Hi. My story is a bit different.
When I was younger than 14, I was extremely weird. No one liked me. I lost a s**t tonne of weight and started wearing makeup and refused to talk to my old friends. I learned to act. What I couldn't act, I sat pretty for. I amassed a bit of popularity by acting better than I was. But still I never really fit in. Boys didn't like me. My friends tried to brush me off but I'd guilt them into staying. Eventually it got to be too much for me and I cut them out. But still I never thought the problem was me, or allowed myself to think that at least. I buried it deep down.
I had all the symptoms, but I denied them, convinced there was something else wrong with me. At the worst of my vanity, I even appropriated other more palatable illnesses like alcoholism or even an eating disorder to try to rationalize being misunderstood. I identified with both but still I knew I was just playing a role. I was a fraud. And I knew nobody really knew me. And no matter what I did I was lonely, no matter how many likes my selfie got.
Eventually other girls saw me as cute and funny, even though I never thought I was really funny. I would just do things and people would laugh and say, "that's Megan." I went to my teachers for understanding and I got it, but still they didn't know what the matter was beyond my family issues because I even used those to cover up my own feelings of insecurity. I was a total Machiavellian. Probably because of the onesided bonding with teachers I did bond a lot more easily. It didn't require as much social give and take as with my peers. I went through a lot of close friends in high school but I felt most understood by my teachers and stayed in contact with them.
When I graduated these tactics couldn't transfer over to the real world. I'm nearly 20 and I haven't started university and I always thought I wanted to be a teacher but after asking myself whether it was another ego validation or my hearts true desire, I've had to rethink everything. My sister disclosed to my mom she thought I had aspergers and I blew up at her and said a lot of nasty things. And now, even though I once felt so independent and prepared to face the world, I'm about to move in with her.
But I guess this is just the beginning, like hatching from an egg probably. The tenderness I feel now is only because of the novelty of this strange new world I've found myself in, despite desperately trying not to outgrow the embryonic dark. But the good news: now there's light.