Check In #1

Hello everyone. How are all of my amazing readers doing?

   I usually have a topic to talk about when I am writing to you all but a lot has been going on since the last time you heard from me. Think of this as a little check in to keep you up to date on what's happening.

   I sort of made up with the person from my last blog post. We talked and decided on being just friends. I continue to keep my distance though because I see no point in possibly getting all caught up in another sucky situation and hurt again. Things are civil between us but nothing like they were before.
   I finished my second semester with all passing grades. My lowest grade was Math with a 78 and highest was 100 in English. I know I could've done better if I had committed myself to it more, but my depression kicked my butt at the beginning of the semester and things kind of fell apart. I recognized my faults and I can let go of it and not let it bother me now. The semester ended, its in the past. There's no reason to dwell on it.
   I started listening to a band called There For Tomorrow. Soon after I found out they had broken up a few years back. Luckily though the lead singer and drummer started a project together and the singer does solo music too. Not going to lie, the singer, Maika Maile, is really freaking cute 💗 and I got just a little bit obsessed. Look him up and you'll see why.
   I started following this guy on twitter that constantly spreads positivity and love. You all should look him up @MoshWithTyler
   I came out as non binary and gender non conforming to my family. I do not want to make a big deal out of this because I don't want anyone to think this is my whole personality or something. I don't want people to find out and think that my gender identity is all I stand for. It's just another part of me that I've recently discovered. I may or may not write about it in more detail later on. If you have any questions, feel free to send them my way and I will answer them to the best of my capability.

    My third semester for Prepa starts on Monday. Am I a little worried and scared about starting? Of course, I am always worried about meeting new people and now, not only do I get to worry about how people will react to me being American but also about their reaction to me being non binary. Am I completely dreading going and stressing over what people will think of me like last semester? I can confidently say NO. Maybe this has to do with the band I started listening to. Or maybe because I have a friend at school that fully supports me no matter what. Another possibility is that @MoshWithTyler’s positivity is rubbing off on me. It also could have been the acceptance I showed myself towards my grades and my parents’ acceptance towards me coming out. For all I know NONE of this has anything to do with it.

   Or maybe, just maybe, I started loving myself a little bit more than before and now have the strength to make it through each day. I truly am not sure. Things didn't get any easier over summer break. As recently as last night I laid crying in bed because of things that were bothering me. The crying didn't make them go away, but I did feel better after.  A little bit of self love and acceptance go very far when you are struggling just to get through each day.

   I feel like I've been a bit selfish with this post. Only talking about myself. But that's okay, because I know I am just letting some things off my chest. It's something that everyone needs to do once in a while. I truly do want to know how any of you are. If you want to see me write about something specific, let me know. I best associate certain problems or issues with songs I listen to and I have some ideas about songs that have been stuck in my head, so you all my be getting more content sooner than expected.

   So that's it for now.
Drink water. Follow @MoshWithTyler and me @hurt_blog on Twitter. And don't forget that it's okay not to be okay.
Catch you later lovelies. 😘

 

I Want You (Gone)

   Hey guys, it's been a while. I know every time I promise that I'm going to be better at posting more often and every time I fail to do so, This particular post was supposed to be about something completely different, but given current circumstances and situations, that subject no longer holds a space at the front of my mind, maybe it will come back up later, maybe it won't. I guess consider it a lost post.

   I've never withheld any of my thoughts and feelings from you all because I want to be an example that it is okay to feel these things and that there is no shame in hiding it. On that note, I plan to be brutally honest with everything that is about to come out.
   I have been struggling. And bad. I have been feeling helpless and lonely. I have been extremely stressed out and overwhelmed. I want to give up on everything. With my own mental state, my social life and academically. The simple fact of being a teenager is anything but. Add onto that other factors like depression, fear of rejection and the complexities that are my day to day life, things are not easy.

