Five months. Five months is how long it took me to put the pieces back together after my heart was hit by this train of despair. Five months of this empty feeling. Five months of wondering why. Five months of black and white. Always seeing colour, but never feeling colour. When someone you love leaves you, you wake up the next day feeling like you aren’t at home anymore. Your breathing is staggered, your heartbeat falls behind as your train of thought rushes forward. You never stop thinking. It physically hurts when someone decides they don’t want you anymore when all you wanted was to be worth something to someone.
I did wake up the next day. That’s for sure, I did wake up, but I did not feel like I was awake. All I wanted was to talk to him or for him to say he was joking and she was never a threat. After a year of dedicating my life to somebody, I was too invested to change the pattern of my daily life. When you feel someone’s soul has died inside of you and then see them the next day, it’s painful and confusing. They say they love you but it’s not with the warmth in their eyes anymore. People say the eyes are the windows to the soul so I guess his soul was conquered by the blizzards of a lost love because his eyes were so cold.
Then I moved. I moved to an entirely different state, but I was still in this state of depression. I wanted to move. Not physically, but mentally. I wanted to be sublimely happy, I wanted to feel love again. Being numb is funny because you’d rather feel pain than nothing at all. Sometimes you have to bleed to know that you’re alive and have a soul and I wasn’t even hurting anymore. The tears started coming without reason and I was at this constant war with myself. Moving was essential for my development. All I had to do was wait for high school to start, the greatest years of our lives. I was ready for the greatest years of my life.
High school started and the fear of being accepted started to kick in. Wondering if anyone will care about you for once.
Who knew a fire drill could set a fire in your soul that doesn’t die. I was complimented by a guy that became my best friend and his group of friends consisted of the best people I’ve ever met and the one I love. The day after I met them, every small amount of pain inside me lifted and it was such a miracle. I was loved. I was thriving. I was laughing. Smiling. I was okay. I was sublimely happy.
I was unpacking boxes in my house the other day that I was afraid of opening for so long in fear of a forgotten memory. I opened one and a whole bottle of his cologne was spilled in the box. It didn’t smell like a lost love anymore. It didn’t smell like grieving. It smelled a lot more like Phoenix. I finally know what his cologne smells like. I finally feel love. I don’t just see colour anymore. I can feel colour. I did wake up.All my life, I’ve been a person who hasn’t fit with my surroundings. Growing up with bright coloured hair and libertarian beliefs, I never fit in the country towns I grew up in. I started taking to social media with my friends and soon discovered how easy it is to make friends on the internet. For once in my life, I felt like I fit in. It’s comforting to have someone to talk to who understands what it’s like to feel out of place in their surroundings. People say that social media creates isolation, but in reality it creates a wonderful world of love and acceptance for some teens. For some teens it even helps them learn more about their mental illnesses and how to relief them. Social media does not create isolation because it’s a doorway to discovering cultures and countries you’ve never been to, it helps connect with distant friends and families, and it’s easier to be accepted as who you are on social media.
In the average American town, you don’t see a lot of people from different countries. Social media is a doorway to discovering all sorts of cultures and countries. You can literally be a part of a place you’ve never even been to! Social media is a way to learn about other cultures by actually talking to and befriending other cultures. Social media is a fantastic learning opportunity and it’s more hands on than simply reading about a culture. On social media I’ve learned a lot of information about other countries and their values and I’ve educated people from across the world about what the average American does. On both ends, it’s interesting. It’s important for people of all ages to know and accept different cultures, and social media does just that.
If you’re someone like me who has moved a lot, you know the pain of leaving people that you were close to. If anything, that’s something that causes isolation! Social media helps people connect with friends and family, no matter where they are. Whether your friends and family are in a border state or in a different country, they’re only a Skype call or a Facebook message away. It’s easy to feel detached from people who you live far away from, and social media is the perfect fix.
In some areas, not all types of people are easily accepted and welcomed with open arms. On social media, it’s easier to find people that are more like you. You can easily see someone’s personal interests and befriend them. There’s so much more freedom of expression on the internet and you can be yourself and say what you feel and find people that relate to you.
Some would say that kids are always looking at their phones and typing up a storm, but a lot of the time they could be telling their best friend how they feel about their day or helping someone feel better about themselves. Social media is helping and healing to some teens. The experience of teenagers has changed considerably over the last 30-40 years, including a significant increase in the rate of anxiety, depression and behavioural problems, according to new research from the Nuffield Foundation. This illustrates how much teens need people that understand how they feel and who they are. A lot of people in our community might not understand how you can’t find someone like you in real life because the community that goes to Churchland is fantastically diverse. When you live in a small town, there’s less diversity and less opportunity to find someone who understands your personal struggles and opinions. It’s so simple to feel left out and misunderstood when people around you make you feel like you’re less of a person because you’re not the same as the average person in your community.
Social media helps people feel better about their surroundings and about themselves. Social media isn’t isolating teenagers, it’s only helping them find who they are and the type of people they want to surround themselves with. Social media may be different from what you grew up on, but change can be good, and social media is a good change.