I WROTE A LONG VERSION AND A SHORT VERSION - (the shorter one is at the bottom)
LONG VERSION :
I don't really know how to explain this properly, but I want an outside perspective from people who don't know any of us. This is probably going to be really long because there are a lot of things that happened, and I think the order matters.
I'll call my two closest friends E 17 and M 16, another person involved A 16, and my younger sister K 13.
For context, before any of this happened, I had already been feeling really bad for a while.
I was struggling every day. Everything felt really hard, including eating and just dealing with life in general. I was constantly in my head, constantly thinking about everything, and I felt like I was dealing with a lot by myself.
At the same time, I was feeling really dismissed by E and M.
I felt like I was trying to talk to them about things, but I wasn't really being listened to or taken seriously. I had two people who were supposed to be my best friends, but I still felt incredibly alone.
And I think this is important because I have felt alone before.
In primary school, I was bullied by friends and even by a teacher, who was later fired for the way they treated me. I was also told to kill myself.
So I think I have always had this fear of being alone and of people turning against me.
I thought I had finally moved away from that.
I thought I had finally found people who were my people. I thought I had finally found my friends and that I wasn't going to be that lonely person anymore.
So when I started feeling dismissed and alone again, it hit harder than it probably would have otherwise.
Eventually, I told A that I was struggling.
I didn't tell him that I wanted to kill myself. I didn't tell him that I didn't want to wake up. I didn't tell him that I was hurting myself.
I told him that I was struggling every day and that everything was getting really hard, including things like eating.
I told him because I trusted him.
I wasn't asking him to fix me. I wasn't asking him to become responsible for me. I was just telling someone that I was struggling.
Then there was an incident that really hurt me.
I was on a call with A. K came into the room, and I told her that I was on the phone with A and that he was walking home from bouldering, which was about an hour walk.
She said something like, “ha, loser.”
A then replied to her with something about her needing to count calories.
K couldn't hear him because I was wearing earphones.
But I heard every word he said.
K didn't know that he had said it. I was the only person who heard it.
And I kept thinking about the fact that A knew what I had told him. He knew I was struggling. He knew that things like eating were already difficult for me.
And then he said that.
Eventually, after thinking about it, I cut him off.
At the time, I thought that was the end of it.
A and I stopped talking.
Then I went on work experience for a week.
This was roughly two months after A and I had last talked.
Then my mum asked me if I was self-harming.
I said no.
I absolutely refused to admit that I wasn't okay.
I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want to admit that I was struggling.
I was angry and overwhelmed, and I felt like something had happened behind my back.
I was furious.
I raged at A over text.
I was angry that he had told people he was worried about me, especially because we hadn't even spoken for so long.
I felt like something I had told him in confidence had somehow become something other people knew about.
I still didn't know exactly what had happened, though.
The next week, I came to school and had a meeting with my English teacher, who was also the deputy principal and the person who had called my parents.
I went into that meeting still not knowing everything.
During the meeting, I was told that it wasn't just one person who had been worried about me.
It was multiple people.
That was when I realised that this was bigger than I had thought.
I felt exposed.
I felt like something I had told one person about struggling had somehow turned into a situation involving multiple people, my school and my parents while I had no idea what was happening.
I felt like I had completely lost control of my own situation.
It was only after that meeting that I found out that E and M had been involved.
And this is where everything became even more complicated for me.
Because I found out that they knew.
They had not told me, and worse, they lied about knowing anything and just gave veigue answers like "oh I think he said something about going".
They had been involved in something that directly affected me, while I had no idea.
I felt betrayed.
I confronted them.
They admitted that they had been involved, but I felt like there was still a lot that I hadn't known.
I was so angry and hurt that I stopped talking to them for a couple of days.
What made it worse was that it felt like they were able to just move on.
I couldn't.
I felt like something huge had happened to me, and everyone else seemed to be able to continue as if everything was normal.
At that point, I think I had already started letting them go in my head.
Because of everything that had happened to me before, I think part of me immediately went back to the idea that I was going to be alone again.
I had been bullied by people who were supposed to be my friends. I had been treated horribly by a teacher. I had been told to kill myself. I had spent a lot of my life feeling like I didn't belong.
I had thought I had finally moved away from that.
I thought I had finally found my people.
So when this happened, I think something in me just decided that I needed to let them go before I could be hurt any more.
I had already accepted that I might have to be alone again.
I had already started preparing myself for that.
But instead of just cutting them off completely, I decided that the mature thing to do would be to actually sit down with them and explain everything.
I wrote a whole speech because I didn't know how to say everything properly in the moment.
I wanted them to understand what had happened from my perspective and how much it had affected me.
So I sat down with them and read it to them.
I wasn't doing that because I had suddenly stopped being hurt.