   My breaking point was a few weeks ago when me and my team had to finish a Spanish assignment for the next day. Our subject was about The Poquianchis, a group of serial killer women who prostituted and murdered young girls in Mexico. It is not light reading and i am already so sensitive to everything. I remember so clearly when I started to freak out. I was starting to panic, I couldn't breath. I was crying and I told my team "I am having a panic attack, can someone else please finish this?" The only one that responded was (who I thought was) my best friend. She just told me to calm down. She didn't ask me if I was okay. She didn't ask what she could do to help. It may seem ridiculous to get upset over something like this, but I needed her and she just left me alone.

   What bothered me the most afterwards was realizing that she didn't care about me the way I did for her. I gave her my all. I tried so fucking hard to be there for her because I knew about the problems she goes through at home. I am the one that found out that she self harms and offered to go with her to get help. She asked me to be her best friend after I found out and me (blind with the desperation to have a best friend again) said yes. I constantly worried about her. She had this sort of aura around her that just drew you in. I don't know if maybe I have a thing for the broken and damaged or maybe I just had so much longing to be close to someone, but I was so emotionally invested in her that i didn't realize she just kept taking and never giving anything back. I wanted her to help me fix how broken I feel.


   Needless to say, after I realized the state of mind I was/am in I sat down and talked with my parents about seeing a therapist because I knew I needed help. We're still looking, but I feel better knowing I took the first step towards getting help.
 

   I started pushing her away from me. I needed my own space away from her so I could think about myself for a while. I'm not completely sure what happened, but after I no longer felt the need to have her around, after I realized I wanted her gone from my mental space bubble, she changed. She started acting stuck up and better that the rest of us. She stopped trying to even talk to me in class. She even froze another mutual friend of ours out.
   This, of course, affected the team. Everyone started fighting and she used every excuse she could to say it wasn't her fault that nothing was working and went so far as to blame it on everyone else. She tried to use being depressed as an excuse and I told her that I have diagnosed depression and didn't let that stop me from finishing my work. As if her problems at home made her superior and perfect compared to the rest of us. In my eyes, she was trying to play the victim. And, unfortunately, it worked on some of us.

   I couldn't understand why she began to act this way. Why she doesn't seem to care enough to even try to fix things with me. At the same time, I know she goes through so much and no one deserves to go through what she has. But this doesn't mean she has the right to use people for her own benefit. There are so many things that I don't like about myself, but one thing I pride myself on is that I have not let my situation turn me into someone I don't want to be.

   On the note of my once mutual friend with this girl. The thing is, me and this other girl weren't even really friends with each other. It was more like we just happened to both be friends with the same girl. I found out recently that my ex best friend had told this girl everything she had told me. About the abuse she faces at home and her self harming. And that apparently something I had said had upset her.
   It was after thing had kind of blown over that me and this other girl had (I guess) started bonding over losing the girl as a friend. Even though she was closer to this boy in our team, she ended up getting hurt too. Sometimes it's almost like shes mourning him because they were so close and she misses him terribly. All we know is that my ex best friend must have said something to him. Of course, we aren't sure, but we don't know why else he would have stopped talking to my now friend.

   In the end, I made the conscious decision to let her go. I let go of all the pain and hurt she made me feel. Of the sadness and suffering she radiated off and I let soak into me. I know it seems selfish (to stop helping someone for your own benefit), but I feel lighter. Things look brighter.

   I don't regret having had her as a friend or having to let her go the way i did, because she made me learn a very important lesson that I still hadn’t fully comprehended. I learned that if someone is hurting you, even someone you really care about and they refuse to acknowledge it, you have no obligation to stick around and keep getting hurt. I tried and failed. I accept that and now, after letting that all out and putting it into writing, i can move on.

   So, maybe take my experience that I have now shared with you all as a sort of imaginary permission slip to let go of toxic people in your life. I know I am not perfect and that there are probably 50 other ways I could have handled this situation, but I refuse to put myself through more than I have to. And you shouldn't have to either.


   Goodbye, for now, dear friends.
And never forget, it is perfectly okay not to be okay.

The Hurt, The Hope

Hey guys. So it has been awhile, to say the least. I hope that all of you have been okay.

