The Middle School Years
My middle school years were tumultuous but not the same type of rollercoaster and blur as my elementary days. Although I remember a lot about elementary school, middle school was by far different, and in its own way, it was worse. I waded through a serious crush on the man I almost married, braced myself for heartbreak in friendships time and again with the wrong people, battled through times with my period due to frequent accidents and other mishaps, and mastered trying to perfect how to not appear so glazed over during my classes all while actively fighting to maintain my balance from the narcissistic drama going on at home.
Middle school was like a beastly machine. I was chewed up and forcefully spit out. I found it hard to make connections. Friendships were not really friendships at all but more like closed circles of cliques that I did not easily fit into. Internally, I battled not allowing the anger that raged within me to get the best of me. I silently battled depression and fought through posttraumatic stress from a sexual assault that my brain thought it best for me not to remember, and I lived in elements of a fractured self who struggled to cope.
It was easier enough for me to just completely dissociate into a haze of thoughtful daydreams and lull myself into a stupor of boredom during school. A few times, I hid out in the bathroom, a dark and unused gym when there was no class, or outside in corners and closed spaces around the school to avoid going to class. I was caught a few times and was given after school detention, but I never told my parents. They had always assumed that I was staying after school for the extra help I so desperately needed in a lot of subject areas.
I hated school at this time in my life. I hated the social madness of it all. I hated not being able to fit in while being forced to make myself fit. I missed the old days, but those days when I was so impassioned about school for ions away. Actually, my love for school disappeared soon after kindergarten ended when I found that my specific oddities were not socially acceptable to others.
Stay tuned for more of The Middle School Years.
My Voice Unchained 