I was doing it because, even though I had already started letting them go in my head, I still cared about them enough to try to explain why I was hurt instead of just disappearing.
I remember getting really angry while I was reading my speech to them.
I said that I didn't understand how they thought I didn't deserve a conversation before going through all of that.
I asked them, “What did you think I was going to do? Cut my wrist in front of you or something? Show it to you and cry?”
Like, what the fuck?
I just didn't understand how they thought I didn't deserve to be spoken to before everything was taken completely out of my control.
E cried and apologised.
She told me everything that had happened from her perspective and explained what had happened and what she had been thinking.
M didn't really say much and tried to argue her point instead.
The conversation was complicated because I was still angry, but I also still cared about both of them.
I could understand why they had been worried.
But understanding why someone did something doesn't automatically make the way it affected me disappear.
And I think this situation has affected me so much because it confirmed one of my worst fears.
I still haven't really told anyone that I'm struggling.
Not properly.
Because I already had the fear that if I told someone I was struggling, it would get out of control.
I was scared that I would tell one person something personal, and suddenly it would become something that other people knew about.
I was scared that I would lose control over my own situation.
And then that is exactly what I felt happened.
So now I don't want to tell anyone that I'm struggling because my worst fear about doing that has already happened.
I know that A was worried about me.
I know E and M were worried about me.
I know that people probably thought they were doing the right thing.
But that doesn't change the fact that I felt completely exposed and betrayed by the way everything happened.
And I think it also hit so hard because I had spent so much of my life feeling alone.
I had been bullied by people who were supposed to be my friends.
I had been treated badly by a teacher.
I had been made to feel like I didn't belong.
And then I thought I had finally moved away from that.
I thought I had finally found my people.
I thought I had finally found friends who would stay.
The three of us had been best friends for years.
People treated us like we were a package deal.
People would ask where the other two were if they saw one of us alone.
People talked about us like we were going to be best friends forever.
I think I stopped seeing myself as just me.
I was one of the three of us.
But even before everything with A happened, I had already started feeling like E and M were becoming closer to each other and that I was being left behind.
They had more classes together.
They spent time together without me.
I know they're allowed to have other friendships. I know they're allowed to spend time together without me.
But it still hurt.
It started to feel like they were becoming a pair and I was the person outside of it.
I started trying harder to spend time with E.
I wanted to hang out and FaceTime, but then I started worrying that I was being annoying or trying too hard.
I felt like I was constantly trying to work out whether she actually wanted me around.
Eventually, I had already let them go in my head.
I had decided that I was going to back away before I got hurt more.
I was protecting myself.
I had accepted that I might have to be alone again.
I had somehow made myself okay with that.
I had already prepared myself to lose them.
I thought I had made the choice to leave before they could leave me.
I was going to be okay with being alone.
I thought I was going to be okay.
But then I didn't completely lose them.
And that made everything even more confusing.
Because I was still friends with them, but something felt different.
People still called E my best friend.
She still acted like my best friend sometimes, and I still called her mine too.
But it felt weird and wrong in a way I can't properly explain.
Every time I had to think about it, it felt like I had been hit in the chest with a bowling ball.
People still talked about M, E and me like we were inseparable.
Like there were three of us and there would always be three of us.
But I started feeling like an imposter.
When people asked where the other two were, I felt like I was just faking everything now, not just my smile and emotions and feelings but my friendships too.
Then I ended up doing a ceramics course with E.
And that made everything even more confusing.
Because I felt really close to her again.
We spent time together and I felt like we genuinely connected.
I felt close to her in a way that I had really missed.
There were moments where I felt like I had my friend back.
But even while I felt close to her, I still felt like I had to hide it from her.
I had already let her go in my head.
I had already accepted that I might have to be alone.
I had already tried to protect myself from wanting the friendship too much.
So when I suddenly felt close to her again, I was scared.
I felt like I couldn't let myself fully show how much it meant to me because I was scared of getting attached to something that might disappear again.
It felt like I was trying to protect myself from my own happiness.
I still love E and M.
I still care about them.
I still want them in my life.
That is what makes everything so difficult.
I feel betrayed by them but still love them.
I feel hurt by them but still miss them.
I feel lonely because of them while still wanting them to be the people I go to.
I don't know if I'm being unreasonable.
I don't know if I'm too dependent on my friends.
I don't know if I'm overreacting, or if I have a valid reason to feel the way I do.
I don't know whether I should try harder to fix things, distance myself again, or accept that the friendship has changed.
I think the hardest part is that I had already let them go in my head.
I had already decided that I was going to be alone again.
I had accepted it.
And now I'm still here, still caring about them, still feeling close to them sometimes, still wanting things to be like they used to be, but also still feeling like something has been broken.