   Maybe some of you have noticed and maybe some of you haven't, but I like to use the names of songs as my blog titles. I've been sitting on this one for two reasons.
1.- Waiting until its February.
2.- Waiting for something to give me a reason to use it.
   And guess what? They finally coincided! Granted it is the last day of the month, but that's okay.
:)

What finally gave me something to think about, something I believe needs to be talked about came from some stuff my dad said on Sunday.

   So my parents were leaving to go to a dog show and I had decided to stay behind to work on homework and do some cleaning. I had music playing on the TV and the song playing was a cover of the song Hey Hey, My My from the movie American Satan (click here to check it out). The video is a tribute to all the great artists that passed away during the production of the movie. Two people on there are Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Chester Bennington of Linkin Park.  Two amazing artists whose music means so much to so many people and who, unfortunately, committed suicide.
   My dad was saying how he just didn't get why they would do that. Why, when most of these other artists died of illness, age or accident they would take their own life.

   I understood what he meant. From the outside looking in, it seemed like they had a nearly perfect life. They had money, a family, a job they loved, thousands of friends and fans that loved them. Who, in their right mind, would essentially throw all of that away? But looking from the inside out, things change. It dawned on me that not many people truly comprehend what mental illnesses like depression and anxiety really do to a person. Of course, its different for each person.

From this point, I will focus on my depression since it is what I am most able to describe. My feelings do not apply to any other person with depression or another illness.

   From a scientific and biological point of view, depression is a chemical imbalance of the body's endorphins. Endorphins are a natural chemical in the brain that basically makes you happy. Now imagine lacking those chemicals? It doesn't sound pretty, does it?
   For me, the best way at describing my depression is that it's like feeling nothing, like this horrible emptiness that makes my heart sink, but feeling everything so strongly it makes me want to cry all at the same time. Its contradicting and confusing. It's painful and it sucks.

Getting back to the song now. Read this blog to further understand what I'm about to explain.

"Because we all

Need to feel release

Because we all

Wanna be at peace"

   Whenever someone self harms, it isn't because we want to mark up and scar our bodies. It's because we have this need to not feel the way we are feeling at that moment. Some do it to try and feel something, others to distract themselves from the pain they are feeling on the inside with an external pain. Its something controllable when we feel like we have no control. 

"All alone, I've lost the hope

That I'll find myself again

There's a heart so cold within me

It feels like February"

   I personally feel that suicide happens when we finally get tired of fighting. When we've been battling against ourselves for too long and believe that it is never going to get better. When we have lost all hope. Depression for me isn't simply being sad all the time, Its feeling lost and lonely. It's thinking you aren't enough for anyone and that no one could ever want you.

   I hate to think that people see me and think that nothing is wrong. Because there is always something wrong. There is always something that is bothering me. Something that got under my skin and won't leave me alone. Thinking about Chester and Chris and how no one "saw the signs", sometimes there aren't any. After Chester passed, his wife posted a picture of him a couple days before the event. He has a big smile on his face and looks to be so full of life and happiness. No one would have guessed the various thoughts were going through his mind. He used his music as an outlet for his pain, but it wasn't enough for him.  Listen to the songs. pay attention to the lyrics, and you will hear how much pain he was going through. 

   I truly hope that I got my point across. I don't want this to seem like I am encouraging self-harm or anything of the sorts so I continue with these last lyrics.

"Despite all the pain, the tears and the rain

It's got to get better

No matter how lost, no matter the cost

It's got to get better

The infinite fall, the distance I crawl

It's got to get better

And maybe I'm wrong, but I pray that I'm not

It's got to get better"

   For every single one of you that is going through a rough spot in your journey, please believe me when I say that things don't stay bad forever. Suicide does not end the possibility of things getting worse. It ends the possibility of it ever getting better. So stick around and see where your road takes you. I would love to hear one day about how you all got through whatever it is you are going through and came out stronger because you are strong enough.

You are all strong, wonderful, powerful human beings that have earned the right to feel down sometimes.

   To everyone else that doesn't feel like they can relate to any of this, the ones that have trouble understanding the rest of us, it's okay. Maybe you never will get it. But it doesn't mean you can't try. It takes one minute to send a message asking how someone is doing. You never know when you could be someone saving grace.

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful weekend full of laughter and fun.

