Assignment #25 - Megan Ewing - No One Really Believes.

I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t tell these stories anymore because when I do, I always see half-hidden eye-rolls and scoffs and hear whispers of “She’s over dramatic” and “She really just wants attention, doesn’t she.” And it hurt too much, so I stopped. But these stories really shaped me as a person, changed my worldview, opened my eyes to new ideas. Don’t misunderstand this, though, these are all highly negative stories, I just have to put a positive spin on them for my own sanity. I’ll start with one I’ve discussed in a previous blog post, partially because I figured it probably wouldn’t be read in detail anyways. I figure this won’t be read either, so why not.
My sister changed the way I would see myself for my entire life. She told me I was a fat, ugly, idiot who was worthless and undeserving of love and happiness. I never associated her saying these things as being something wrong with her until she stopped when I was about 13. (She has changed and become a much better, more understanding sister.) I always believed these things were simply true, unassailable facts. I still do, for the most part. I believed I could never have any real friends and still do, even though I have the most amazing friends I could ask for. So, since I had no hope of having any sort of social success, I threw myself into schoolwork, since that was an objective measure of me. A high grade means I have some hope of being worth something. That worked, until middle school, when it didn’t and I just sunk deep into my pit of “I’m alone and depressed and nobody believes me.” But this dismal childhood led me to be in the accelerated cluster at Tates Creek Middle School and led me here, to the Academy and it will lead me to a bright future. It’s shown me that I can grow and I can make the best out of 13 years of misery.
My second story is a bit more specific and happened during my year in a private Christian preschool. I started out at the four-year-old preschool when I was three, so some of the other kids seemed to have problems with me. I remember a conversation with the only two kids in the class who would talk to me when they told me that there was one girl, and she was friends with everyone else and she told them all that if they talked to me, she would kick them out and make sure no one else ever talked to them. I think back on that now and I’m baffled by the ruthlessness of those four-year-olds. Was that preschool in 2007 or was I excommunicated from the 16th century Catholic Church? This experience taught me that people can be horrible to you for no real reason and that I can’t trust others. This may have led me to have trust issues, but I haven’t been betrayed by a friend since a petty thing in second grade, so I guess it’s worked.
My last story is really difficult to tell. My parents don’t know about and only a select few of friends do, but it’s one that my brain keeps revolving back to when I’m spiraling into a mental breakdown. I feel simultaneously ashamed that I don’t talk about it and wholly uncomfortable with sharing it, but here we go, I guess. When I was in 8th grade, I went on a trip to Cincinnati with the band. I was having a good time, I was in a room with people I at least considered close acquaintances and one friend, which was much better than the year before. We were on a tour of the Reds stadium, in a crowded elevator and there was a group of five-ish 7th graders behind me. One of them, I’ll never know which, squeezed my ass. It wasn’t just an accidental brush, it was a full-on squeeze. (I only say that since it’s the first question everyone has asked when I talked about it.) That really shook me up. Then, when I told my only friend that I had there, she was entirely unsupportive and just really wanted to keep having fun and not worry about me and my childish problems. From this, I garnered a new viewpoint on female empowerment and the need for the #MeToo movement.
So there’s three stories that hurt in the moment and hurt to tell but have changed me for the better after living through them. I hope you truly believe all these negative things happened to me for a reason. (Don’t try to contradict that. It’s keeping me sane.)