“ I myself am strange and unsual… ”

hey, my name is zo. it’s nice to meet you. today is september 27th 2025 and i am 20 years old. in this digital birthday diary, i will be writing a retrospective piece about me and my life each year on my birthday until i turn 30. this is the first entry:

it’s weird to say that at this very moment, i am officially no longer considered a teenager. i am a fully-fledged young adult woman now, which is… awkward and scary, mostly because i don’t feel like a young adult. and that is a feeling that has been stuck on me for so long; mentally and emotionally, i have felt like an overgrown child that has yet to reach the point of abandoning the innate childishness of youth. my life is just a time capsule, playing out exactly as it did seven years ago when i was bedridden in a full body cast after surgery when i was 12. and things have progressed… physically. i am finally in my last year of high school after six years of constant emotional turmoil and severe mental health struggles brought on by chronic pain in relation to my disabilities.

in the years since then, it’s a very common occurrence for me to look at myself and my life, and think, “why do i feel so alone? why can’t i just grow up?” and it’s that almost permanent loneliness, the childlike sensitivity and that… gutwrenching, painful feeling of being stuck in the mud way behind everyone else — of being left behind everyone else BY everyone else — that has made my teenage years an absolute living hell. especially within the last year and a bit. because nothing’s really ever changed. I haven’t really changed. i still have more friends online than i do in real life. i’m still living with my parents. i don’t have a job, i don’t go outside. most of all, i am still just as lonely and frustrated and tired and and depressed as i was when i was completely isolated after surgery.

in fact, i would say that i’m even more lonely and frustrated and tired and and depressed now than i was back then. and that’s exactly because things have changed so much physically over time. i have lost a lot in my life throughout those seven years. first, it was parts of myself and my abilities to be independent. then, friends slowly started to slip away after elementary school. my self esteem began chipping away soon after. then, the closeness with family started to wear thin. i’ve lost both of my grandmothers, even though one of them is still living. but i wouldn’t say she’s alive in the way she once was. her body is just functioning on instinct as the dementia eats at her brain harrowingly presents herself to everyone else.

the other died in a painfully slow month-long waiting game while she was in the hospital gradually declining. when i processed the devastating fact that she was only going to get worse instead of better, i cried more worrying about when she was going to leave me rather than if. this was the hardest pill for me to swallow.

however out of everything i once had, i have lost more friends than anything. i’ve just lost contact with most of them, but there are a few that have the most impact on me because of the growth in the ever-present loneliness these losses have left me with. this is not to disparage any of the friendships i have held onto because there are so many amazing people in my life who have been extremely supportive of me while i was in some of the worst situations of my life. i love the people i do have by my side with all my heart and deepest devotion, and i am so grateful to have them in my corner.

needless to say, i definitely would not be the person i am today if none of the good, bad and ugly experiences were to ever happen, and i think that’s something i need to take into account going forward this year. because no matter how much i’ve lost in my life, i have still gained so much good in return.

you’re not on your own, kid. every happy memory and moment is a remedy for all the bad. remember that… please.

LOVE YA.ᐟ