  And never forget, it is perfectly okay not to be okay. Goodbye, for now, my dear friends.

Sanctuary

Hey guys, how has your week been? So I've finally gotten to my school blog and have something worth saying.

   Like I said a couple of posts back, I was terrified of starting back school and meeting new people. I was worried that I wasn't going to be accepted like I was in my first-semester group. After today I realized that I had nothing to worry about. Much like last semester, I have a small group of people that I get along with, that form a part of the teams we have to have for our projects. But completely opposite of last time, these people not only accept me but also support me. 

I found this out because today in class when my best friend wasn't sitting right behind as usual and I needed help with understanding something, one of the boys tried to explain to me too. <3  

   And not just that, my team and I had to go to one of the girl's houses to work on a biology project and they didn't talk about stupid stuff or mess around the whole time. We ate our pizza, worked on our project and kind of just talked a bit about things. We talked about how this one girl is crushing on a boy from her church and what happened last semester with the boy that wanted me to do his homework. Two of them were talking about circumcision on the way back from dropping one girl off at the bus stop (I have no idea how that conversation got started). The boy that walked with me to the plaza for the bus, most would just be quiet and walk, but he kept a conversation going. It seemed like he was actually interested in hearing me. (Don't you dare think I got a crush on him. He's cute but taken.) My point is, the conversation was of actual substance and not meaningless chatter. 

   I can't say for the whole group, but at this point, most of my classmates seem more mature than the last ones. I know I may not be much more mature than them, but I am not the typical teenager either. I don't want to go to class and hear you joking about how you want to kill yourself (this has happened once so far and he admitted that he knew he shouldn't say thing like that), or how you hate "otakus" so much and constantly bully them just for them liking the things they do. For someone who suffers from a mental illness, taking that in daily makes life so much harder. I often call my old group "toxic" because of the way they made me feel.

     It simply amazes me how a change in the people surrounding you can make you feel. I feel content. Almost happy, having something more to look forward to every day. I go to bed tonight with a light heart and a clear mind, knowing that I have one less thing to worry about. 

So here's to this small group of six people that have become a small sanctuary of patience and understanding for me. May you continue to have plenty of it so we can be friends  😂. 

So just a quick rundown of my first two weeks of my second semester:

-All new teachers, except for the art teacher, who gave us social studies before.

-My English teacher doesn't know English as well as I had hoped. She pronounced "often" without   the T because that's how she heard it in songs (?). 

-My chemistry teacher kind of freaks me out. She explained how one molecule in a compound can   change water from something necessary for life into a poison that will kill you immediately.

-I don't like my Spanish teacher. She caught me with my piercings and had me take them out.

-My Physics teacher thinks we live in the Matrix. He's special (if you can tell). 

  And I believe those are the things that have stuck out to me the most. It's not much, but that's what happens when you overthink things constantly and space out during class. 

Lastly, never forget, its okay not to be okay.

   Goodbye and goodnight, my lovely readers. <3

The Truth I'll Never Tell

Hi everyone. :)
   So I hadn't written a blog because I haven't been feeling well. By this, I don't mean that I've been physically sick (though my nose is a little stuffy). My mental health has been crap this past week and a half.
   The Saturday before I started school, I was laying in bed watching YouTube, and I felt something break inside. It was like I felt every emotion I'd been holding inside,  but I was numb. My feelings rushed on to me so strongly that it was almost physically painful. I wanted to cry, I wanted to let it all out, but it was like I couldn't actually feel anything. I was emotionally vacant and painfully numb. My mind was filled with thoughts and ideas that were everything less than healthy.
  
   My depression hadn't grabbed a hold of me like that in a long time. So, I've been using any little spare time from school to try and clear my head. I would have never imagined sharing this with anyone. To tell someone about the thoughts that haunt me during a time like this is something I will never take lightly. But, I found my safe place. In the midst of all these horrible thoughts and feelings, I found a way to feel better. This time, it was music. Next time it might be my family or a therapist. Because it's okay to ask for help. 

   What I'm leading up to is that today, I won this fight. I woke up feeling good, feeling positive, powerful and all over, mentally stronger. I go on for another day to enjoy my life and continue fighting my battles in the war against myself. 

