The school year is starting again for children all across the country. This is a new year for them. For a lot of us, we've continuously begun our new years, not in January as the calendar dictates, but in August as it was ingrained in us from a very young age. Some of us outgrow this way of thinking after being in the 'real word' for a period of time. Others have children in their 20s and continue on with this throughout their lives until their children graduate and go off to college. Others are teachers so going with this routine is, well, routine until they retire. Then there are people like me. I do not have children. I am a 32 year old recovering alcoholic working in the investment industry. I still feel my years begin in August and end in June. Perhaps it is because I am an adult adolescent. Perhaps it is because I began killing brain cells at age 14 and did not stop for a decade and a half. Or, perhaps, everyone has this mindset without actually being aware of it. Just this simple conversation about when the year begins caused me to reflect.
There are so many different stages of the growing up process while being school-aged. While I was hearing about all of these kids getting ready to go back and start a new year I began to reminisce about what this time meant for me during many of those different stages.
As a young child, beginning Kindergarten and each grade up through 4th and 5th, I was always very excited. I mean, summer was awesome but I could never find ENOUGH kids to play with which was all I ever wanted to do. Play with everyone and be friends with the whole world. I would run around town, by myself at a pretty young age and just go make friends or knock on peoples' doors and ask if there were any kids around. A recent conversation with my mom revealed how crazy that was and that they really didn't know I was doing that. My parents thought I was playing in the front or back yard but I would just wander off down the block. It was a small town. It was still crazy. So, when the school year would start I would be SO excited to make friends and play at recess. It was Heaven. I wasn't much interested in learning and I do recall the start of my trouble-making career being as early as Kindergarten. We would get check marks if we were "bad" in certain areas. I always got check marked on "disrupts class" "talks too much" "doesn't pay attention". This was consistent through grade school. I would be reprimanded or 'talked to' by my folks about it but the school world was separate from my home world so what mom and dad said at home did not enter my mind while in school. This thought process continued through my senior year.
Up until 5th grade my school life was great, even with the constant detention and groundings for misbehaving. I had so much fun with my friends I really didn't give that other stuff much thought. My grades were pretty good too so we all just kept trucking along. When 5th grade hit, something changed. It started out the same as always, with the thrill of new beginnings and new teachers. And THAT year- that was the year homework was going to start so that pretty much meant I was becoming a grown-up. Which was also exhilarating.
I was a little chunkier and pretty dorky. I did not know anything about styles or trends. I did not know these were things I was supposed to know! I did not know I was chunky until kids started pointing it out to me. I did not know my clothes were goofy until I was told these things by my peers. Groups of friends would fraction off into smaller groups and I kind of just didn't fit with any of those. That's where the feeling different really began. That is also when I began to discover my hidden talent. Most of the days I spent by myself or with one other outcast child at recess and at lunch, but in the classroom, where we all HAD to be together, that's where I would shine. No, not by showing off my intellect or passing pop quizzes with flying colors. No. My gift was making the other kids laugh. For those fleeting moments when I would respond to the teacher's direction with a clever rhyme or throw my voice or share a story (that was most likely fiction) and the room would fill with laughter- I had them. They were mine. I had power. What would often be the icing on the cake was when the teacher would laugh too.
5th grade was also the year my grades began to slip. My focus was faltering. How could I care about Social Studies when I was the center of the universe and everyone was thinking about me and my life was at stake every moment and what the hell is Social Studies, anyway?!
On to middle school and the anxiety began. Intense. Paralyzing. I was not pretty. I was not fashionable. I was not thin. These, I learned, were important things to be. My intelligence and my character were not given much regard. Not by me, that is. My parents and teachers would stress to me how smart and creative I was. How much POTENTIAL I had. But how could that matter to me? How could that matter when the future didn't exist and everyone was watching me right now? I had to try my best to appear better than I really was. It was an impossible feat. I began to loathe how different I was. Loathe the island I lived on. It was all very dramatic. But I could still make everyone laugh. Even if it was at the cost of the teachers dignity- or my own. They roared.
I began writing poetry in 7th grade and it was quite dark. Morbid. Looking back, it was a cry for help. Most of it was awful but some was pretty good. Some of it was beautiful. I loved writing. I would write all of the time. When I was told to write about something in my life or an experience I'd had I would just make something up. It was better that way. I did well on these assignments. I was down to zero friends now and would spend my free time writing or listening to music. But always obsessing about what other people thought of me. Always obsessing about how, "if I could just be someone else." I despised myself. This was the time in my life where I began idolizing the 'bad' kids, the rebels. The kids who smoked pot, drank, had sex. They were cool to me and I wanted to be just like them. I had to fit in somehow. Somewhere. I HAD to or I would surely die. So I pretended to be like them. I talked about how much I drank or smoked and I actually started smoking cigarettes, even though they made me barf. I would at least walk around with them so they knew they were missing out on a real gem, here.
