basically a vent of my entire life story, and a plead for help
I’m a 17 y/o homeschooled female, homeschooled since birth. You read that right, since birth. My mom is very anti-vax and extremely holistic (the usual suspect). It’s been hard on me for as long as I can remember, especially since all of my half-siblings went to public school. I used to joke that I was her guinea pig, lol.
From a very young age, I learned how to cope with being alone. I was basically my own best friend.
I had the occasional friend growing up, but those friendships were rough. They would openly call me names, leave me out, and make me feel like an outsider because I was such a sensitive kid. It hurt, especially because they were the only friends I had, and I was too young to really understand why. I just learned to deal with it.
I also vividly remember trying to do schoolwork with my mom. I would cry every single time because I couldn’t retain any of it. Even simple math problems would make me sob and say, “I don’t know.” Honestly, I always did better with history and science, but math has always been my #1 enemy. My mom tried different programs and worksheets, but nothing ever stuck. I was like a soaked sponge, I couldn’t retain any more water. (Weird analogy, I know)
Eventually, math got pushed aside completely. I quite literally grew up learning everything except math, since it was put to the back burner.
I went to a few co-ops, and while my social skills were obviously rough, I did make friends and enjoyed it for a while. Then COVID hit when I was around 11 or 12, and I was right back at square one. Still isolated. Still not doing math.
I kept one friend from co-op though! I'll call him G. He became my best friend, but he lived two hours away, so we only saw each other every couple of months.
That was around the time I really started feeling like a failure. I knew I was behind, and instead of trying again, I just completely froze like an idiot. I wish I had pushed myself then. I really do. Around that time, I also found self-harm as an outlet.
Because of COVID, I had almost no opportunities to practice socializing until I was about 13, and even then it was mostly quick trips to the mall or grocery store. Nothing meaningful, really.
Life kept going. The world kept spinning. I had G, and I had a few online friends. For a while, I tried convincing myself that was enough, but it wasn’t. Every time I saw kids my age hanging out, it felt like a pit opened in my chest. I felt like I didn’t belong. Like I wasn’t normal.
It only got worse as I got older. The loneliness and incompetence fed that feeling. I’d cry myself to sleep, praying that I’d wake up and somehow be normal.
By 16, I felt awful. I’d never had a boyfriend or girlfriend. I had one friend I saw every two months. I stayed in bed all day, every day. I had started vaping, was severely out of shape, and was deeply depressed. Borderline suicidal.
Then somehow, when I turned 17 and summer came around, I made three new friends: M, N, and S. They all lived in my city, and for the first time, I felt like I belonged. Tbh, it was probably the best summer of my life. I still had G too.
Eventually, N and M went back to school, and S was also homeschooled. M’s strict mom mysteriously stopped letting him hang out with us, so it became mostly me, S, and N. We made a good trio, even though S and N had been best friends long before I came along. Rip.
We started hanging out multiple times a week, and things were good, if I ignored the constant looming shadow of doom hanging around me at all times. I will say, hanging out with them made it easier to ignore.
Around Thanksgiving, I developed severe health anxiety (probably tied to my OCD), and it wrecked my mental health. Every sensation made me think I was dying. Then I started getting terrifying aura migraines that mimicked stroke symptoms. I think anxiety and hormone issues triggered them. My dad gets them too with the exact same symptoms, so it was only a matter of time before the gene struck me.
I became terrified. I stayed in dark rooms, cut out some of my favorite foods once I figured out my migraine triggers (soy, aspartame, MSG), lost weight way too fast, became malnourished, and lived in constant fear of the next migraine because of how scary they were.
I still hung out with S and N when I could, just with sunglasses on and strict food rules. I never told them I needed space or that their presences were bothersome. If anything, I told them the opposite.
I was actually very honest about how badly I was struggling. When I told my mom how miserable I felt and how badly I didn’t want to be here anymore, she would threaten to send me to a mental hospital because she didn’t know what else to do. I told S and N that, and they seemed sympathetic. They said they’d help get me out of the house so I wouldn’t sink deeper.
But slowly, they stopped showing up. Once a week became once every two weeks. Then three weeks. Then nothing.
A month passed without them even checking on me. Meanwhile, Life360 kept notifying me that they were hanging out together every day without me. Talk about ouch.
Then I found out my best friend G was moving across the country. I cried for hours. We hung out one last time before he left, and we shared a painfully long goodbye.
After a month, S and N finally reached out because S wanted to pick up a book she had loaned me. I said yes, hoping maybe we’d finally talk and catch up.
Instead, they pulled into my driveway (with N), said “hi, thank you, bye,” and left.
That completely tore me up, because ARE YOU SERIOUS?? 😭
I was still hurt, but mostly I was angry. How do you treat someone you call your friend like that, especially when you know they’re struggling??? I was genuinely so lost.
That anger became motivation. I wanted to pull myself out of the hole I’d been stuck in for years. I wanted to become someone better. Cut my hair, dye it, get healthier, get my permit, get a job, graduate, rebuild myself from scratch.
But I don’t even know where to start. It quite literally seems impossible to me. I’m broke. My parents are broke. I have no real support system. I have terrible social and health anxiety. I can barely walk around my house without my heart racing (I suspect POTS smh). I have the math skills of a third grader as a supposed high school junior.
I feel discouraged, depressed, embarrassed, and so incredibly alone.
I’m turning 18 in four months, and I feel like I’m running out of time. I don’t want to stay stuck like this forever. I just want guidance. I just want help.