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Write a personal essay in which you reflect on moments of insight and revelation you have experienced.
“There’s shame, and shame is something we can do without.” - Edna Kinsella in the novella Foster by Claire Keegan.
Before I moved to Ireland my entire life had been a string of experiences what I consider to be child neglect. I accuse the adults in my life of subduing me intellectually, cornering me mentally, isolating me emotionally and ostracising me socially. The amounts of times I have been betrayed by authority that was assigned to help me, the many times I have been lied to by my own family, been told to keep something within the family a secret much like The Girl in Foster, the countless times I have gotten in trouble for attempting to find out the truth when I knew I had been kept in the dark or worse, lied to, they hated it when I succeeded even when I legally had the right to know when it concerned me and the amounts of times people lied on behalf of me. It's unmeasurable. Academically and socially I felt as though I was years behind in maturity and ability. I wasn’t critical. I wasn’t political. I was uninformed on all matters you could think of, whatever it was I guarantee that I wasn’t allowed to think for myself and have my own informed opinion. Trust me. I was manipulated into feeling remorse for having thoughts (even when they weren’t voiced) and shamed and put in my place as “that stupid, ignorant child” if I did. In my opinion my family, school and after school care facilities did not equip me with the appropriate tools to become a functional member of society. I was unaware of myself and this caused me to be unprepared for the cruelty I was going to face and had to put up with because no-one told me this wasn’t how you were supposed to be treated. This is the story of how I realised I had a toxic friendship and the realisations leading up to this.
As a student that had been severely bullied by children, teens and adults alike moving to Ireland was the single best thing that could have happened to me as it was a fresh breath of air from the two-faced teens that were absolutely everywhere, you didn’t have to be popular to do this, you didn’t even need a motive to be this cruel. It is clear to me now, from my time in Ireland seeing how treating people like human beings is actually done, I have discovered that you simply need to strongly identify with Dutch culture or identity and use it as an excuse to be a prick towards others not taking into consideration that you might have just shattered their confidence.
I must admit that at first I was skeptical of the people around me, I had already made my judgement that people everywhere were the same. ‘Why would Ireland be any different?’ I thought ‘Surely it must be worse anywhere else? The Dutch are open and tolerant, it’s just bad luck, my life is simply bad luck.’ The patriotic indoctrination had worked! I had fallen victim to the problematic beliefs of my own culture and still I believed in it like the gullible child I was. However, soon after I had been fully convinced and proven wrong. I had a moment of realisation knew that things were getting better.
After the realisation life wouldn't be what it was I started to warm up to the school culture and Ireland as a whole. I wasn't as hard of a critic as before and was fairer with my attitude towards moving country. The people I met had been really nice and one day the librarian introduced me to a student one year above me, which wasn't for long as I caught up to second year after Christmas Break the same year. The student and I had great chemistry and we had a lot of overlapping interests as well as lots of individual interests that we would be explaining to each other. Every break we would be meeting on the middle corridor and it basically became routine for us to do. That student was the first friend I had that wouldn't hangout with me for a motive such as gathering rumours, a dare or just for giggles and I loved being able to be less guarded when talking to that person as I had never been able to do that with anyone and over the following three months we had been bonding and we were very close friends. It was always us and one other friend of hers hanging out, usually talking about manga, Cartoon Network shows, art or anime. We hang out after school despite both being introverts with one of us having Generalised Anxiety Disorder and the other specifically Social Anxiety and stepped out of our comfort zones for each other. This is a moment where I should have had discovered the first red flags, but I did not because I was blinded.
What I have left out of this personal essay until now is that for a few months now I had been walking around with the secret that I liked girls, my friend didn't know that as I purposely left it out when we met, to make matters worse I had been pretty much strongly infatuated by her from the moment I met her and yes things could get worse, I had a whole entourage of people for moral support, I asked them to wait for me right outside the library door in case my confrontation went disastrous. Fun fact, I just said I needed moral support and I never stated why! I had them following me because I needed all the courage to come clean about my secret to her and as well as a close friend of mine, they were the first two people that knew. It was received positively by both, still no alarms ringing and warning me.
If only unsuspecting me knew when to say nothing at the right times, just like The Girl in Foster. Should I have refrained from my “Honesty is the best policy”? Maybe it was better if I did. A few days after second year had wrapped up I was foolish enough to tell my affectionate at times, but more often than not cold friend how I felt about her and that I wished to distance myself from her for both of our well-being as I knew neither of us needed more stress factors in our lives. Regardless, after leaving the confession on read for two weeks she finally had the courtesy to answer and she insisted it was completely fine with her to stay in touch and hang out, to just go on with live like it already is. Honestly, it's the same tale. I really don't know why I didn't have my moment of insight right there and then. I suppose I was just really dense, blinded like a deer caught in headlights and just straight on in denial about the obvious.
