Night's School Story

[Night]

I'm finally deciding to do this. This is gonna be a long read. I'm going to go over everything from before I started to after I dropped out.

Content warning: bullying, homophobia, child abuse, suicide, self harm

When I was 4 I visibly remember kneeling on the couch looking at the bus drive by outside my window. I asked my dad when I would be able to go to school. I thought it was the coolest thing and I was really excited for it. I feel like most kids start out this way, which is why I think it's ridiculous that adults say children wouldn't go to school if it wasn't by force.

Now I remember going to kindergarten. It was alright. It was as kindergarten was, lots of play time, nap time. There are two sort of major things that happened in kindergarten. I remember towards the end we started with some basic math. I got a worksheet one day, and the next day, I got a similar looking worksheet. I must've misunderstood the directions because 5-year-old me just filled in the answers from the previous worksheet (from memory mind you). I got everything wrong of course. But I still think the fact that I remembered everything was pretty cool. And here I am, already searching for shortcuts in my work. however, I think possibly the most important lesson I learned from kindergarten is, in a way: consent. I was a 5-year-old white girl raised in a white family, all my friends were white. It wasn't the first black kid I saw, but it was the first that was close enough I could touch their hair (typical...). Needless to say I got scolded a little.

First grade is when I first remember starting to dislike school. I can't remember all that much from first grade to be honest. I remember my best friend from kindergarten wasn't in my class this year and that kind of took a toll on me. I started getting some light teasing and bullying at this time. I think this is when my Anxiety really started to form.

By second grade, I definitely didn't like school. By this time I think it started getting progressively more difficult to get me out of bed. But I still went. I got in trouble for cheating this year. I started cheating on tests and worksheets and basically everything this year in order to get through. One day one of the girls just blurted out to everyone that I was looking at her paper. That was pretty embarrassing. I pretty much stopped cheating at that point.

Summer school. My teacher in second grade asked me if I wanted to try summer school. She said I might not get in, but I was down for it. I got in, I did summer school. And I actually kind of liked it. It was pretty laid back I guess, I wasn't bullied during summer school, and outside of the classes we were with kids of all ages, from even younger than me to high school. I thought that was the coolest thing when I was that age. I learned how to tell the time on a clock.

Third grade. I was ready for third grade. Summer school had me kind of pumped. But it sucked. My anxiety got worse this year. And as a child you don't know how to voice that. Almost every day of school, I would tell my mom before I went that I had a stomach ache. Of course that never worked, so I'd tell my teacher every day too. She always sent me to the bathroom, which I didn't understand at the time. The thing is, I was never lying about my stomach hurting. it did hurt, it hurt a lot. It wasn't until much later that I learned that constant complaining of stomach aches is a major sign of Anxiety in young children. My mom kind of knew, she used to tell me, "It's just a nervous tummy." Though I wonder what would've happened if she had realized the full extent of the problem.

As for 4th and 5th grade, I really don't remember much at all. It's almost like they didn't happen. I wonder if it was so bad I had to block out my memories, or just so normal I don't remember.
The only thing I can remember was a halfway decent math teacher. I vaguely remember kind of liking him. But I also remember not getting the math. I think this is when my dyscalculia started to rear its ugly head. I do actually remember the bullying being the worst. It was stupid things like "Hey my friend likes you" and then they'd all burst out laughing. Then again, maybe that's just how little boys are and they really did like me. It still hurt though. I also remember I started to become very aware of my weight at this point.

6th grade was when it really got bad. In the beginning, it was alright. My math teacher was pretty nice, so was the English teacher. I didn't like our reading teacher though (two separate classes for English and reading? Idk). I was reunited with my best from kindergarten at this point. She used to let me copy her work all the time in math. Thanks her I only got 2 F's instead of 3. But I never wanted to go. And that's where the problem's began. In 6th grade I started trying to skip days. I slept in, missed the bus nearly every day. My parents weren't fond of this and mornings turned into yelling matches. I remember one morning pretty vividly. Being dragged out the door. I'm sitting crying begging not to go. My dad's face is bright red, I see his veins popping, spit flying out of his mouth as he yelled inches from my face. My mom standing by the door. A lot of mornings looked like this from this point forward. I had completely given up on homework. I never did it. Homework and homework only is the reason I failed 2 classes this year. I remember Reading class in particular. I never did homework, but I consistently got 90s and better on tests and in-class work. I remember my teacher saying I would be a perfect student if I just did my homework. I wonder if he's seen the studies on homework lately... I got sent to the guidance office a few times this year because I kept coming to school late with red eyes, puffy face. Sometimes I'd come into class still crying because I couldn't stop.

