#thingscanchange

I’ve seen a lot of ‘it gets better’ posts and wanted to share my own. 

A year ago, I was sitting awake at three in the morning, newly 18, and entirely unable to picture a future for myself. I was consumed with what felt like an incurable sadness. I could only force myself to go to school because I didn’t want to be home. My family was in shambles and everyone blamed me. I wanted to die and I was one bad day from ending things. I woke up miserable, unable to sleep because I was so afraid. I was miserable. If you’d asked me then, I would have sworn that I was going to be dead before I graduated high school.

A year later, and I’m sitting in my dorm room at college, watching youtube videos at two am on a friday morning and I have class in less than eight hours. My best friend is asleep in the bunk above me after helping me make halloween cookies and I spent the day shopping for decorations. The room is decorated in gay pride flags and skeletons and I haven’t felt this much like myself in years. 

I’ve spent the last week feeling like something is missing, and it hit me like a brick as I was staring at the picture my sister drew for me when I left. For the first time in my life, I’m not running away from anything. I’m going towards it. I’ve spent so long feeling all alone, but I’m not anymore. I have a family that chose me, and I chose them, and that is the best feeling in the world.

When I lose sleep now, it’s not because I’m afraid of what’s going to happen while I’m sleeping, it’s because I don’t want to miss a second of what life has to offer for me. 

I’m not happy, not right now. I haven’t been in so long that I don’t think I’d know how to tell if I was. I’ve spent my entire life in a state of melancholy and I don’t delude myself by pretending that that’s going to change overnight. So no, I’m not happy, not by a long shot. But, for the first time since I can remember, I think I’m getting there. I can see myself being happy, I can see a future. I’m safe, my family is safe, and I’m loved. And that might be enough to handle anything life throws at me. That might be enough to change things, and that’s what matters right now.