After the summer holidays my brain finally decided to process all that happened to me in the past year and thought “Hey! You know what it is like to be finally treated right! Why are you putting up with this?” Of course, I gave it another shot, simply more cautious now. I hang out with her and another warning, she started asking me out of all people about her questioning her sexuality. That left a bitter taste in my mouth because I insisted she should talk to someone less involved in her life and come to the conclusion on her own and she insisted. “Possibly,” Was my answer, I regretfully added a joke to lighten the mood, “I hope so.” The only reason I made the joke was to slow down my aching, thumping heart and to release some of the discomfort. I knew she did this to toy with my thoughts. She had me like a marionette puppet because only days later I let myself give in to one of her nasty traps. We hang out at the public library and she would say the mean, hurtful and obvious things “Even as a boy I would be uninterested in you.” It wasn't meant as comforting statement of “Oh Gender isn't the main issue.” She knew what she was doing. Back then I didn't know that was her intention and I tried to see the best in that statement. Who's fooled though when the following happened only thirty minutes later? She insisted her dad gave me a car drive home. Because I was intimidated by her strict dad I had always declined but for some reason I accepted the offer that time around, it wasn't the very first time, it was probably about the third time when she suddenly started saying things like “Oh my gosh, you're adorable when you are flustered.” she wasn't the type to compliment and if you have a friend that likes girls that's a very ‘yes homo’ thing to say. I seriously thought I was overthinking myself, I asked one direct question “That day, did you do all of that on purpose?” and she admitted shamelessly that it was all on purpose for her own sick enjoyment. That was when I realised I had to end this. Of course I couldn't.
It didn't end there, I had to be ignored for three days, be yelled at in public, be humiliated in public, shoved and pinched before we cut ties. The incident happening at school grounds was reported and the story was twisted in such a way that she tried to make me out to be the person that insisted to stay friends. From all the way back then, she set me up. Still, she admitted a few events on a certain day were all planned, however it didn't mean all the events were, right? That's what I told myself and I insisted I was being negative and paranoid. It were my friends who witnessed me becoming selectively mute and withdraw myself from social situations, it was those people that nearly three years later had to shake me up and say “You were being emotionally abused, don't you realise?” before I had my ultimate moment of insight.
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Kreeg 85%
“There’s shame, and shame is something we can do without.” - Edna Kinsella in the novella Foster by Claire Keegan.
Before I moved to Ireland my entire life had been a string of experiences what I consider to be child neglect. I accuse the adults in my life of subduing me intellectually, cornering me mentally, isolating me emotionally and ostracising me socially. The amounts of times I have been betrayed by authority that was assigned to help me, the many times I have been lied to by my own family, been told to keep something within the family a secret much like The Girl in Foster, the countless times I have gotten in trouble for attempting to find out the truth when I knew I had been kept in the dark or worse, lied to, they hated it when I succeeded even when I legally had the right to know when it concerned me and the amounts of times people lied on behalf of me. It's unmeasurable. Academically and socially I felt as though I was years behind in maturity and ability. I wasn’t critical. I wasn’t political. I was uninformed on all matters you could think of, whatever it was I guarantee that I wasn’t allowed to think for myself and have my own informed opinion. Trust me. I was manipulated into feeling remorse for having thoughts (even when they weren’t voiced) and shamed and put in my place as “that stupid, ignorant child” if I did. In my opinion my family, school and after school care facilities did not equip me with the appropriate tools to become a functional member of society. I was unaware of myself and this caused me to be unprepared for the cruelty I was going to face and had to put up with because no-one told me this wasn’t how you were supposed to be treated. This is the story of how I realised I had a toxic friendship and the realisations leading up to this.
As a student that had been severely bullied by children, teens and adults alike moving to Ireland was the single best thing that could have happened to me as it was a fresh breath of air from the two-faced teens that were absolutely everywhere, you didn’t have to be popular to do this, you didn’t even need a motive to be this cruel. It is clear to me now, from my time in Ireland seeing how treating people like human beings is actually done, I have discovered that you simply need to strongly identify with Dutch culture or identity and use it as an excuse to be a prick towards others not taking into consideration that you might have just shattered their confidence.
I must admit that at first I was skeptical of the people around me, I had already made my judgement that people everywhere were the same. ‘Why would Ireland be any different?’ I thought ‘Surely it must be worse anywhere else? The Dutch are open and tolerant, it’s just bad luck, my life is simply bad luck.’ The patriotic indoctrination had worked! I had fallen victim to the problematic beliefs of my own culture and still I believed in it like the gullible child I was. However, soon after I had been fully convinced and proven wrong. I had a moment of realisation knew that things were getting better.
