CW: Suicidal thoughts, sexual assault, panic attacks
Dear Society,
This letter may be a little messy, but life is messy too so it is what it is.
I turn eighteen next month. Whenever I tell other people that I’m tired, traumatized, and struggling, they often tell me that I’m too young to understand pain. Maybe I am, but maybe I’m not. Something I once heard that I try to tell myself and others is “if it hurt you, it hurt you,” so even if I “don’t understand pain,” hopefully there is some validity in my feelings.
I’ve been to eleven schools and I have never once completely felt like I belonged. In fact, my current school is the school I’ve been to the longest, yet I still don’t know where I’m going to eat during lunch. I know a lot of people, but no one knows me. They don’t know that my father emotionally and physically abuses me, they don’t know my mom dropped out of school to work, they don’t know about my suicide attempts, they don’t know about my panic disorder, they don’t know about my insecurities, they don’t know my family was once bankrupt, and they don’t know that I work hours a week while having to go to school. All people see is just another Asian girl that gets everything she wants. “She doesn’t know pain.”
I once tried to give my “friends” hints that I was suicidal and that my father was abusive, but they never caught on so I gave up. It would be burdening for them to know anyways.
I used to have panic attacks every single day in middle school. Panic attacks are different for everyone, but for me, my whole body felt numb, my heart raced, I couldn’t breathe, and worst of all, I felt scared, alone, and even judged. No one ever told me “it’s gonna be okay”; no one sat by my side. In fact, people said I was faking it and made fun of me. And that was when I realized that ableism is very real.
I’ve also always struggled with the fear of sexual assault. Because society keeps saying that showing skin causes it, I try to dress conservatively. I don’t even feel comfortable wearing shorts and short sleeves anymore. To be fair, I don’t feel comfortable with how I ever look. I’m known as the ugly one in my family, and people often treat my sister better than me because she’s pretty. People outside of my family don’t tell me I’m ugly, but I often feel ugly. People just don’t treat me the same way they treat the pretty girls. And it’s not even that I wish for people to call me pretty. In fact, such comments annoy me. But I just wished people could pay less attention to looks. I myself could work on this too.
I feel like society is too judgemental. I get laughed at whenever I bring food to school unless it’s American food. People say they like “exotic food” and “trying new things,” but the moment it’s something too different from what they know, they start to bash it.
I once told my friend that I like kpop and their response was “I hate kpop.” And let me rant for a moment on why that response is problematic. First of all, people that say they hate kpop don’t realize that kpop varies a lot. Within kpop, there are ballads, rock, EDM, and so much more. IU sounds nothing like SHINEE. Second of all, kpop is korean kpop. How can someone hate a genre just because of it’s language? How about Jpop then? Or Mandopop? Can’t understand the lyrics? Google it. In fact, there are songs in kpop that are completely in English. Does the reasoning of “I can’t understand it” still stand? People need to understand that music is music. If one can sing along to Despacito or even an orchestral song, they can sing along to kpop. Third of all, that fear of listening to music that isn’t just reflects xenophobia in our society. People need to be okay with respecting other cultures even if it seems “weird.” It has been incredbily difficult for asians to gain recognition or any representation in both film and music. Fourth of all, you can say something isn’t for you without saying you hate it. Fifth of all, kpop has helped A LOT of people through difficult times and just mindlessly throwing hate towards it is very hurtful.
I feel like the only time people, especially white people, are okay with hearing a foreign language is when they themselves are forcing their friends to “say something in chinese.” For the love of God, people need to stop thinking they’re appreciating culture when they say these comments. It’s not appreciation when you’re treating your “friends” like they’re exotic museum artifacts. Because it’s those same people that say those comments that get uncomfortable when their bilingual friends are actually using that foreign language.
One more thing as I close this letter. There was this one time when someone I knew called me lazy and tried to flex that they were a top athlete and are in a bunch of activities. But that kid’s parents work at Intel and they have literally all of the time and support in the world. I struggle financially and have to work. I don’t have time to do all of these ativities. So it’s not fair to compare two students with completely different situations like that. Society needs to understand that those that are far in life aren’t always the hardest working individuals. It’s not fair that some of top students that have so much time and money are called hard-working while their less-academically-strong counterparts that work every day after school and cooks for the family get absolutely no recognition. And this comment isn’t even about me, it’s about how elitist our education system is.
It always feels like I’m running. I run and run because it feels like the moment I stop, I won’t be able to run again. I mean that metaphorically, not literally-I don’t exercise. But it always feels like I have to be moving forward to prove that I deserve a place in society. There are too many people I need to prove wrong and too many people that have hurt me. I can’t let them win.
-Anonymous
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