A letter to my teenage self

*Warning, this post may have triggers around thoughts of suicide and self-harm*

Dear Stupidgirl45,

I see you, aged 15, sitting on your bed, wondering if you'll always be this lonely, unable to imagine a life past school, a life as an adult. Feeling invisible, as if you might just dissolve and no one would even notice. I see you doubting whether you are likeable, or clever, or pretty. Wondering if popularity is all that matters. Itching to be accepted but wanting to be different. 

I see you wishing you had the guts to kill yourself. Contemplating pills or razor blades. Researching the correct way to cut, wondering if you could swallow *that* many tablets. But not wanting your family to find you and also, the humiliation of the possibility of failure. Of people knowing that you were so useless, you couldn't even kill yourself properly. Feeling like you lack the guts to try, not knowing that your instinct for survival is stronger than you think.

I see you cry, I feel your pain, I watch scars from cutting heal up as if it never happened. I know you wonder, is this really it?  can I ever hope for more? will i always be on the outside looking in? and finding it hard to believe that the lives you read about in books really happen to people. I know you think you're worthless and ugly, of no value or importance, that it terrifies you to speak to people - to strangers, to order a drink in a shop.

I see you, I hear you and I know you. I am you and clichéd as it sounds, I promise it gets better, You will learn to apply liquid eye liner. You will grow boobs. And one day, to the right people, to the people that matter you will be really very incredibly important to them. But mostly one day you will have some confidence and some shreds of self-esteem. You will survive this, this nuclear landscape that your social life is now. You will not be a pariah forever, and things that matter now - about being a homogeneous clone - will drop away. 

The things that make you different now, that make you value yourself so little, will become what makes you distinctive - apart but apart on your own terms. You'll learn, again a cliché, that being different is good - and that it takes strength to be different, to strike out on your own and form your own identity and thoughts. And not give a fuck.

You won't die, you won't dissolve and you won't give up. You didn't give up on life back then and now you treasure it so you don't give up on what matters now - relationships, passions, work. You fight, and it might make you tough but you're soft where it counts, not just round the middle but inside where it matters. You might be building up those walls now, but in time, for the right people, you can take them right back down again.

So don't give up, don't despair. Life is out there and when you've finished surviving, you're going to be grabbing it with both hands and hugging it to your scarred heart. Winged eye liner, boobs and all.

Thank you and good night,

Stupidgirl has left the building

PS This post was inspired by this very touching (and much cheerier) post by @jumprunscrap about her dreams for her daughter. It's very good reading.