I’ve had them since mid last year and have not seeked for help. It took me longer than it should have to even admit to myself that I have them. It happened a couple of times last year and I thought it wasn’t that big of a deal, maybe it was just stress from school. Just as I thought I could manage it myself, they got worse. It affects my relationships with the people around me as I tend to distance myself from them, not cause I want to, but I feel like I have to. Many people have said that I don’t show that I care enough. Based on personal experience, people tend to walk all over you when you show that you care. It shows that you’re weak and vulnerable. So after being hurt by someone i trusted over and over again, I told myself that it would never happen ever again. So I think having that kind of mindset made me put up walls around myself to protect me. I’m always described as cold and harsh. And that makes people think that I have no emotions. I guess this makes it harder for me to open up to people, especially the ones who I’m close to. Oddly, it’s way easier to open up to strangers here than it is to open up to the people I actually care about. I have considered seeking professional help, but it’s just really hard to talk about it. I feel like I shove my feelings down so much that it builds up over time and when they resurface, I just spiral out of control and absolutely lose it. I always tell myself to “suck it up". I’m not the only one with problems in this world. There are people who have it way worse than me. Isn’t it just selfish to pity myself? When I was younger, I broke down in school one time and had to talk to the school counselor. Let’s just say it was really annoying having to sit there and listen to someone else tell me how I should deal with my feelings when I really just wanted to hit something. In this world, if you have panic disorder, you are labelled as crazy or weak. If you can’t control your own feelings then how are you going to succeed in life? I’m still young, if people know that I have them then what will they think of me? Will teachers look down on me? I’m a pretty smart kid I guess, I managed to top the cohort for a couple of subjects last year. I have it so easy don’t I? Teachers have said to the class that I’m “sailing through school”. That makes them think that the smart kid can’t have any problems. My life is perfect, I do well in school, sports, I have the most amazing friends. What more could I ask for? This past week, I somewhat opened up to a couple of my friends. I guess they could see that something was up and I just blurted it out, I didn’t go into detail about it but I still said it. They were really understanding, as expected. But I don’t know, I kind of regret it. A few weeks back, the only person in the world that knew was me. When I had one outside, my friends would just think that I was just not in the mood to talk as I would distance myself from everyone for the day. But now that they know, I just feel so exposed. I don’t like the feeling of people comforting me, it’s just so uncomfortable. Maybe it stems from my childhood, my family has never been the kind to talk about feelings. So whenever I was upset, I dealt with it myself, no one would ever comfort me. In a way, it toughened me up, made me emotionally mature. But it has its downsides.
I think part of the reason why I haven’t told an adult yet is because of my age. During cce lessons in the morning, the school is always talking about mental health. I know of people who have reached out to the counselor for help but it only ended up with the counselor telling their parents. All their family members would just call them a wussy. “you’re still so young, what kind of problems do you even have?". They looked down on them, tell them they won’t survive in the real world. Most Singaporeans have this kind of mentality, mental issues= crazy. They think that just cause you have mental health problems means that if they piss you off, you’ll start chasing them with knives or something. So they shut you out, avoid you. I don’t know. All I know is that I’m lost. I don’t know what to do, what to think, I don’t even know who I am anymore at this point. It’s alright, I’ll just pretend to be okay, gaslight myself into being fine. Maybe that’ll work. Sorry you had to read this, I don’t even know what I’m saying anymore. Just needed to let it out.
You don’t have to explain or justify yourself to people who cannot understand you.