close. My parents always tell me that they'd love me no matter how I did in school- so why did I get a half hour long lecture for getting a B on one test earlier this year? There's no way to go back or stop what I'm doing- I'd feel like I was sacrificing everything I had done for everyone. And in the end, that's all I -am- doing: everything for everyone. I don't know what I want, anymore- it's been so long since I had a genuine interest that was solely my own, unshaded by any measure of expectation or guilt, that I really don't know what I would care about. I apologize compulsively. Every time my parents talk to me, I feel guilty.
I don't really have any options. I can't change my classes or my extracurriculars. I should talk to my parents, but I can't- it hurts too much to try to explain something, and be constantly interrupted with suggestions or "well, Kate, if you spent less time on the computer, maybe you'd be less stressed!" (especially when the computer is currently my only outlet for emotions) or "wait, who is this person? You participate in what now?". I should talk to my friends, but I can't- I feel like I hardly know them well enough any more, and even if I did, I don't want to burden them, and even if I -did-, I wouldn't know where to begin. I don't want to change their opinions of me- I'm just barely holding onto the friendships I have without starting to whine to them constantly. I wish there was a professional I could talk to, but that would require either seeing the one at school (who is, reportedly, a wonderful person)- which I can't do because other people would find out and the gossips would spread it all over the school in hours- or telling my parents that I wanted to talk to a psychologist/psychiatrist, which would necessitate talking to my parents.
That's all I wanted, really, to know that someone cared enough to reach down and bring me back to myself even when I'm at my worst, when there's nothing lovable or worth loving in me. But the proud and cold and alone are only saved in books- in the real world, I'll just keep walling myself off, until there's nothing left to breathe. It's too late to go any other way, isn't it? I don't know how to reach out from myself any more. Social atrophy.
I don't know what to do. At least online, I don't have to face anyone and be judged and weighed and measured, go abruptly from receiving all of the approval and commendation to receiving pity and worry. I don't have to fear that my relationships with classmates or parents are going to change. All I have to do is type away aimlessly, rant about how miserable I am. I'm not even sure I have a right to do this- goodness knows I'm not as deserving of pity or help as some. I've always done well and succeeded when so many other people are struggling to do that. And here I'm sick of it- is that even fair? What right do I have to complain about anything, when I do well?
But I can't stand how it feels to always be isolated. I've poured everything I have into meeting expectations, and they only ever get higher and more contradictory. My parents want me to do well. My teachers and counselors want me to do well. My peers want me to be normal (subconsciously, at least, that's what we're all being herded towards). My friends want me to be happy. I want to be happy, I suppose. But I can't -do- all of that. I can't be happy when I'm doing well. I can't be happy when I'm normal. I can't do well and be normal. Everything is mutually exclusive, and I just wind up running in circles. My whole life ends up concentrated in textbooks and grades and just doing well enough to get a smile from my parents occasionally. I've always gotten straight A's in all advanced classes (except for a B in third quarter chemistry in 10th grade, but since I got the highest grade on the exam, it sort of balances out), but my parents just tease me about "no improvement". The day my AP scores came this summer, and I found out I'd gotten all 5's (a big achievement), there wasn't any fanfare or excitement. I was ecstatic because I'd met my parents' expectations, and they just said "Nice job, Kate" and went back to talking about Mom's work.
My sleeping has gone all strange. I overeat. I don't take showers or wash my hair as often as I should any more. I spend hours slaving over homework one day, and then none at all the next. I can't seem to be consistent or to settle down. I don't think my parents have noticed (well, mom complains that I stay up too late, but that's only because I supposedly keep -her- awake). Sometimes I try to go an entire day without talking, so that at least someone will notice something is wrong, but I always find myself slipping back into my usual "smile-and-nod" patterns so that people don't stare. I hate being watched and stared at, and it seems like it happens all the time- I walk through the halls at school without meeting anyone's eyes, head down, watching my feet. I move as quickly as possible, as if the less time I spend in the hall, the less attention I'll attract.
I'm not sure why I'm writing this. I'm just as afraid of receiving platitudes from strangers as I am from parents and friends- I know I'll be told that I need to talk to someone (probable suggestions: parents, friends, therapists of various sorts), that it'll be ok, to stop stressing so much, to focus on what I want instead of what everyone else wants. It's what everyone tells me. But I don't know how to even begin. So here I am, writing an endlessly long, rambling stream of consciousness as though it will do me some good or as if anyone here will care. Goodness knows no one in the real world seems to.
I'm not suicidal- I've been there before, and I know how it feels, though I haven't actually attempted to kill myself (I always stop right at the balcony railing- it's more fear of heights than anything that keeps me alive, I think). I feel suicidal when I have a bad week- when I get bad grades at school for a little while and my parents get angry; when I have problems with the few friends I've got left. Now it's just this endless sludge of emotion that's turning everything grey and brittle as glass. I can't deal with anything for fear that the scarce little structure of sanity that I've built up is simply going to break. I can't live because there's nothing of interest- I can have fun for an hour, two, three, but sooner or later I start to worry about what others think, about what I'm not getting done, about what mom will say when I come home. There just isn't anything here.
I don't know what to do anymore. I'm not sure why I'm writing here- I don't know what there is to be said. But there it is.
I'm not going to go back and re-read or edit this; if it's redundant, at least it's true to what I felt when I wrote it. I'm sorry it's so long, and to have bothered you.
-K
