Hate

I used to hate myself. 

I think that sometimes. It is important to remember how far I've come.

Anyway, I used to hate myself. It seems as if that is all I used to do. Hate myself. I look back often and think, wow, it almost seems as if it comes innate, all that hate. 

I think it is important to talk about these things. You know, negative feelings and weak points. It is not a sign of weakness when you talk about things that cause pain or that hurt - it is strength. It is not selfish to think, let me dwell on my problems and flaws when there are other people dying because they hardly have anything that we have, yet we are still complaining. It will do us good to remember that there are people not as blessed as we are, but thinking, I am not going to complain because other people have it worst, is impossible - our default setting is not happy. It is impossible to be happy all the time, especially when emotions are bubbling through us all the time threatening to guide and control us. 

I also think it is important to talk about things so that everyone knows that everyone else understands one way or another. Limiting an experience to yourself makes you think, oh, I am so isolated in this, when really everyone bears the brunt of pain, one way or another.

This is me, talking about stuff. Some stuff I have never even trusted myself with acknowledging and, hopefully, after this, stuff that will set me free.

I was dyslexic as a child. I could not pronounciate to save my life! I had to be taught the basics by my younger sister and my parents were told by teachers that In would never get anywhere in life. That I was stupid. My mum tells me sometimes when I am revising, that she would never have expected me to be good academically because she thought I was stupid. Wow, she really had faith in me.

It wasn't too bad. Some people still have learning difficulties. I beat it. Some people  cannot make friends easily and their learning disability affects so much in their lives. I know a girl who still cannot spell - she was dyslexic too - and a guy who is so good at maths but so horrible at communicating. I had it easy compared to others. 

I know that. I really do. 

When I was younger though, I felt like a liability. Why me? I had to be the child who was not normal. All the rest were not stupid. All the rest were not as dependant as me. 

I hated that. 

We moved around a lot. I felt unwanted. My mum saw my sister as prettier and smarted and just better than me. I think she is still her favourite - she is the girly girl whose not fat and whose useful, who can pick up skills like hairdressing. I am a lot different. My mum had other children when we moved around and it was hard to settle because people do not like the new kid, especially if the new kid is an alien and not like the rest. 

I finally settled in Brentfield, in year four. I did not have to have speech therapy any more. I was so fat. I had spent my childhood up to the scribbling in books, writing and comfort eating. It was such a horrible habit and I must have been so fat because people from church are always telling me how I lost weight and a guy from primary school I was talking too was like, wow, you lost a lot of weight. I did not get out much, okay. 

I stuck out a lot, obviously. I was an anomaly. I hated that. 

I started high school. The first day in tutor group was weird. I sat next to the girl who threw mud down my back, two years previously. She was the only person I knew. I was eager to make friends. It was a fresh start. Not everyone knew everyone, so it would be easier, I thought. 

I was wrong. 

I was walking up the high road and I saw a girl I recognised from class and I was like 'hi Karina.' 

From that day onwards, she started to bully me. 

I know see, from hindesight, bullying was one of the best things that could have happened to me. Other people do not see it that way of course. I knew so many people who had got bullied; a lot, the victim of a victim - Karina - themselves. She too was bullied, but it made her so bitter. This one guy, got bullied for having ginger hair and he cannot trust people - well he trusted me enough to say that - but it is just that he sees the bad in people. 

It hurt in short.

I hated myself. Did I bring this on myself, I thought. Was it because there was something wrong with me? Was it because I was so repulsive? I thought so then. 

It was sly comments - I had it easy.

They would call me a rhino and say mean stuff to me.

They. Soon it became most of the people in the class. This one time, Mrs Alawiye left the class and they all started to call me a rhino and I started to cry and Mrs came back and didn't realise a thing. It was bad enough that they got to me, but it was worst that they knew that they were getting to me. 

