TW: Sensitive topics, I don't expect anyone to actually go and read it, but if you want to stay just for some minutes I don't really mind.
||Back in childhood, I never had any true friends, or at least not anyone who could go deeper than my facade as the “clown and happy friend.”||
||People like that are always available.||
||They make you laugh, they make you see what they want you to see, and that is supposed to be good enough, right?||
||But what happens to the child who could not express their own self out of fear of judgment?||
||I do not want to sound like the “different type of child” or anything like that, but I have never felt like I was really meant to be in a place like this.||
||I was always in survival mode, and I used my personality as a way to be socially accepted.||
||Even when some form of animosity happened, I did not really care.||
||As long as they laughed, as long as the validation was there, as long as social presence existed, survival stayed the first thing the body and mind put in place.||
||Then I started to care a little about school, and my grades suddenly went from bad to high.||
||I was happy for myself.||
||No one really knew the exact reason, but it was enough.||
||A new year of high school started.||
||New surroundings.||
||No old me.||
||Hehe.||
||Until I became the one who could not be serious.||
||Until I became the one no one could actually rely on in any way.||
||The one who always gets shut down before he can speak.||
||The one everyone always wants to see laugh.||
||The one who always has to show his superficial behavior, while the one who really wants to express himself stays hidden.||
||It is tiring.||
||It is annoying.||
||It is disgusting.||
||It is harsh.||
||I never wanted to put this mask on in the first place.||
||I never really wanted this.||
||It was for surviving an environment that never gave me the priority to be myself, just like my childhood environments.||
||I have never had good family connections.||
||They are all traumatized children, just like me.||
||So why can I not just stop?||
||Why can I not just be myself again?||
||Why can I not simply stop being the clown friend and actually be what I want to be?||
||Why am I always behind others?||
||Why am I wrong?||
||Should I blame my bullies?||
||Should I blame myself?||
||The old teachers who never protected me?||
||My family?||
||Or myself, for never really speaking up and calling for help?||
I don't really want to sound this as a way to gain attention, more like if anyone could give me just a little reassurence, or just talking.