"For someone as smart as you, you tend to be dumb most of the times". "Can you pay attention when I'm talking to you?" "What's so important that you can't focus?" "How could you forget your work?" "How stupid can you be in life?"
Throughout my life, these were sentences that were consistently thrown at me. I never really cared because I'm Asian. I was brought up believing that when people are mad at you, they love you. I never really understood why paying attention in class was such a hard job. I wrote lyrics in class, planned my month, weekend, disturbed my friends. I'm just distracted. This is normal. Or at least I thought I was normal. Throughout primary, because I was on top of the class, it didn't matter if I was daydreaming now and then. It didn't matter that I wanted to leave class every 10 minutes. It never mattered that I played with glue on my table or was consistently drawing with my sharpies.
But it mattered when high school came. I consistently forgot what was assigned unless it was written on the whiteboard. My teacher's felt like I was purposely being irresponsible. The go to line was "just because you're smart doesn't mean you get to skip out on work". During prep time, I would spend 60% of the time walking to people's class, doing my prefect duty even if I wasn't on duty and only starting my work at the eleventh hour. I never thought it was a problem. I was a busy girl. I participated in Taekwondo, Wind Orchestra, Debate, Research and Development and Head Girl. There were also times when I just volunteered to do work after school. These tiring activities made more sense than sitting and listening to a teacher rambling about something I can read off of my textbook. This is exactly what I did. I studied with my books. The only subjects I loved being in class for was anything related to Maths and History. I loved being able to do calculations, argue about history. YES PLEASE. I got straight A's in all my exams up till high school. Alhamdulillah.
Then College came. Things were falling out of hand. I missed a month of school due to surgery. I broke. I mean break into pieces. My mind did not make sense. My emotions were... unexplainable. Nothing, and I mean nothing made sense to my brain. I lost someone important. Someone close to my heart. I lost myself. I couldn't even speak in front of the class but I won an Overall Best Speaker two months ago. I hated social events when meeting new people was my drive. What happened?
I got help. Yes. I went to see a shrink. I fought all the thoughts of judgement and said I needed help. But then, I struggled to come with terms that I'm not okay and that's okay. Right? When I started getting help, I wanted to get better now. ASAP. Today. By the end of the month. Everyone around me. Or, most people around me wanted to know the 'timeline'. But here's the thing; there is no timeline. In the journey of repairing, reinforcing and healing years of eventful things, it takes time. But coming terms with that, took time. So, when will I get better? It doesn't matter. What matters right now is that I'm moving forward. I'm trying. I'm fighting and most importantly, I'm okay with not being okay.
Of course, bad days happen. Of course, there are days which don't make sense. Like the past few days. I've been mindlessly scrolling through Instagram the moment I'm alone. I've been feeling constantly tired. I had a breakdown, panic attack, a moment feeling like I was no longer in control. And that's okay. Because I am okay with not being okay. I don't know what turns and events life has in store for me, I really don't, but what I know right now is that, this will pass. It feels like it's not going to get better, but it will. Life my be tough, but I'm tough too.
So, I guess that's it? So long, farewell, sayonara, bye, selamat tinggal. I'll see you whenever.
