Do you ever find yourself – in the middle of doing something – taking a breath and asking: How did I get here? Well, I do.
I sit here writing this out, three days after my due date, and I think to myself: How did I get here? How have I let my mental illnesses get in the way of the things I love? Why does opening my computer fill me with dread and picking up a pen gives me a headache? The thought of going outside and talking to people – like I once loved to do – hurts me so much. I feel as though I am becoming a walking enigma: born to be in bed, forced to be out. What brought me to this point and how do I leave here? Lots of questions and very few answers.
Understanding myself is a task heavier than it once was. I find now I cannot just ignore the things that weigh heavy on my lungs and create holes where my heart should be, not like I once could. Throughout high school (LCHS Go Falcons), I made straight A’s (until junior year; thanks for the B, Mr. Hastings) and didn’t miss class unless I had to. I also played soccer and had a social life. How did I get from there to here? Since college started and I had to move away from everything I knew, things shifted.
I was the first of six to move away from home – and stay away – and start at a university. It was hard. Packing my things up and leaving my home behind changed me – I think. Making friends has never been an issue, and it still isn’t today, but coming somewhere where you don’t know anybody is hard. It is rough to sit in your lofted bed and realize you are alone, and then you make friends and see maybe this isn’t so bad.
Coming to Florence has been such an amazing experience and I would do it over again, but I think losing my support system, my family, really shook the foundation of who I am. I started getting involved and being overzealous with my activities and what I could handle. I fear I have been in a continuous state of burnout since October of 2022. But I thought I was fine.
I realized I had an issue when three of my very close friends sat me down and began with: “This is just a conversation.” How did I get here?
How did I let myself go to the point where others noticed? Why can I not handle this? Am I not strong enough? Those are questions I found myself asking when they sat me down. I panicked, but once it subsided, I saw they were right, I was doing too much. How did I get here?
I created these issues for myself when I decided I didn’t like how things were and I couldn’t bring myself to trust anybody else’s hands but my own. I always created these issues when I felt like I could never do enough, could never be enough. These issues were created when I was brushed off as a hormonal teenage girl; I had my first psychiatrist appointment last Thursday, and I felt like I had hope.
I am twenty years old. I am twenty years old and I bring too much on and I have to keep asking myself: How did I get here?
