My whole life has always been so different. For years it felt like I was fighting a constant battle every day. I was so alone, and I've been taught to trust no one even if they seemed like they wanted to be a friend. Looking back now I can see everything I've been through and how I was during all that time. I didn't notice anything wrong with the way I was living my life. I'll share some examples. Most of 3rd grade I was terrified of sleep. Around 7pm every night I would start to panic about bedtime getting closer. I shared a room with my older sister so when it was time for bed, I would talk to her for as long as I could. After a while she would stop responding back to me and at that time, I would start sobbing. I would cry until someone woke up with me, and I would stay awake until daylight started to show outside. I would sometimes cry so hard I would make myself sick. I would do this anywhere that I stayed the night.... at home, friend's house, hotels, etc. Going to bed got a little easier about a year later, but I still couldn't spend the night at anyone's house. It terrified me so much. In middle school I started to get angry. During school I would sit in class and daze off. I started getting flashbacks like crazy. And they were so real. I don't know why, but it happened a lot during band class. I can remember sitting there, everyone playing the music except for me. Several times I would start to get shakey, my heart would beat like crazy, I felt really hot and really confused. I walked out of band class several times my 8th grade year. And when my teachers would question me, I would get so angry. I have no idea why but I would get really, really angry. I felt like they should already know what's wrong. I sit in class day after day having the same problems, so they should have noticied on their own. My four years at high school is when life got really hard. I felt so blind to everything. The only thing I had to do was make sure the abuse was a secret. Looking back I hate how much of my life I missed. I missed making more friends, going out for sports, actually enjoying high school life. Every day was SO hard, and NO ONE understood. I had a hard time sitting through class. Concentrating was not working for me, I was constantly feeling anxious. All day long my head would be filled will all the secrets I had and how no one was suppose to know. I looked at others around me and hated them for all the freedom they seemed to have. I looked free too. I would sit in class trying so hard to work, when all I really wanted to do was go down to the counselors office and scream. I wanted to scream about how angry I was, how afraid I felt all the time. I wanted to yell at the top of my lungs how life wasn't good, and how every minute of the damn day felt like hours to me. I wanted to cry because they didn't know what I was feeling or going through. Because they didn't understand... they didn't understand how hard it is to just live. How school was the least important thing to me because I had much bigger things going on outside of it. How I would go home every day and feel like I was less of a person. The abuse changed my life. I was angry over so much, even the smallest of things. When I grew out of the anger, I became so sad. I had lost so much that I could never have back. I was so afraid of things that I shouldn't have been. I became a liar. I would lie to people about why I had marks on my body, why I was sad. I even started to change details of my attacks and combining different incidents later on when I started talking about it. Maybe because it was easier to talk about, or because I was ashamed? I don't know. The hurt was so excruciating and it never seemed to go away. It made me do some really stupid things that I didn't realize were bad for me. I became bulimic and I started pushing people out of my life. My abuse took a chunk of my life that I will never have back. I still don't understand how to move forward though. It's still hard every day.