For all of you that are going through a tough time right now, I promise you that at some point things get brighter. Yes, brighter, not better. Not better because we can't just wait around for things to get better. What we can do is look for when things get brighter, when a little piece of hope passes by us. I like to think that hope feels like sunshine on a cold winter day. So when hope crosses your path, grab a hold of it and make it grow, make it brighter. 

I know that this post is short, but this is something I had to get off of my chest before telling about my first week of school. I promise that I will write all about it soon. 

And never forget, it is okay not to be okay. :)

Goodbye, for now, lovelies. 

  

Seventeen Ain't So Sweet

Hi guys. Are you all doing okay?

   So this is it. I start school tomorrow and to be completely honest with myself, I'm slightly terrified. The thing with Preparatoria is that it's basically taking your classes for your Associate's degree, but at high school ages. But unlike high school or college in the US, you get put into one group for the whole semester and you don't switch classrooms, the teachers do.  I got lucky in my first semester with students that didn't have a problem with me not being born here and that my Spanish isn't the best.
   But what if I don't this semester? What if a whole bunch of them hate Americans? I mean, I wouldn't blame them. With everything that's been happening, I would expect people to have less than pleasant feelings about Americans. But what if they decide to take it out on me? These are the thoughts that have been plaguing me during my last week of winter vacations.
 The only things I definitely look forward to when going to class is seeing my best friend and learning. My best friend because we got lucky enough to be put in the same group and learning because I love it.

   Yeah, I love learning. I enjoy understanding new things while knowing that I'm one step closer to being where I want to be. Unfortunately, that becomes extremely hard when in a class full of screaming, immature, teenagers. I'm sure some of you can empathize with me when my stress levels go through the roof when there is no teacher in the classroom. At least in all the classes I have EVER been put in, the second there is no teacher or staff watching us, chaos begins. Screaming, people all over the place, the smell of 20 different lunches being pulled out, everyone that doesn't have headphones blaring their music and videos over everything else. It's sensory overload. The only thing that keeps me calm and sane during these moments id putting my headphones on, turning the volume all the way up and ignoring everyone. Even then I could still hear them over my music.

   I guess while I'm at it, making this list of things I have to worry about, I should add meeting new people. By this, I write about liking someone. Maybe even fall in love. I am 17 and have never had a boyfriend. I don't want one to sneak around or do stupid stuff with. I just want someone to take enough interest in me to get to know me. I know this is a typical normal girl thing but I feel that for others like me it turns into anything but typical or normal. Questions like "Does he really like me or does he just want to go to the US?", "When I tell him I'm not leaving Mexico will he leave me?", "When he finds out about my mental health issues, will he still want me?", "If he does, can he handle me?".

   I know for someone my age, some of these worries and fears seem irrational, maybe even laughable. But for me, they are very real and terrifying. I'm going to school tomorrow knowing that any of these things could happen. I also know that none of them could happen and I could have a wonderful day. That is the greatest fear though, isn't it? Fear of the unknown.

   I never said that this was going to be inspiring or happy. I can only hope that this reaches some of you and you see that you are not alone. Being a teenager isn't easy. I know some of us are a little scratched up and bruised because of what life has put us through, but that's okay. It is perfectly okay to not be okay.

Goodbye, for now, dear friends. :) 

Supposed To Be

Hello everyone. How was your weekend? Mine was okay, thanks for asking. :)
   I have decided to write about something I hold very close to myself. Something that I think about constantly and worries me.
Some of you may remember from my first post me telling you all about my depression and how I've had it since I was young. The thing about depression, especially when you have it before you are even capable of understanding what it is, is that you get comfortable with it. It becomes such a large part of who we are that when faced with the opportunity and then making that decision to get better we go into a type of identity crisis.

I say we because I believe that is what I am going through and I know that I am not alone.

Beyond the typical teenage problems that we all have, those of us that have depression have additional issues and questions. The biggest one being, "Without my depression, who am I?".
When we take away the sickness, what is left of us? We didn't choose to be this way. Mental illness doesn't discriminate.