It was about this point that my parents graduated from simple spanking to full-blown beatings. This is the point when I started getting really depressed. I was already depressed, but it was around this year that it got really bad. I started cutting this year. I started thinking about suicide. I started thinking about drugs a lot. I started to look for them. I started having scary thoughts about shooting up my school and killing my family. I was 11.

7th grade was much the same. Somehow despite failing 2 classes I was pushed along the road. Because I failed 2 classes the year before I wasn't place in the advanced placement class. This actually took a huge toll from my confidence. Got my frist major crush this year. I was better at hiding the sadness inside me so I never got sent to the guidance counselor this year. I was cutting a lot.

Now... 8th grade. 8th grade is also where my SS story begins. I joined this year! My first thread is actually about my algebra teacher during this time. Looking back at this time now is when I think the bipolar started kicking in instead of straight depression. I started getting pretty manic sometimes around this time. I tried to pretend I was confident. It barely worked. The bullying got pretty bad this year. I had a small group of friends, we skipped class together sometimes, sat together at lunch. It was me, the girl I mentioned from kindergarten and 6th grade, and 1 other girl (until later in the year we got a new student and she joined us). One day we were skipping class and me and the best friend I mentioned before kissed while the other girl took a picture. Thinking we were funny we posted in on facebook. Cue the homophobic 13-year-old boys. The girls were surprisingly quite accepting. The boys however were monsters. Haha, kind of ironic calling them monsters since that's what they called us. They acted like it was contagious. It was funny at first, then it got kind of hurtful to me at least. But then it got funny again. Nothing like sneaking up next to one of them and scaring them. I got fat shamed too. I remember a friend coming up to me and telling me that a girl had just been calling me fat. Word of advice by the way: if you hear someone talking about your friend like that, don't tell your friend (unless you know for sure they can handle it). There was even this one boy, twice my size, and he called me fat lol. I also got called things like"Godzilla." Middle schoolers are mean.

It was around this time my father got arrested for hitting me with a belt. My mom accused me of putting the marks on myself. My sister yelled at me one day "are you going to get everyone in this house arrested!?" My dad is still in denial that the marks were even there in the first place. My mom bailed him out the same day if I remember correctly. He wasn't allowed to come home though, there was a protective order for me. My dad got probation. This helped him recover from alcoholism. Social workers were sent to my home constantly, The Department of Children and Families had an investigation on our family. They made me see a psychologist. At first I didn't know we were going to see a psychologist. It's like they were TRYING to deceive me, they just told me it was a doctor's appointment. So I assumed it was a regular check up and I didn't go. So of course, without ever even talking to me, the psychologist diagnosed me with Mood disorder NOS and ODD and told them to hospitalize me. You can imagine how scared I was. You can imagine how It felt like I was being punished. My blood is actually starting to boil as I recall the memories of this situation and how utterly fucking ridiculous it was.

When I was hospitalized they started prescribing me medication. And I took it. It was alright, it helped a little. I'd go through several different medications, one of which turned me into a monster, before quitting completely years later.

Anyways, while this was happening my school district had been going through a type of transformation. Our test scored were deemed too low so we were being forced to change things. When I started school we had 2 elementary schools, you went to one until something like 3rd grade and then you went to the other until 5th grade. 6th through 8th grade was just one school, middle school. And then high school. During 8th grade, they changed everything. We now have 2 elementary schools both from kindergarten until 6th grade, Middle school is now only 7th and 8th. High school stayed the same. We had a half day every other week because the poor teachers were forced to go to meeting every other week. And I swear we were taking a practice tests every week for all the standardized tests.

But I guess I wouldn't really know since all these changes were really done once I was a freshman. You see.. I skipped almost every day of my first year of high school. My father had pretty much given up on getting me to school if I don't want to. It didn't really start like that. At first I was ready to give it a chance, a new school, people are a bit more grown up, I wasn't around all those same people that bullied me relentlessly last year. And when I did see them, they reached the point where they wouldn't even look at us. It was more like I was just burnt out. Totally done. So I just stopped going. One day my parents were trying to get me out of bed and they took my blankets. I don't really have a very clear memory of what happened. Only bits and pieces.. But I got arrested. I got charged with 3 things, one of them got dropped later on. My sentence got suspended. Which is just basically like probation.

My probation officer helped me get into alt ed. At least she tried to help that way. Alt ed was pretty cool, I actually already had a friend in there. Made some pretty cool friends.

But then...

Some of you will know exactly what comes next in this story.

