Me.

I remember standing drunk in a freezing cold shower, to try and make my body feel something, instead of being so numb like it had been lately, I was fuelled with thoughts of suicide. I hated myself and why should I bother to keep sustaining life when I was such a failure and would never amount to anything. This is something I have constantly felt throughout my life. I don’t remember ever feeling good enough to actually do anything meaningful with my life. When these kind of thoughts are flooding your mind, it is hard to see any clarity and meaning in life. There was a constant emotional rollercoaster and I never knew how I would feel when I woke up in the morning. Whether I’d roll over and go back to sleep and not want to wake up until well into the afternoon, to hide from life and it’s consequences, or whether I’d jump out of bed full of happiness and positive outlook for the day ahead. Who knew.
I could not say primary school was a breeze for me. I remember having problems with bullies and not understanding why I was teased about such things as body odour, when at the age of 10 I certainly did not have any of that just yet. However, over and over again I was harassed by a gang of 3 kids, I guess themselves building up their own self confidence and therefore sucking all of mine right out of me. I had girl friend problems, one day I was friends with one girl, the next she hated me. It was a very confusing time and I still do not understand to this day why any of that happened. There was a girl who was our same age but taller and larger than any of us average kids and she was one in particular who played games with most of our heads. Telling me as a 10 year old I could not invite my best friend or she would dunk her under water at my pool party. So what did I do? I didn’t invite my best friend to protect her, yet in the same way nearly lost a friendship. I have a distinct memory of the school counselor getting all of the girls together, and getting us to tell each other how we felt when we were left out or harassed, I believe that did not work, and actually made it worse. I don’t feel like I had a terrible primary school experience, however I would not say it probably helped in the future when I felt I was not worth living.
From the ripe age of 15, when most teenagers are heading into a catastrophic hormone nightmare, I was heading in the same territory just like any other teenager of my age. I was prone to being emotional and throwing tantrums as a small child, so being a teenager and the trials and tribulations that came with the fears I held, were finding it hard to head in a constant straight line direction. I had no problems at high school until around 15 years old. In July 1999, my grandpa who I had a strong relationship with suddenly had a stroke and died. Noone saw it coming, especially his doctor who he saw on the day before the stroke, who said he was as fit as a malley bull. My grandma woke up to my grandpa thrashing around and just thought he was mucking around, as supposedly he was prone to this. She then realized he was actually thrashing around for the wrong reasons and called 000. For the next week he was in the hospital. I have vivid memories of going into the hospital room where he was hooked up to so many machines, and holding his hand asking him to wake up. One week later, my grandma told him that if he needed to, it was time for him to go. She read him their favourite line from the bible, and he left this earth. It is extremely haunting, yet so incredibly beautiful. That was the longest week of my life and I don’t believe I grieved for my grandpa until I was 25 years old. My mother became in charge of everything. Mum had to take hold of the funeral, helping grandma, sorting out any necessary details. My grandma was in shock, she lost weight and slowly became severly depressed, and so would I if I had lost my life partner of nearly 50 years. Unfortunately Mum was so tied up with everything that she didn’t know she needed to grieve herself, and help us grieve. Life definitely changed from then on. Grandpa’s funeral was hard. My Dad exploded with tears, as he had lost a Dad too even though he was Mum’s paternal father. They were much closer than my Dad had ever been with his own father. There was an open casket, which wasn’t as terrifying as I thought it might be. I just remember being so very sad for all of our losses of such a great man.
I think we all changed the year one of our friends died in a car crash. It was in November 1999, and I can remember the exact moment I got the phone call from a friend at school. I was sitting in my room with another friend and we were making crafty things. My mum knocked on the door and told me I had a phone call from a girl from school. I was a bit shocked as this particular girl would not usually call me. I was then informed of the newspaper clipping and that it could be this young man. I hung up the phone and got the newspaper, cut out the clipping and realized it probably was him. But how? Why? So many questions filled my head. The next few days at school were a blur. I was having flooded memories of how I was in English class with this guy and how much we had fun just mucking around. We had shared a lot of the same music taste, and had often frequented the local skating rink on a Saturday night. I remembered the times when he had helped me when someone had bullied me and told them to fuck off and leave me alone. I was sad, because here I had made an alliance with someone who wasn’t seen as an academic, wasn’t that good at sport, but was an all round great guy. The funeral was hot, and a lot of students fainted, not being able to withstand the heat. All I remember is singing morning has broken, and the next few days being very subdued at school, especially my English class. I wasn’t even as close as some at the school had been, but I can look back now and be glad that I got to spend the small amount of time I did with him.
These two experiences of death, at an early age and at a time in my life when my emotions were rapidly varying, and not grieving properly, definitely pushed the start of a very depressive and now I look back, terrifying 10 years.
High school after the two deaths, seems very blurry to me. I remember never feeling like I never belonged to any friendship or apart of the school. It was an Anglican school and I did not feel I had a strong Christian faith like many of the other students. I found by the end of year 11 I was not happy at all and in my holidays before year 12 began, I did not know how I could return to that school. Somehow I convinced my parents that they should send me to a public high school. Honestly, I was very persuasive, but really now I think about it, I was just running away from any problems I had at the private school. I might have stayed there, however there just were not enough policies put in place, or help put in place for bullied kids. One of my best friends had been having personal problems and had left high school as well to go to a high school where they studied agriculture, something she had always been interested in, however I know now she was just escaping as well. I did not feel like I wanted to be there, I had to change homegroups because of feeling so unwelcome in my own by two girls, who were twins. Honestly, I would say they made my life hell in high school and even when I think about them today it makes me so sad I could not stand up for myself and tell them to fuck off. They were just so manipulative and as we were all going through hormone changes, they really swapped and changed friends, to whomever they felt they wanted to know week to week. This made me very uneasy and I know that in the time I was friends with them, there were some good times, but the bad times outweigh the good, especially since I had to change schools to get away from all the crap.
Starting year 12 at the public school was interesting. I went from wearing a skirt, white shirt, tie, proper school shoes, to a public school where I could wear tracksuit pants and a t-shirt. It was very different indeed, and this definitely encouraged a much relaxed take on school, homework and my own attitude all together. I remember around that time I was having a lot of problems with my parents. In the end I hated school, a lot of my teachers were horrible and I had once again, problems with friends, and maybe even more severe than at the private school. Once again counselors did not help, and I felt heavily victimized by the school when problems arose. I ended up studying year 12 over two years. I am still not sure whether this was a good idea. I can’t regret the decision, however I can see how it made me lazier, and in the end I did not attend school much at all.