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What I Learned From Revisiting A Three-Year-Old Recording of My Mental Breakdown
Hint: it hurt a little bit
I didn’t open my vast catalogue of memories on Google Photos with the intention of opening old wounds. It was already 3 AM, and I desperately needed sleep. Hell, I hadn’t even showered yet.
But, for whatever reason, I sought out the past.
Initially, this was an attempt at finding funny old videos to cheer me up. I didn’t have to look far, as I surveyed the most iconic moments of the past year of my life — a collage of memories from the past couple of months, the summer that seemed to never end, and my freshman year of college before it. I grinned, reminiscing on these moments that weren’t quite far enough from my vision for me to miss. They happened and they were over and I was fine with it.
And then — I reached the summer before that, and my senior year of high school presented itself. To my surprise, this is when it began to hurt.
In my earliest years of public education, I loved school. I liked being around other kids my age, I loved recess, I tolerated lunch, and I genuinely enjoyed learning. Over time, this soured. The realities of school started setting in, reminding me that I wasn’t good enough and giving me the sense that the whole world was against me.
