August 24, 2022: Making great strides in therapy

The power of kindness. Many people don’t realize the impact kindness toward a stranger or even someone they know may have. Today when I went to therapy upon entering the building, a young female stopped and made eye contact, smiled and said hello and asked how I was doing. This small encounter made me feel good. As I was waiting for my therapist, the same female walked past me twice and both times made eye contact and smiled. This kind of kindness toward me I am not used to. But I liked it and hope for more in the future. Yet I couldn’t help letting my mind pose the question, would this female show me the same kindness if she knew my story. Would she still be kind or would she see me as a horrible person. This encounter also left me thinking will I see the girl from last week again. The anticipation was killing me and a large part of me was hoping to see her again. Therapy was supper helpful, but like usual when I truly start getting into something time is up, and I am left hoping I can pick up where I left off, which is usually not the case. I wish therapy could be longer when I truly get into something that is helping me get control of my mental illness. Therapy started with my discussing of and wondering of will there ever be people and/or a person that will not see me as a criminal or a bad person. Will someone ever truly listen to my story and not make assumptions of a label I will have placed on me in the coming months of being a felon. This label along with the label of a criminal will be hard for me accept and place on myself due to having no recollection of the crime, being on medications that made my symptoms a million times worse, and the crime being something I could see myself ever doing in my more clear state of mind. Therapy then shifted to my timeline and how different events shaped my mental health. From sexual abuse before I was in kindergarten, being bullied by my fifth-grade teacher, and bullying other even people I had crushes on just to fit in and take heat off myself. And this is where therapy ended me talking about bullying a girl, I thought was the prettiest girl I ever laid eyes on at the time, that was a little bigger. I wanted nothing more than to go on a date with her, but all my friends called her Randa the Panda and picked on me for my crush on her. So I went with the status quo and began bullying her to take heat off myself. Thinking now my relationship before my last, everyone picked on me for her being bigger and bullied me to no end. So, I turned on someone I loved and bullied her behind her back instead of standing up for me. I realize this makes me should like I am a horrible person, but my mental state I am unable to defend myself, let alone another person, and it has truly been a continuous process my entire life. I ruined so many relationships with amazing people just because I got bullied for the relationships and wanted to take the heat on me. Mental health is a crazy thing, and without resources you may never realize you have a mental illness and in my case ruined amazing relationships. I would give anything to change the past, but I can’t, all I can do is change the future and be better.