#I genuinely wouldn't have made it through quarantine without you guys

[you-deserve-to-love-yourself]

Hello! How are you? I hope you're doing well :).

Uhm, well you see....I don't know if it's okay if I kind of ask you for advice (?) but please feel free to ignore this if you don't want to reply, I understand if you do and I will respect it.

Well, you see... I don't want to get into great detail with the story of my life, but, long story short, I have adhd-pi and I was bullied at school and I kinda swept it under the carpet when I got a year held back because I got to meet new people so I tried to leave it in the past.

I thought I was over it throughout the years, but turns out I am not over it and this year after quarantine a lot of things have started surfacing again and it's horrible because my head will bring up stuff that I don't want to remember and whenever I try to distract myself my head will now kind of associate that distraction with another unpleasant memory.

I also have more issues trying to socialize which is something I didn't struggle with that much last year. Like I was able to start a conversation with people and classmates almost smoothly but now I can't, and I've gotten like, two attacks in class. One because I was terrified of presenting a project and the most recent one because the teacher asked me something in class.

I was trying to become friends with a new student in my subunit because my few friends are in the other one because we had to be divided because of Covid.

It was good at first, really nice, genuine, etc.. but things went down when I was paired up with them for this project and I told them I was terrified of presenting and they told me they felt the same way and I remembered they told me they have anxiety. When the day of the project came it was a mess. I had to tell the teacher about our problem because they wouldn't say anything and I broke down when the teacher pulled me out of class to talk. The teacher told me that I wasn't loosing anything at her class but I could lose my job in the future and that this was and exception and could not happen again. She added that I should stand by my partner's side during the presentation to support them but I didn't have to present and that I would have to read the titles on the slides if I could. When she stopped talking I tried my best to tell her that my partner has the same problem and with a heavy sight she told my partner to come out of the class. The teacher started kinda scolding us (which made me feel worse because it's not something I could control) and then my partner made up the excuse that I had just told them that day about my problem which is a lie because I did tell them before. They later on after the presentation proceeded to look at me with one of their friends and they said something along the lines that I had left them hanging. They stopped talking to me and I at first felt guilty but then I felt mad. I would also try to ignore their presence in spaces we had to share and I would not even look at them.

It's been a couple of months since that incident and I really don't want to get into deeper detail about what I saw about this person at first and what I see now or what other events have happened in my life that have made me feel like utter crap, but basically I've been paired up with this friend of them (the one they told about me leaving them hanging) and another classmate. Despite them already knowing that I have this problem (or at least I assume so because they saw me when I was standing by this person's side) I don't know how to explicitly let them know about it. I don't really trust them (especially this person's friend) and I really don't know how to tell them because it's not easy but I need to tell them.... how should I tell them? Thank you so much for your time! I love your blog!

Ah, I forgot to add that I mentioned all the things that happened to me because I believe that my attacks are linked to it in some way (?)

(just clarifying so it doesn't look like I said all of that without any context at all)

Once again, thank you so much for your time!

Hi anon!! Sorry it took me a bit to get back to you.

As long as my ask box is open, feel free to send these things in!! Keep in mind I’m not a professional, and I might not get back to you immediately, but I’m always willing to help someone who needs it. The exception is if you’re considering suicide or are otherwise in immediate danger, in which you need to contact an emergency line or a hotline.

You’re not alone in having things resurface that you thought you were over - that’s happened to me too, during quarantine.

It was wrong of your partner to lie to your teacher and lie to their friends about when you told them about your problem, and I’m sorry you had to go through that. I hope you know that feeling mad is totally valid. *hugs* 

If you have trouble talking to people in person, could you email or text them? I’d suggest sending your partners something along the lines of “Hey I don’t know if you guys know this, but I have really bad anxiety and I’m not able to present. If you guys want, I’ll do extra work on the slides so that you guys can present. I can also read the titles.

I’d also email the teacher beforehand explaining your situation again so that there isn’t a problem on the day-of. Something like 

“Dear Ms ___,

I know it’s been an issue before, but I wanted to reach out beforehand about my inability to present. I’ve talked with my groupmates, and we’ve agreed that I’ll do extra work on it and only read the titles. I wanted to let you know so that there wouldn’t be a problem on the day-of.

Best,

___

I wouldn’t talk to your current partners about what happened in the past, because if anything that could turn into drama pretty fast. But if you want to talk to your original partner from a few months back on it, you could send them something like “I know this happened a few months back, but it really hurt me and I’d like to talk about it if you’re open. I felt really hurt when you told the teacher that I hadn’t told you in advance about my presenting problem, since I did. And when you said something similar in front of your friend, it also made me feel hurt and angry. I understand that you have anxiety too and I’d like to be on good terms again. If we’re ever paired up in the future, could we try to talk to the teacher about any problems we have beforehand? And if I’ve miscommunicated in any way, I’d like to be told so that I’m not blamed for failing to do something, when I did do it.”

Of course, I wouldn’t send something like that if you don’t want to repair the relationship. And either way is okay! You’re not obligated to forgive or be friends with them.

Going back to what you said earlier about memories resurfacing - how I deal with them is grounding techniques! Like you mentioned, distracting yourself doesn’t always work and might just lead to more associations, but using methods to ground yourself in the present moment might be super helpful.

They work well for panic attacks, too. I might have linked this before, but 7 Cups has a help guide on panic attacks that might be helpful for you.

Sending you love and I hope things turn out alright for you! 💚

#ask #anon #school tw #(brief) #suicide ment #aure speaks