Around the same time, things were getting rocky at home. I started to resent my mum. She was always on my case. My parents did not know about the bullying - I was already a liability; I did not want to make it worst. My brother told me I had mental problems because I got angry too much and being 11 years old and irrational and a person who over thought, I naturally over thought. 

I hated myself. I did not do anything about the bullying. My friends knew - it was obvious. I did nothing. I allowed myself too. 

I thought about suicide one day, when it got to much. I came home crying and no one was around and I pulled out a knife and I was holding it and I thought, please, just be strong enough do this. I hoped that it would kill me so that they would have to deal with the burden of pushing me too far. I urged myself too, but I could not. I felt weak and pathetic and I was on the kitchen floor, crying. No one noticed though. I had to pick myself back up and wipe away the tears and pretend I was okay. I thought then I was too pathetic than to end it all - I made the right decision that day. 

I ended telling my form tutor. The bullying stopped overtly, but continued covertly for a while, then it died.

It started again in year eight - this time a girl called Kinal but that ended soon enough.

I did not like myself at all, but it was easier to pretend than to deal with stuff.

I made such a fool out of myself though. In year nine, I was a laughing stock. People would laugh at me and I would laugh too, at myself. No one talked to me unless it was to copy work. I was apparently smart - I was not really ; I just knew how to read. 

I allowed my mum to blame me for social services entering our lives. I was 12 and I got fed up of everything being left for me. All the cleaning, cooking and responsibility. I crashed and I could not do it anymore. No one else would. The house was an absolute mess. They had come to give my dad a parking ticket and the result was taking us away from home.

I resented my mum growing up and I am pretty sure she resented me. She made me do work experience in a crummy hair salon, every saturday from 10 - 6. Me and Joy. Every saturday for three fucking years, spent doing what my mum wanted and she could never be proud of me.  

My parents tried to get me to see a dietician but I wriggled my way out of it. They thought I started to eat better, but I bought junk food everyday.

I started to realise just how much I hated myself before year 11 started. I thought I had made friends throughout year 10 but I was not keen to see anyone; I wanted to remain isolated because around most people, I felt alone and obligated. That is the thing, with being a pushover; you always feel obligated to help. I realised that doing people's homework and being there for people who needed someone to be there for them was not friendship. I felt suffocated. I hated myself. I was so repugnant. 

I felt like I was a mess. I was letting my friends down. I was letting myself down. At first no on noticed anything was wrong apart from my close friends. I could put on a smile. Things started to get rocky because I just felt like crap all the time. I stopped hanging out with my friends for a while. I started to hang around near the mentoring department because I felt like the people there understood me. Almost all of the people there had got bullied and a lot of them had mental health problems. 

People started to realise I was not doing too well when I started to cry in lessons. I did that a lot. It was horrible. I could not hold it in. It eventually got back to my form tutor, Mrs Hamdoun. But I did not trust her and I did not want to talk to her so the next day, I went to talk to Mrs Saeed, because she seemed less scary. 

I was a shit friend that year. I would think, how do they put up with me? They struggled putting up with me. I was hot and cold all the times. June and  I had arguments. I treated Syed badly and yet her still saw the good in me. Zainab kept telling me that I was not as bad as I thought I was. And Agata, I do not want to mention her - you will probably read this Agata - I do not want to say how you reacted because it hurts how much I put you thought, the most. It hurt, that you felt hurt that I could not tell you things because we were supposed to be best friends ans yet I was distant and so all over the place. That is part of the reason why I am writing this, so that you know that I can tell you things now. That I have grown up and that you matter a lot to me.

Now going back to pretending that I have no idea who will read this. 

Long story short, I dealt with things. I stopped hating myself around February 2014. I am so many things more than I saw. I am strong, confident, funny, intelligent, articulate amongst other things. These are things I could not have said a long time ago, but now I can.

I remember Agata got me a book and she told me to write 50 reasons worth living. I could not think of many back then. Now I can. This is just a little thing. But it feels so big. I am so much more in so many little ways but even still, I have come a long way from the girl I was and I will keep on travelling.