2020 was a hard year for practically everyone on this planet and I was no exception. I was in my junior year of high school and my entire life had been turned upside down. Before COVID hit, I was already struggling a lot; I was struggling with my mental health, and I had my first ever break up. Not only that but I was being iced out by my core friend group. I had been friends with these people since middle school. We had been through everything together and now they wanted nothing to do with me.
I’m not saying I was not in the wrong though. At the beginning of the breakup, I shut down, isolated myself, and didn’t really even speak to them – except for the person I was closest to in the group. I was not perfect, in fact, I was a terrible friend to them. However, when I finally felt okay enough to reach out and ask for help, when I wanted their love and friendship, they weren’t there. Instead, they told me I was emotionally abusive and manipulative to my now ex-boyfriend (I talked to him afterward and I apologized because I did feel like I was being that way to him during our relationship, he accepted and we both ended on good terms). They also wanted me to apologize to them. I remember apologizing to them profusely – I felt like a child who was being scolded by their parents. I felt overwhelming grief. I felt like I was climbing up a rope trying to get to them but the rope was neverending. I wish I knew back then that nothing I would say would make them forgive me.
I was already spiraling into a major depressive episode at that point, but I still had my best friend, the one I was closest to in my now former friend group. Until I made a mistake, and they too left me. At school, on one of the days I was feeling more like myself again, I was grabbing lunch at the cafeteria with my theatre friends which had now become my best friends, when I saw my ex-boyfriend and ex-friend group hanging out and eating lunch together. I wasn’t shocked by that, I knew they were hanging out because I had seen them, but I always made it a point for them to not see me. But this time, they saw me, and it felt like they were looking right through. Suddenly everything I worked on in therapy and on myself had vanished and I had a panic attack. I texted my best friend asking for support and when they didn’t text me back in time; I got angry at them. I lashed out and when I went to apologize, they sent me a long paragraph saying that they wished me the best, but I was being emotionally abusive and manipulative and they didn’t want to be my friend anymore. I didn’t have the strength to reply back so I didn’t. I just wailed and begged any higher being that somehow this was a dream and my friend who I thought would be my friend forever was still going to be that.
On February 13th, I went to the hospital. Early that day at school I had extremely painful stomach cramps on my left side and my grandpa took me to the emergency room. The doctor told me that I had gallbladder stones and they needed to do surgery and remove them. While I didn’t want to go through surgery, I knew it needed to be done, so I went through it anyway- plus I got to skip school. It’s weird to say but being in the hospital was probably the happiest I had been at the time. Sure, I was in so much pain and couldn’t eat solid food, but I was happy. I was focusing on myself for the first time in a while. When I went back to school, I was still dealing with depression and anxiety, but I was getting better. I was eating again which I hadn’t done in a while. I found new passions like anime and kpop. I became more involved in theatre and became friends with people in my department. I strengthened my bonds with my theatre friend group who had been there for me through everything that went on and who I now consider like family to me. I also strengthened my bond with another friend that I had known since middle school, that I had not been a good friend to while I was still friends with my ex-friend group.
What I’ve learned from this whole experience is that people come and go from your life all the time. Who you thought were your friends will not always treat you like a friend, but there are people who will sit with you through everything and they won’t let go of you. They will hold you and they won’t treat you less than. They won’t treat you like you are a burden because they are your friend. Much like a relationship, friendship is taking the good with the bad. I don’t mean that someone should sit through a toxic friendship/relationship, but you don’t just accept only the good in people. I think a lot about this one River Pheonix quote, “Run to the rescue with love and peace will follow.”, that can be applied to any situation, I apply it to what the people in my life did for me during that year.
Two years later and I still feel hurt sometimes. I get sad and I miss my old friends, even more so my ex-best friend. I hear songs that I used to listen to with them and wish we still called each other friends. I still keep track of their birthdays and sometimes silently wish them a happy birthday. I wonder how their families are doing and if they are different people than when I last saw them. They’ve all since apologized to me since and I’ve unblocked them since except for one person – my ex-best friend. I unblocked the rest since they apologized, and I felt like there wasn’t a need for that barrier anymore, but I can’t bring myself to unblock them. It’s probably because I still feel hurt or maybe it’s that I feel the others were more worthy to have access to me because they apologized. Either way, I can’t bring myself to do it.
Though maybe it’s because I still feel angry at them for what they did. I am still dealing with the effects of what happened. I don’t have the same trust I used to. I second guess everything people say or do to me, even the friends that were there for me through everything. I still think that all of my friends secretly hate me and are just waiting for the right moment to toss me aside. I am insecure and scared that if I share how I feel people will leave because I’m too much of a “problem”. Sometimes I feel unlovable and I think about how I should just cut everyone off because I don’t think I should have friends because I can’t trust anyone. But then I remember what one of my friends said to me in response to me asking how do I know that they weren’t going to leave me, and she said, “You’re just going to have to trust us.” And I did and they didn’t leave, and they still haven’t. And every time I feel this way I remember those words.
Healing isn’t linear and I’m still struggling to learn that. And though I wish sometimes I could go back and fix everything, I realize I don’t want to. Why would I go back to the past when there are so many wonderful people in the present? So I just keep moving forward. And you should too.