The one thing that other people would notice about me is that I was very quiet and tended to stay by myself. I had people observe that I seemed to be tired all the time, and maybe I was, but I was more afraid of rejection and feeling unwanted. I still don't talk a lot, and tend to try to stay out of the way. My therapist now often comments on my long, awkward silences being socially inappropriate. I had a lot of depression too, and I remember believing that the whole world hated me. In Junior High, I spent lunch hours in the bathroom, crying. Almost anything that another kid said to me, I interpreted as some kind of criticism or attack or put-down.

But I always wanted to have friends and be accepted. I was just afraid of the pain of either rejection or losing them to moving away or something. When I was 9, we moved away from a place where I had a best friend, but also was bullied by other kids. When we moved, I vowed not to try to make friends anymore because it hurt too much.

One of my supervisors/professors in college told me that I didn't have adequate social skills to be in a social sciences field (I had a dual major in psychology and communicative disorders). When I didn't get accepted to graduate school in speech pathology, I gave up on education and career, and sank into depression for a long time. But now I have been working in mental health fields for the past three years, and I'll finish my master's degree in mental health counseling in less than a year from now. All I have left is the internship. So, my point is don't accept limits on what you can do. I'm overcoming the problems that had me stopped in my tracks for a long time. You can do anything that you want to. You just might need some good supports right now, like maybe counseling and a social skills group.

Do your parent support you in getting help? What are they like?