Fear of Knowing

Many people are afraid of the unknown and with good reason. Knowing that changes are going to happen that can affect your life in a variety of ways, some of which may not be very good, is scary. Fear of change is not a bad thing as long as you don’t let it be a roadblock to you and hinder you from success and personal growth. Tomorrow at 4 pm, I’m finally taking the first step to removing the roadblock that’s hindering me from some much-needed change and growth.

I’m going to see a therapist tomorrow. I’m nervous and honestly, I’m pretty scared. I know that I need help because I’m having problems that are interfering with my life and my ability to function and even though I’ve already been diagnosed with ADHD as a child, I’m afraid that I’m going to end up with another diagnosis. I know that having a diagnosis is not a bad thing and may be needed to help me sort out and gain control of the problems I’ve been having, but I also know that I have a family who isn’t going to be supportive of me if I do go back home over winter break with a shiny new diagnosis.

In my family, you suffer in silence. If you say anything, you are automatically shamed for it or blamed for the things you feel and go through. Your challenges and your feelings are constantly invalidated by someone who is uninformed and thinks they know everything about you when they don’t know anything. I lived in a home where emotional and verbal abuse was normal. I lived in a place where even though my dad rarely ever hit me, I feared for my life. My father would look at me as if my very existence was an inconvenience and any time I made what he thought to be a mistake, he would yell at me and spew poison with every word that came out of his mouth and when I looked into his eyes I honestly feared that I was about to die. I couldn’t even take a nap for a little while without the fear that my dad was going to call on me and that I wouldn’t hear him in my sleep. The last time that happened, he came into my room and struck me with a TV remote, just because he wanted me to fix him something to drink which he could have just as easily done himself. My dad thought it was funny to shoot metal BB’s at my siblings and me inside the house no matter what we were doing, even though it made us cry and left welts on us. When he started doing that, I was terrified to come out of my room. I begged my mother not to make me come out of my room to do my chores because I was so scared.

Now, I’m in college and I always find a way to get to the dorm first every year so that I can pick which side of the room I want so I can pick the bed further away from the door and face the door when I sleep. I ALWAYS lock the door when I’m in my room alone because if I have to be afraid in my own home where I’m supposed to be safe, what does that say about the rest of the world? When I enter a room I’ve never been in before, I survey it and think of ways to escape or how I could defend myself using the things that are available in the room if I were in danger. I live on edge, always afraid of what might happen.

Most of my memories, I am not able to access. I cannot purposefully think back and remember things that have happened to me, most of the time not even the bad things. There are always a few things that stick out in my mind that are just shocking to me, such as the examples mentioned above. I always remember how everything felt though and if I get upset about something I often feel as if I’m upset over a thousand different things all at once like it has been building up inside me for a long time and then I just break down and begin to weep.

Last week, I went to my professor’s office before I was supposed to be holding a podcast which my classmates were going to be participating in. I was feeling good about it and when I went at 2 (when she was supposed to meet with me) my professor was busy until about 2:45, so needless to say I was a bit frustrated at first but once we finally got to meet I was feeling good. I showed her the PowerPoint I had made as a guide for myself for the podcast and she did not criticize me harshly but she told me that she was looking for more of a discussion than a lecture.

I don’t know why and I’m still not sure exactly what happened but it seemed like I started to have a nervous breakdown or a panic attack or a meltdown or something. I was totally overwhelmed so I went to the bathroom for 3 minutes and I started to cry and then I began to count until the tears stopped falling. I wiped the tears from the inside of my eyes and walked back to her office and sat down. I could feel myself still trembling and deep down I knew this was not going to end well but I tried to keep my cool and to keep my head on straight and stay calm, but eventually, I just exploded, and once again I wept. The only difference was that this time it was in front of another person. I felt horrible about it too because I knew she felt like she had said something to hurt me or in her words “freak me out”. It wasn’t her fault though and when she asked me what was wrong I could not even respond in a constructive manner. 1- because I didn’t even know why I was weeping and what was actually wrong, and 2- because when I get upset like that it’s like my brain just shuts down and I can’t say anything that makes any sense. I did what I have only done once before, I asked my professor if there was any way that I could do the podcast another day. I hate asking someone to make an exception for me because I think highly of myself and I want to be held accountable just as any other student would be and expected to meet the deadline regardless of the situation, but I knew that there was no way I was going to be able to calm myself down from that until I had some time to process what had happened and to get all the negative emotions out of me. Luckily, my professor was understanding of the situation. I told her that I was going to seek counseling because I knew that I couldn’t ignore it anymore and pretend it wasn’t there because now I’m not the only one who knows that it happens to me. I was so disappointed in myself because I felt like I had failed.

***SPOILERS

I fixed my PowerPoint guide and I went through with the podcast last Thursday. I think I did a pretty good job of it considering what I had gone through to get it done.

Anyways, I guess I just wanted to say that I’m afraid of knowing what’s wrong. I’m afraid of being diagnosed with another problem knowing that the people who are supposed to love me will not care at all (besides my boyfriend who is always very supportive– If you’re reading this, thanks Ryan) because even when I’m making some progress it feels like a knife to the windpipe when someone puts me down for seeking help and seeking answers. I don’t want to go home at all but since I don’t have a choice, I guess all I really want is to be able to go home and tell somebody and not be told that it’s “in my head” (even though technically it is in my head because it’s my brain causing the problem) but I’m tired of people putting me down and telling me that my problems are the result of me being a bad person and that I’m making it all up, because I’m not. I know that if I come home with a diagnosis when someone incorrectly makes an assumption about the situation, I’m not going to be able to keep my mouth shut, I’m going to correct them and it’s going to end up being an argument because I’ve always been a very independent and stubborn person. I just want to get better. I want to feel happy. I want to feel in control of my emotions and my life. I want to function well and be successful all the time. I want to feel like me.