Disillusioned – I think that’s the perfect way to describe how I feel.
When you’re a kid, you’re told that everyone is special and that anyone can change the world, then you grow up and realize that no one is special. I spent almost four whole months just dissassociating, taking long hikes, one hour or more, several times a day and even at night, and I barely slept at all because of nightmares, I barely ate because I had so much anxiety. Now that that’s over, I don’t know what to do. I can barely walk anymore, well I can, if I eat a lot of food after, I can’t go for those hikes anymore. Everything that I enjoyed doing I got laughed at for. I didn’t feel safe anywhere, I still don’t. My room feels like it belongs to someone else, almost nothing in it is mine. It’s mostly just stuff I’m borrowing from other people, and I can’t even tell anyone that anything is mine, because then my parents have the need to remind me that it’s not actually mine, it’s theirs and they can take it from me while I have no right to protest at all. I used to have dreams. I used to have nightmares. Now I have nothing at all. Not even the slightest bit of hope for the future either. I’m not allowed to do anything that I enjoy doing. For some reason I have to tell my parents whenever I go outside even though I’m 17 years old? It feels like I’m not a real person. I’m trapped inside a bubble of “protection” that hurts me more than it helps. It really is extremely boring to live like this. I used to have illusions, dreams, of a different life, a life where everything I do isn’t controlled by someone else, but I don’t have any choice. The only thing I can do is wait. I hate it.
2 comments
I felt very much like you. I wanted freedom to be a person of my own, make my own decisions and so forth. So I left home. It was hard, but it seemed worth it. I was free to come and go as I pleased. No school. I could smoke in my own home. But I had to work ten hour days for pennies. Only place I could afford was a shared slum room. And man is it tough being a single girl in this country, nevermind a slum. I fell in with the wrong crowd. Became a whore to afford a better life. Dealt drugs. Went to jail six months. I’m 18 now. I’ve lost my last two years of school. I have no family and no career prospects. I want a future now. I want money. I’m sick of choosing between groceries and electricity. But you know, I can’t go to college because I’m not in school. And enrolling in school is tough when I dropped out two years ago. And I have no idea how I’d put myself through college without whoring since my parents fucked my credit score. At this point in my life, I feel like an idiot. I ran away when I was 15 and stupid. And now I can never go back. My parents were miserable to live with. They were strict, angry, always busy, and with no better parenting techniques than beating. And they really couldn’t use birth control. We had a new baby every year even when they could hardly afford to feed us existing kids. But I wish to fucking hell I’d stuck it out just three more years. Because then I’d have been 18 and able to become anything in the world. Now I’m 18, and while fighting to survive in this mess I created, I lost every opportunity I had.
Anyway, forgive the long story. I wanted to stress how much I regret this. And you’re 17! You’ve got less than a year till you’re an adult and free. I know how slow time crawls when you’re waiting like this. But wait, don’t run away firstly. And secondly, that birthday of yours is the light at the end of your tunnel. Plan where you’re going to go. Someplace far away. You’re going to be free man. This is not going to last forever.
I left my parent’s home when I was 16. It’s a really difficult thing to do, but it was the right choice for me, but I am not sure it is the right choice for everyone. I agree if you can hold out until you are able to finish high school that will do you a lot of good. Life can be different, even if that doesn’t always mean better.