   I'm 17. I turn 18 in 9 months. I have a little over a year to decide what I want to do with the rest of my life and my personal issue isn't that. I know that I want to help people. But am I the kind of person to meditate, perform reiki or aromatherapy, be surrounded by herbs and do acupuncture. Or am I more suited for prescribing pills and fixing broken bones? Surrounded by white walls, and blood and disinfectant. Could I handle trying to save someone's life and forgive myself when their heart stops beating? I have so little time to decide.
   All the time we have spent alone in the company of our depression when we should have been out, living life. I am just now becoming comfortable with my mental state and doing things I should've done before. Hang out with friends, find love, try new things. Things that would help us define who we are. The sad reality is that I am insecure and unsatisfied with who I am. Sometime I feel I have to ask myself, "Do I like this because of who I am or who my depression made me to be?"

   I have already distinguished a few of these and with each one, I feel more satisfied with who I am becoming. I know it isn't easy for anyone and I know that it is going to be a while before I am completely confident in who I am. But that's why I write. To organize my head and define who I am.

   So as a little challenge for us all, define one thing about yourself. It doesn't have to be super specific or it can be as specific as you want it to. The point is to feel more sure about a part of yourself. Take as long as you want (and listen to this song while you're at it). And when you are finished, post it on twitter/facebook/Instagram with the hashtags #thehurtthehopemx and #SupposedToBe so I can see it and be proud of you for taking one step closer to being who you are supposed to be.

And never forget it is perfectly okay not to be okay. :) Goodbye, for now, dear friends.

Watch Me

Hello to all of you Wonderful Beings. I'm sorry I'm a bit late to the party but...

   I haven't really posted or said anything because I have been thinking about the message that I want to give you all for this new year that is upon us. But first thing first.
We survived another year! YOU survived another year. Another year that maybe was full of pain and suffering and loneliness. Heartbreak, anger, loss. You survived all of that and that is amazing. And I am so very proud of each and every one of you. So here's to another year. Let it be filled with happiness, acceptance, and peace. If it's not, then I promise you that you can and will make it through anything that 2019 will throw at you. Some didn't think they would last through 2018, but here we are. You are the very real proof that you can withstand anything.

   So, on to more personal matters.
Did any of you make New Year's resolutions? Made any big decisions to try and better your life for this new cycle? I feel like I did.
   I decided to fully embrace being straight edge (if you don't know what that is, watch this vlog by Patty Walters). So on New Year's Eve, while the rest of my family was drinking squirt and agave, I was perfectly content with my sugar-free coke. I felt better about myself and felt that I was starting the New Year out the way I wanted the rest of my year to go. I also decided that I'm going to try and reintroduce certain people into my life again (at some point this year). And a kind of generic one. I am going on a diet. I KNOW. Every year everyone says that they are going on a diet and most don't stick to it. But I am doing so out of necessity and a deep desire to not only physically but also mentally better myself. To better the image I have of myself.

   I know that many people around me and that are involved in my life will look at these choices and believe that I am odd or different than most. And the truth is, I am. I have always accepted that I am different than everyone else, but it wasn't until more recently that I accepted that not everybody is going to understand me. I've even accepted that, because of my differences, some might be rooting for my failure. Waiting for the one sip of alcohol or bite of something sweet to throw it in my face and say I wasn't strong enough. But if I mess up, I know I can continue on the path I have chosen and that I shouldn't feel bad for it.

So this is my New Year message to you all.
Don't be afraid to fall. Don't be afraid to mess up. As long as you get back up and go on, the mistakes you make don't matter. Stop caring about what the other people are doing or saying. Even if you lose it all, at least you are doing something with your life.
Think about it, while you're at home bettering yourself and strengthening yourself, most if not all of the people that will judge you are doing only that-- judging you. So they are wasting their time on something so stupid and meaningless, you are out there becoming the person you have always dreamed of being.

   So live and let go. Of all the harsh words and disapproving stares. They don't matter. Instead, let them watch you turn that negativity into something beautiful.

And never forget, it is completely okay to not be okay. Goodbye, for now, dear friends.