After the realisation life wouldn't be what it was I started to warm up to the school culture and Ireland as a whole. I wasn't as hard of a critic as before and was fairer with my attitude towards moving country. The people I met had been really nice and one day the librarian introduced me to a student one year above me, which wasn't for long as I caught up to second year after Christmas Break the same year. The student and I had great chemistry and we had a lot of overlapping interests as well as lots of individual interests that we would be explaining to each other. Every break we would be meeting on the middle corridor and it basically became routine for us to do. That student was the first friend I had that wouldn't hangout with me for a motive such as gathering rumours, a dare or just for giggles and I loved being able to be less guarded when talking to that person as I had never been able to do that with anyone and over the following three months we had been bonding and we were very close friends. It was always us and one other friend of hers hanging out, usually talking about manga, Cartoon Network shows, art or anime. We hang out after school despite both being introverts with one of us having Generalised Anxiety Disorder and the other specifically Social Anxiety and stepped out of our comfort zones for each other. This is a moment where I should have had discovered the first red flags, but I did not because I was blinded.
What I have left out of this personal essay until now is that for a few months now I had been walking around with the secret that I liked girls, my friend didn't know that as I purposely left it out when we met, to make matters worse I had been pretty much strongly infatuated by her from the moment I met her and yes things could get worse, I had a whole entourage of people for moral support, I asked them to wait for me right outside the library door in case my confrontation went disastrous. Fun fact, I just said I needed moral support and I never stated why! I had them following me because I needed all the courage to come clean about my secret to her and as well as a close friend of mine, they were the first two people that knew. It was received positively by both, still no alarms ringing and warning me.
If only unsuspecting me knew when to say nothing at the right times, just like The Girl in Foster. Should I have refrained from my “Honesty is the best policy”? Maybe it was better if I did. A few days after second year had wrapped up I was foolish enough to tell my affectionate at times, but more often than not cold friend how I felt about her and that I wished to distance myself from her for both of our well-being as I knew neither of us needed more stress factors in our lives. Regardless, after leaving the confession on read for two weeks she finally had the courtesy to answer and she insisted it was completely fine with her to stay in touch and hang out, to just go on with live like it already is. Honestly, it's the same tale. I really don't know why I didn't have my moment of insight right there and then. I suppose I was just really dense, blinded like a deer caught in headlights and just straight on in denial about the obvious.
After the summer holidays my brain finally decided to process all that happened to me in the past year and thought “Hey! You know what it is like to be finally treated right! Why are you putting up with this?” Of course, I gave it another shot, simply more cautious now. I hang out with her and another warning, she started asking me out of all people about her questioning her sexuality. That left a bitter taste in my mouth because I insisted she should talk to someone less involved in her life and come to the conclusion on her own and she insisted. “Possibly,” Was my answer, I regretfully added a joke to lighten the mood, “I hope so.” The only reason I made the joke was to slow down my aching, thumping heart and to release some of the discomfort. I knew she did this to toy with my thoughts. She had me like a marionette puppet because only days later I let myself give in to one of her nasty traps. We hang out at the public library and she would say the mean, hurtful and obvious things “Even as a boy I would be uninterested in you.” It wasn't meant as comforting statement of “Oh Gender isn't the main issue.” She knew what she was doing. Back then I didn't know that was her intention and I tried to see the best in that statement. Who's fooled though when the following happened only thirty minutes later? She insisted her dad gave me a car drive home. Because I was intimidated by her strict dad I had always declined but for some reason I accepted the offer that time around, it wasn't the very first time, it was probably about the third time when she suddenly started saying things like “Oh my gosh, you're adorable when you are flustered.” she wasn't the type to compliment and if you have a friend that likes girls that's a very ‘yes homo’ thing to say. I seriously thought I was overthinking myself, I asked one direct question “That day, did you do all of that on purpose?” and she admitted shamelessly that it was all on purpose for her own sick enjoyment. That was when I realised I had to end this. Of course I couldn't.
It didn't end there, I had to be ignored for three days, be yelled at in public, be humiliated in public, shoved and pinched before we cut ties. The incident happening at school grounds was reported and the story was twisted in such a way that she tried to make me out to be the person that insisted to stay friends. From all the way back then, she set me up. Still, she admitted a few events on a certain day were all planned, however it didn't mean all the events were, right? That's what I told myself and I insisted I was being negative and paranoid. It were my friends who witnessed me becoming selectively mute and withdraw myself from social situations, it was those people that nearly three years later had to shake me up and say “You were being emotionally abused, don't you realise?” before I had my ultimate moment of insight.
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Kreeg 85%
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