At the end of that school year, I took a bunch of pills and OD'd. I don't think I really wanted to die, just send a message, I don't know. But then some friends called 911 and I was back in the hospital. This is relevant because once I was transferred to the hospital my Probation officer wanted me at, there was school there too! And it really wasn't that bad. In fact, I might even say I liked it. Honestly, the whole experience at that hospital was really good for me. I really appreciate all the people that were there who helped me. They were mostly so nice there, only a few very isolated incidents where it wasn't cool. The school itself was nice, not everyone was the same age or at the same level so we did a lot of self-teaching. Asking for help when we need it. In the science class, we played some cool games where I managed to wow everyone with my scientific knowledge (lol).There was one teacher in particular that I really liked his energy. And for my birthday (I spent my 15th birthday in the hospital) he let me borrow this book he had in the classroom. I guess it's not surprising that the only school I'd actually like is the one where everyone trained on how people like me work.

I got out of the hospital and I was immediately thrown back into school. I was still in alt ed. I was also still a Freshman. But that's just what happens when you skip more than half the school year and you're only allowed to miss 16 days. At this point, things were getting better for me. Like I said, my experience in the hospital was actually really good for me. I was doing therapy. But still I just couldn't manage school. I still missed more than the allowed number of days. You're allowed to submit an appeal once. So I did that and managed to be a sophomore. I was supposed to be a junior. I'm 16 at this point. Finished with medication and pretty much done with therapy.

Despite being mostly stable and fine, I still wasn't going to school. Since I had already used my one appeal I had to stay back and be a sophomore again. This time they tried something new with me. Instead of being in the morning classes I was placed into the afternoon classes. They also placed my friend me, literally to babysit me. But she graduated early and I guess they were right to give me a babysitter because I stopped going again.

This time they didn't want to bother with me. They wouldn't answer my mom's phone calls. By the time the next school year had started no one had answered our calls and we had no idea what was going on. So my mom finally accepted it and at 17 years old she let me drop out. However, the story doesn't end here.

Almost immediately, I started taking evening classes for the GED. Attendance wasn't mandatory at all, but I went every day until about a month before I was set to take the test. And I took it, and I passed with nearly perfect scores (you can actually find a thread with them if you want). The adult ed was pretty cool. I liked the teacher a lot, he had a great energy and it felt like I was actually learning something for once. It was also nice to be in a very small classroom with a wonderful diverse and respectful group of people. It was the first time since being in the hospital that was getting praise from my peers and even better, encouragement.

I applied to college. I got in. I got cold shoulder and got in a huge fight with my parents about not wanting to go anymore. Everyone convinced me to just give it a chance and I was like fine whatever. I started, it was alright. I absolutely hated the commute. I got used to taking the bus. But the ride was so long. And I hated with a passion waiting for the bus to go home. I got talked to and stared at some many times. I got asked if I wanted to be a stripper at one point. Plus if I didn't want to be stood next to some gross people I'd have to stand on the edge of the sidewalk right where the bus will stop because I swear everyone in the city took that bus at that time. College itself was alright I guess. I learned an important lesson about researching your professors beforehand. I had to drop a class because the professor was just a mess, we didn't jive at all. Almost failed a class because I got sick. And literally every single time I did my homework I started crying. I didn't even last the whole semester before I just stopped going.

And here I am today.. I don't know how to end this really. I'm just here. Not a clue what I want to do.

[brainiac3397]

Are u fine with acting/modeling?

U could act/model(and model doesn't mean strutting yo thang in a bikini in the arctic. Those plain folk on shopping catalogues are also models...)

Probably a whole bunch of stuff you've got to try before realizing what you'll enjoy I guess. Unless you have something you enjoy.

[SoulRiser]

I guess even a relatively crappy job would be better than the shit you've already been through.

I still don't really know what I wanna do either btw... but I'm pretty sure I like not having to do anything in particular most of the time. Passive income ftw.

[brainiac3397]

Im thinking of importing clothing from some west african country and selling em online.

If I get a manufacturing deal, that stuff'll be exclusively mine guaranteeing that I basically get best lowest price around.

I also have an idea for that modeling business that's gotten mentally lined up...Gotta check if something like it exists and what I can do to improve upon it.

[Ami]

Think after all the shit you've been through, you deserve to find out what makes you happy. What you actually like to do. You deserved this since age 0 but since that wasn't given to you, now's a good time as any. Thanks for sharing btw.

[brainiac3397]

U see like 60 year olds starting college and bettering themselves when they neglected or were unable to do so in their youth. You got lotta time to find what works. Aint worth spending trial and error time wallowing about hypotheticals or the shitty past (except to determine how not to become a shitty person)