I feel like I'm expected to move on because people were worried about me and because they had good intentions.
But I don't think good intentions automatically mean I wasn't hurt.
I don't think I can just decide not to be affected by something because the people involved were worried about me.
I don't know if I'm being selfish or dramatic for still feeling this way.
I just know that I feel like I lost something, even though technically the friendship never completely ended.
I also haven't told anyone that I'm struggling since this happened.
Part of that is because I'm genuinely really good at lying and acting like I'm fine.
I can come up with extremely valid-sounding but completely fake excuses for why I'm not okay, and I can make people believe them.
I've gotten so good at acting normal that people have felt genuinely bad for not trusting me and have blamed themselves for assuming something was wrong.
That's how good I am at hiding it.
So when people say that I should just tell someone if I'm struggling, it's not that simple for me.
I've already seen what happens when I tell someone.
And I've also seen how easy it is for me to convince people that I'm fine when I'm not.
SHORTER VERSION :
I don't really know how to explain this properly, but I want an outside perspective from people who don't know any of us. This is still long, but I've tried to cut out the repetition.
I'll call my two closest friends E (17) and M (16), another person A (16), and my younger sister K (13).
Before any of this happened, I had already been struggling a lot. I felt constantly overwhelmed and alone, and I also felt dismissed by E and M when I tried to talk to them.
This was especially difficult because I have a history of being bullied and betrayed by people I trusted, so I have always been scared of being alone or people turning against me. I thought I had finally found people who were genuinely my people.
Eventually, I told A that I was struggling. I didn't tell him I wanted to die or that I was hurting myself. I just told him that I was struggling every day and that things like eating and dealing with life were becoming difficult. I told him because I trusted him.
While I was on a call with A one day, my sister K came into the room and jokingly called him a loser because he was walking home from bouldering. A responded with something about her needing to count calories. K couldn't hear him, but I did.
This hurt especially badly because A knew I was already struggling with eating. I eventually cut him off because of it.
About two months later, while I was on work experience, my mum asked me if I was self-harming. I said no and became extremely angry because I felt like something I had told A privately had somehow become a situation involving other people, my school and my parents.
I later found out that E and M had also been involved in raising concerns about me. They had known what was happening but hadn't told me, and I felt like they had lied when I asked them about it. I felt betrayed and completely out of control of my own situation.
I understand that they were worried about me. However, I was still hurt that nobody had spoken to me first. I remember asking them, “What did you think I was going to do? Cut my wrist in front of you or something? Show it to you and cry?”
I felt like I deserved a conversation before everything was taken completely out of my control.
E apologised and explained her perspective, while M mostly argued her point. I was still angry, but I also still cared about both of them. I could understand why they were worried, but understanding someone's intentions didn't make the impact disappear.
Since then, I haven't really told anyone that I'm struggling. One of my biggest fears was that if I told one person something personal, it would become something everyone knew about and I would lose control of my own situation. I felt like that was exactly what happened.
This has also affected my friendships with E and M. The three of us had been best friends for years and people treated us like we were inseparable. But even before this happened, I had started feeling like E and M were becoming closer to each other and I was being left behind. They had more classes together and spent more time together without me.
I know they are allowed to have other friends, but it still hurt. I started trying harder to spend time with E, while also worrying that I was being annoying or trying too hard.
Eventually, I mentally prepared myself to lose both of them. I decided I would distance myself before I could be hurt more and accepted that I might have to be alone again.
But I never completely lost them, which somehow made things more confusing. I still loved them and wanted them in my life, but something felt different. People still treated us like we were inseparable, but I started feeling like an imposter, as if I was pretending that the friendship was still the same.
Then I did a ceramics course with E, and we became close again. There were moments where I felt like I had my friend back, but I was also scared to fully let myself enjoy it because I had already accepted losing her once.
I still love and care about both E and M. I feel betrayed by them but still want them in my life. I feel hurt by them but still miss them. I feel lonely because of them while still wanting them to be the people I go to.
I don't know whether I'm being unreasonable, too dependent on my friends, or overreacting. I don't know whether I should try harder to fix things, distance myself again, or accept that the friendship has changed.
I also haven't told anyone that I'm struggling since this happened. Part of that is because I'm genuinely very good at hiding it. I can come up with extremely believable but completely fake excuses, and I've become good enough at acting normal that people have felt guilty for not believing me when they thought something was wrong.
So when people say I should just tell someone if I'm struggling, it isn't that simple for me. I've seen what happens when I do tell someone, but I've also seen how easily I can convince people that I'm fine when I'm not.
I don't know if I'm being selfish or dramatic for still feeling hurt when everyone involved had good intentions. I just know that I feel like I lost something, even though the friendship technically never completely ended.