My tricks didn't work. I perpetuated my disposition by constantly obsessing about it and believing it all to be true. So I acted how I felt. Unloved and discarded. Although I had no reason to feel this way. My family loved me dearly and WE would laugh together on a daily basis. Even with all of my perceived failures constantly happening. But my family loving me wasn't enough. I needed the whole world to love me. I needed the world to love me more than they possibly could have even if the whole population DID love me- it wouldn't have been enough. My biggest failure was, actually, when I failed to love myself.
I isolated throughout the rest of middle school and I fantasized about what it would be like to die. I romanticized death. I had no images of Heaven or fears of Hell. Just a long, deep sleep- away from the world that treated me so poorly. Such a victim. These thoughts were acted out in some ways and that's when my introduction to therapy started. This didn't help. The thing is, no one can help you when you're constantly lying to them. I wrote my therapist songs. I wrote them poetry. I talked about all of the fantastic things I had done. I never talked about my feelings. I think they asked but I'm sure I just made something up.
Middle school was the darkest time of my school days and I made it out alive. On to high school where I really found my place. I found alcohol and drugs and the things that worried me were no longer a bother. I had everything I needed and no disappointed family members or faculty would get in the way of always getting what I wanted. The point isn't to write my memoirs here. It's not even to tell my story. It's a reflection with an actual purpose.
I didn't know it was OKAY to feel my feelings. I did not know it was okay to express them. No one ever told me that. I never saw anyone else do it in a healthy way either. People did not tell the truth about this. No one ever said that being different or quirky was wrong either, but that was my perception. There was no real fault here. No blame. And I could have been told it was OKAY but I didn't hear it or I didn't believe it. There is no reason to look back with any regret. There is a responsibility when faced with awareness. Today, when I discover something to be a truth. A personal truth that may help someone else, that's when I have a responsibility to share it.
I have 2 cousins starting college, one starting 8th grade, one starting high school, and one still in grade school. I have friends with children in high school and middle school and starting first grade. I am a 32 year old, single, childless woman who is a member of society today. I can tell each of them, with complete conviction, that showing your true self is GOOD. It is OKAY to be you. Exactly as you are right now. No matter what the world around you appears to be. It's very likely an illusion. And, although, right now, these things seem very important. Life or death important. What is most important is to just be YOU and be okay with whatever that may be. Love yourself and love those around you and just keep it THAT SIMPLE.
Embrace your quirks, your flaws, your assets, your fears, your goals, your passions, your weird. Embrace all the things that make you, YOU, even the things you don't like. And don't just embrace them. Live them OUT LOUD for the whole world to see. Because you will hear "it gets better" "it gets easier"and all of that other crap (which is true, it does if you let it) but the truth is, it will be much better, much faster, if you look yourself in the eyes and say, "damn, you are awesome." And mean it. Not in an arrogant way. But in a way that makes you equal to the rest of us. Think of the person you love most in the world and, if it's not already you, start loving yourself exactly that much- otherwise your love for others will not be perceived as reality by anyone but you.
If your kids are super reluctant about going back. If they HATE school and say this with conviction. If their mood changes drastically during this time. Hear them out. Tell them it is okay to express exactly what it is that they don't like. That, no matter what it is, it is okay to talk about and it is okay to get emotional. It is okay to be honest about feelings. It could save their lives. It could save them from a lot of pain and years of stuffing and isolating or hiding behind humor and a bottle- or worse. I'm not saying give them what they want, I'm saying respect them enough to listen to exactly what they are feeling and then talk it out.
Today, I'm kind of like I was in kindergarten. I just go up to strangers and ask if they want to be my friend. This is basically true, although I am immersed in an environment which makes this normal and acceptable behavior. After 32 years I found my place and every single one of my experiences has gotten me here. It's exactly where I am supposed to be today. I embrace my weird. Some of my most glaring quirks are the things others love most about me today. And I have begun to embrace and love them, myself. It doesn't have to take everyone years of battling demons in dungeons to get there. It can be light and seamless, if we're all honest with our children. By our children, I mean, the children of the world. I am a member of society and that gives me a responsibility to tell the truth.
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