I've struggled for a long time. They say it has to do with your environment, family, peers, and of course, the media. I can only guess where mine comes from.
I didn't have the nicest friends even from a young age. Erin was ruthless. She would exclude people on purpose and very vocally tell you that she dislikes parts of you. She even told me that I both spell and say my name wrong. She would tell me that she was Jamie's friend first and kick me out at recess. I have no idea how I remember that, but it's so vivid in my memory. So I would try to play with anyone else. That's how I became friends with the most ragtag group of people, we played pretend as Buffy the Vampire Slayer just to give you an idea. I also pretended to like Buffy just for the sake of fitting in, even though I had never seen it. To this day I haven't seen a single episode. California was a lot easier and the girls were a little nicer. Deanna and Gabby were two of the nicest girls I had ever met. Hannah wasn't as nice. She was into cheer and was being prepped for high school popularity. I wasn't. I liked to read and I found my way into the nerd herd of a Gifted and Talented students or whatever. She would also find ways to exclude me at recess. I eventually gave up. She wasn't worth the fight. When I got to Texas, I just wanted to be accepted by a vast majority of people. I became friends with Rachel, Nicole, and Kayla all at separate times. Nicole didn't want anything to do with me when Rachel liked me and vice versa. Kayla liked me at all times for the most part. Rachel was the most consistent though, despite our times of struggle. We managed to make it work through fourth grade. Fifth grade was harder for us because we had different interests. We became friends again in middle school. Yet, my friends changed again in seventh grade. It was a power struggle to keep three new friends in a balance. By this point, I desperately wanted normalcy and no more bullying. Yet, I always ended up in the middle of fights and had a hard time dealing with the changes that puberty was starting to bring. High school is what really sent us apart. Girls get worse in high school though. I was finding myself being referred to by people in some really rude ways. I was usually the "other Kara," which hurt because I felt like I was the inferior or less desired Kara. It sounds stupid but not being the original kind of blows. Girls looked at me like I wasn't good enough or pretty enough to be apart of their clique. Guys just didn't look at me in another way besides being their little sister. Most guys scoffed when they were asked if we were dating, which while it was true that we weren't dating, the scoff was uncalled for in all 5 situations. Debate was a monster too. My insecurity showed in every aspect of it. The way I stood, talked, refuted, and even greeted people. That's not even going into the social aspect. I was seeking approval and I got it from an improper gentleman who just wanted me to be there when he was lonely, but got mad when I dropped him when he got a girlfriend. Dating became a thing in high school. One guy tried to let me give him a free pass to date other girls, so I told him up his and that if he wants to date other girls then I would not be in that mix. One of the last guys of high school cheated on me. He even managed to completely hide me on social media and then passive aggressively dumped me by loading his Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook with her. That was a stab right to the chest through the heart and out the back. The next guy seriously dated me for awhile and then broke up with me by just not responding to my text one day and the ignore sesh lasted for 4 months. When I got to college, it didn't get any better. The girls still managed to look down on me like it was their favorite pastime. The guys used me as their make-out stepping stones into relationships. In fact, 4 guys did that.
So I guess family has something to do with it. I want to say that I have always unconditionally loved my family, but the truth is that I have desired to be apart of someone else's family at times. I was kind of a lonely kid through all the moves we made, especially with my mom working all the time. I wasn't involved in anything to really require me to be anywhere or criticized. Yet, I wasn't really praised like some kids are. When I made a B, it was always "why isn't that an A?" The most painful is when I was younger, I held more weight on me. Instead of coaxing me into athletics or some kind of healthy behavior, I had all the adults telling me that I was gaining weight and that I needed to try to get smaller. It didn't seem to be about health at the time. Although, I was already obsessing about how I looked, so I'm sure it was just my perception of how they were talking to me. But I feel like the same chunky 12 year old.
Media just sucks. Everyone is edited in everything and it's hard for people to get a real perception of what people actually look like. Clearly no one is perfect, yet we are exposed to what some arbitrary idea of perfection is. We all have flaws, but the media doesn't want you to think about that. We focus on what we should be instead of embracing what is unique and makes us beautiful.
You can imagine how these things have affected me throughout the years. I have grown into this heaping pile of insecurity and it effects everything in my life. It effects my performance in school because I get defeated. It turns me into "Crazy Bitch" with my boyfriend because I feel inferior and threatened by the girls in his life. I even turn into just plain bitch who will let no one in to see just how deeply scarred she feels.
But it needs to change. I just don't know how.
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