I was a very shy kid growing up, and the fact that I was also home-schooled contributed to that fact, because I didn't have much of a social life outside of my own home. The main social interaction I would get with other kids my age was from church, but I was so very shy, so I did very little talking to my classmates. A lot of times I also felt very picked on going to my primary classes, because some of the other kids would make fun of the fact that I would not talk. I felt bullied going to primary, and bullied when I would go to other activities such as Activity Days. The teacher would ask us questions, and I felt like I almost always knew the answer to them, but I was terrified to actually voice my answer. The few times that I would actually share an answer, the teacher would always be very impressed with what I had to say, because I would give very thorough/thought-out answers; but when I did share an answer, I would get ridiculed by the other kids in the class. It was always, "Oh my gosh, did Kelsie actually say something?" or "Shh Kelsie! You talk way too much!" which would be followed by a chorus of laughter and jokes. That treatment made me feel even more like a freak and a loser, causing me to want to keep my mouth shut that much more. For some reason I always seemed to have problems with other girls my age, mainly because I would get picked on a lot and made fun of by them. For that reason, I have had very few friends that are girls throughout my life. It seemed like any attempts I did make to have friends which were girls were only met with being made fun of, having my name trashed, stabbing me in the back, etc. So instead I turned to just having guy friends, I would always be hanging out with the neighbor boys; we would play football, Cops & Robbers, Night-Games, etc.
I loved the fact that my Mom cared about us kids enough to keep us home and teach us herself, she originally made that choice when my older brother and sister were getting bullied in Elementary. After that, she gave the rest of us younger kids the option when we would reach school age, as to whether or not we wanted to attend public school. I chose to be home-schooled, up until I got into 8th grade, at that point I started attending public school. Although the downfall about being home-schooled was the fact that you would also get ridiculed for that from the other kids, and were basically just seen as a complete weirdo. Not because we weren't smart enough, or good enough, but just because everyone assumed that it just made us "different" and that being different, must be a bad thing. I loved learning, and was always at least one grade ahead in my schooling; that was the beauty of being taught from home, you could actually move at your own pace, instead of just having to progress by grade year. As I grew older, the fact that I did not go to public school made me feel even more like I just DID NOT BELONG, and that I never seemed to fit in anywhere.
When I was 12 years old, and just recently graduated into Young Womens, my family decided to move. The new location that we would be moving to was a very small town, basically in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. I was scared to move, because I would have to leave the only friends I had, the neighbor boys from across the street; and I did not have a good track record for making new friends. The ward that we moved into was a great ward luckily, with so many great people, that they welcomed us right in. I was able to make some friends with a couple of the girls in the ward (mainly because their parent's were my young women's leaders, so at first I kind of felt like it was forced) But later on they would end up becoming my best friends. I did however still feel like everyone looked at me like I was a loser because I did not attend public school. Now that we were in this new ward, I also tried to share my voice a little more; but I got similar reactions as I did in my old ward. I feel like I would share something, and the other kids reaction would be "Okay misses smarty pants," or acting like I was such a "goody-good" just because I actually knew the answers. This drove me nuts, I knew the teachers appreciated my answers, but I felt like I didn't belong in my age group. This again drove me not to want to talk much at church, because the other kids would treat me like I must be Miss Perfect, when in reality I felt oh so far from perfect, I felt like a messed up freak.
One of the things that I did love to do when growing up was playing sports. My parent's had put me in soccer when I was 5, and basketball when I was 8. I was obsessed with sports, I felt like it was my life, and one of the few things that I felt like actually brought me happiness. That was the other thing I was scared to lose by moving, because I did not know if they would have the teams in such a small town, and if my parents would have the money for it after we moved. I was able to continue playing sports once we moved, although it was not near as much as I had before. I wish I would have been able to continue playing sports throughout middle school and into high school though, because I feel like playing on sport's teams is one of the things that helped me feel like I had some purpose.
This was also a hard time for me, because during this time frame I found out that my little sister ( 9 or 10 at the time) had started participating in online chat rooms, and in the mix of things got involved with some not-so-great guys. We would play games online, so my parent's were okay with it from time to time, but they did not realize that the games also included chat rooms so that you could chat with the other players. Most of the time it was just innocent and random conversation, but of course as with anything online, it has the possibility of being bad as well. It was there that my little sister started chatting with guys that were much older than her, at least 16+ (honestly who knows how old they really were) but it got to the point where they started talking dirty to her, sending her nude pics, and requesting her to send pictures in return. My dad is a mechanic and owns his own small car lot, so us kids would always help out there and get paid a small amount in return. One day as I went to take pictures of some of the cars on the lot so that I could post them online for my dad, I found naked pictures of my little sister on the camera. I was shocked, and was so scared of what I would have to do. I ended up feeling like I needed to tell my mom about it, so I took her the camera and told her what I found. After that instance, I continued to find random evidence that my sister was chatting with older guys and sending inappropriate pictures, I was scared for her because she was my little sister. I hated having to tell my mom about it, but I felt like it was something I needed to do, and ever since then I feel like my sister has hated my guts for it. I knew I rated her out, so I expected she would not be happy with me; but I did not know what else to do, I was concerned for her safety. Either way, I again felt like I was the hated one in the family, the one that was always getting people into trouble. I turned a lot of that hate inward toward myself, feeling like everyone would be better off without me around
No comments:
Post a Comment