All in a Year

Written by Sarah Tang of Poolesville High School

Trigger warning: Mentions of depression and suicidal ideation

In just 365 days, I went from what I thought was the highest point of my life to a relapse of depression, betrayal, and finally, the real highest point of my life. A year seems so insignificant and fast once it's over, but once you realize it’s a new year, you sit down and ask, “Where has all the time gone?” And a wave of horror creeps up on you. “What did you accomplish?” Absolutely nothing is how I always feel. I beat myself up every year for doing what seemed so insignificant to my life. My mom’s words of “Your best friend Emma made it into Duke. She worked hard for the past two years; why can’t you?” haunted my mind. She was right. I hadn’t done anything significant, but I did make huge leaps in terms of maturity and experience.

Last February, I acquainted myself with a group of people which appealed to the fun-loving part of me. Not since middle school had I found friends who would hang out often outside of school and lived by the idea of enjoying their youth to the fullest. On the side, I was still working towards my future. But I wanted to have fun; I was tired of doing nothing but studying. We had many common interests, both online and offline. Fast forward a month, I introduced my own friend group to them. And we meshed. Not mixed. Meshed.

My friend group had their own doubts about the other group of people, and vice versa. I was awkwardly in the middle, but I had my fun regardless. Things went smoothly for a while, until those doubts from both sides came to light. Around this time, I would take a lot of the blame onto myself. I regretted trying to mesh the groups, and I tried to take all matters into my own hands to solve. But somewhere in that timeline, I made a mistake which would ultimately lead to the end of all of our friendships. In a late night talk, I unintentionally hurt one of my closer friends from the new group of friends. The opinion surrounding me changed drastically. Although the friend I had hurt was fine, his friends were not. I was justifiably antagonized by the new group of friends. However, I did not have negative intentions at all. I was simply too foolish to see why I was wrong before I said what I said. Perhaps I had expected too much, but I felt as if their antagonization was an extreme reaction for something said late at night and something the friend was already over. At the time, I had argued why I stood by what I said, despite having said it at a time of uncertainty. I beat myself up badly over this, and swore to never make the same mistake again. But things would only go downhill from there.

The weak mesh began to undo itself, and I attempted to put it back together by myself. But it didn’t help that I was constantly being called out on private Snapchat stories and even streaks, with the singular person posting these being aware that I could see them. This ultimately caused my relapse into depression. I was such a horrible person. How could I have hurt our friend this badly? I had already apologized profusely upon realization. But I did it again. And again. And I received the same response. “It’s alright, I wasn’t even hurt that badly.” I took trust in his words and became more frustrated with the lack of empathy I was getting, on top of the pitiful childish immaturity of constantly throwing shade on a Snapchat story and streaks. After a month of being the main target of the Snapchat shade, the person finally messaged me and asked to talk to sort things out. I was already beat up, broken, and bruised, the way he probably intended for me to be. I was elated since I would finally stop receiving so much targeted hate, and the person learned their errors. As a person, I always look at every side of a situation and do my best to learn from my mistakes. For someone unnecessarily slinging dirt at me to learn from their mistakes would make my day. We spoke, made up, and never talked again.

The peace I had found would only be so short-lived. In an online game, I had reached a higher rank than the person, who immediately felt as if I did not deserve the rank. For some reason, my hard work affected his fragile mentality. So he responded subtly. On his status, he wrote “boosted” (meaning someone better than me inflated my rank by carrying me or logging onto my account and playing for me), which was clearly directed towards me. I took complete offense, since I took the time and effort to improve in this game. There was no way that was not directed towards me; the timing was too perfect. And there I was, thinking he had changed. I was still close with the friend I had hurt (which was ironic since I hurt this friend, and that issue led to this one), and told him. I don’t know what he said, but the person would then proceed to make the word “boosted” on his status backwards, which showed that he was still targeting me but tried to make it less obvious. I immediately fell into a mental breakdown. Each day, I would log on and see that message. I struggled to search for validation; my friends all told me I deserved my rank. The friend I had hurt? He said I was miles better than this person at the game. So why was I doubting myself so strongly? My mind swirled back to the last time we spoke. He sounded so genuine in his apology and change. Why was he saying all this now? Was he aware of how sensitive I was? Because at this time, my suicidal thoughts resurfaced. What did I have to do in order for him to realize that his words hurt? What more did I have to say for him to change? What was something I could do to make him realize the weight of his actions? The answer I had lingering in my subconsciousness, an answer which I never would have wanted to think about again, awaited its turn to speak. My life was insignificant anyway. People would be better off without me. I would trade my life to change people. And the worst part about this was the sense of betrayal I felt. Apologies were exchanged, the common consensus of “being chill” was established, and there was the unspoken mutual feeling of never speaking to each other again; why did he have to come back and hurt me like this?

At this point in life, my suicidal thoughts had not resurfaced for two years. Through the two years, I had helped countless people deal with depression and suicide. I knew suicide wasn’t the answer. I knew me, of all people, should not even be contemplating suicide. I had so much to live for. The same reasons I would tell people I cared about to talk them out of suicide suddenly became irrelevant to me. I made an excuse for myself to allow these thoughts. The thoughts plagued my mind. And the only thing I could think about was how I would leave the world. With a note? An ominous text? Or just let people figure it out for themselves? I wanted my life to end in a way where people would honor my feelings: to stay open-minded, learn from your mistakes, and be as empathetic as possible. A part of me knew this was wrong, and that I should seek help. That same part of me knew that if any friend of mine felt this way, I would not hesitate to contact help for them. I allowed myself to be a hypocrite; I disliked hypocrisy as well. My head was a mess, but somewhere, somehow, I spilled my feelings to our mutual friend—the one I had originally hurt. He assured me that he would speak to his friend who was still harassing me. Again, I wasn’t sure what had happened between them, but I did end up unfriending his friend. For the next month, I would be in a huge slump of self-doubt, low self-esteem, and regret. I reflected on my life choices for the next month until I came to the conclusion and acceptance that although I made a mistake, I learned from it and this person didn’t, so I shouldn’t beat myself up for it. Although I did end up getting over this in 2020, there were moments where the feeling of helplessness floated back to me; I beat myself up over it multiple times after I had accepted it was in the past. To put these events in a rough time frame, it was from February to October—there was a period of time where I did not talk to them at all.

In the present-day, I am grateful for each experience I go through, whether positive or negative. I reevaluated my mental health after this incident, since I thought I was pretty stable at the time, which goes to show how people tend to overlook their mental health. I am eternally thankful for my friends who stuck with me through this time. Though the majority of my year was plagued by this event, there were new experiences which brought me happiness. The past year has been different due to quarantine, which made the year feel as if it went by fast, while every day felt the same. It’s true; each day felt the same to me, and it still does. But going through quarantine also made me cherish the little things in life more. I stopped taking the meals my mom cooked, the hours my dad worked each day, and the stress teachers had to deal with for granted. I went on many walks at the park over the summer, which I normally wouldn’t do since I disliked being outside. Overall, I give 2020 a 20/20, which divides out to be a 1. Cherish the little things, and learn from your mistakes. Grow from any experience given to you. And lastly, things will get better. Though this year was difficult, I met new lifelong friends and grew much closer to my previous friends, who gave me the comfort and validation I sought in life. My mental health has never been better. Keep on fighting.