literature

Letter To Myself

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Literature Text

Dear Christina,

I want to tell you a story.

Once upon a time, there was a young girl who lived her life full of adventures every day. She woke up to greet the day with excitement, went on to live through the morning and afternoon. In the evening, the day was all hers again and she lived in worlds unknown. She lived in fairy forests. She lived by the sea. She lived with a seal for a pet. She made her own food from lemon trees. She sometimes was a teacher and sometimes a mermaid. She was a lioness, she was a waitress, she was a friend of dolphins.

Then, this little girl began to grow up. And as this happened, she found her adventures changing. Her adventures weren't there all day long. They were hampered by reality. And as reality shoved its way into her life, the girl began to find other ways to retain her adventure. All night, while the rest of the house slumbered, she became a dragon, she was to be the savior of the universe, she had a child to love, she was stranded on the ocean, she was caught in a whirlwind of magic, she spoke with the unicorns, and rode buses with boys. During the day, she was a quiet girl. Nobody knew of the adventures she kept hidden inside.

The girl reached her teenage years and things changed so drastically. She soon realized that the only acceptance she could find would be in her adventures, still shoved to the night time, still done so fervently when everyone else was asleep. If anybody knew about this, she thought, they would know she was crazy.

She stopped talking to people unless they asked her direct questions. She knew that her input was unimportant and unworthy. So it hardly mattered. During the day, she was a quiet stone. At night, everything she felt and wanted was real and true to her. At night, all the joy she might have gotten from the day was made up for. She was happy at night.

And then the girl reached the age where she began to see something was wrong. This is not how normal girls act, she thinks. What is wrong with me? she thinks. Why am I not like everybody else?

The girl goes to see a psychologist. Someone she's hoping who will be able to explain to her what's wrong with her. She had realized that adventures weren't things most other people went on. And the adventures were dwindling.

Social phobia, they said. You have social phobia.

And she understood then. She was afraid of what other people thought of her and for no reason. She told her family and her friends: This is what's wrong with me! This is why I am so abnormal! They don't understand. They can't understand. They are not afflicted the way she is.

She realizes that her friends and family cannot help her with this.

She loves the worlds she goes to during her adventures. She loves them dearly. They make her feel special. They make her feel wanted.

But she also loves the world she lives in. There are real, true adventures she can go on whenever she wanted to. But what was it that held her back? Her own fear.

The fear preventing her from living her life was what caused her to shut herself up in her room and have adventures all her own.

The girl is much older now. And she has seen that this is not how she wants to live. She loves the adventures, though, and doesn't want to give them up.

So she begins writing. She writes the adventures. She writes them and then lives them through the eyes of characters far different from her. Characters that can go on adventures she never would've been able to go on.

And she begins looking for a way to no longer be afraid. And as the adventures become less prominent in her mind, as she clears away the carefully placed distractions, she sees the truth behind her own self.

Behind it all, she finds horror. She finds fear. She finds depression and self-doubt and uncertainty. She finds a nervous clench, she finds a racing heart, she finds sweaty palms. She finds that she is terrified and that she always has been.

She finds that while she was in denial with her adventures, the fear was controlling her real life. The fear had conquered her while she hid from it. It was making sure she did not want to do anything. It was making her stay home instead of going to a party. The fear made her miss class so many times instead of going through with it and getting an A. The fear made her later and later for work until she quit because she just couldn't take it anymore.

The fear was her slave master. And she was the slave.

For so long she had not known, lost as she was in her fantasy adventures, where everything was perfect and she was brave and had no fear. Where she was who she always wished she could be.

But as soon as she realized the truth- she began to fight it.

And this is where she is now

She is struggling. She is taking medications. She fights every single day just to get out of bed and sometimes she doesn't make it. The guilt will weigh down on her so heavily that she just wants to go to sleep, where she wouldn't have to think about it at all.

She sleeps much more than any normal person would. This she uses to hide from the guilt.

The fear continues to haunt her, but it comes around less these days. Its siblings guilt and doubt hang on her all the time.

But she has hope. There are people who care about her. There are people who want to help. And they have helped and they will help.

She knows she will be struggling with this her entire life. She's ready for it.

And you can be, too. Just remember that you can get through it. Just like this girl, you can fight your fear.

Good luck,
Ina
This is an entry for the Letters To Myself II Contest.

The age I'm writing to is 18.

I really felt like this would be the perfect way to write about my social phobia, so I'm glad I did it. :D
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