No, I don't tell anyone because questions tend to arise if I mention my family because I rarely mention them and always gloss over questions about them. The story gets much darker and I don't want to feel I need to share more than I'm comfortable with and have people see me differently than they see me now.

I want to remain known as the local deaf guy who reasonably smart, studies hard at university, and is a bit socially inept (unless he's drunk).

[Warning] Sad story you may not want to read

I don't want to be known as the guy who has a insanely conservative family who became radicalized after a long period of isolation in a small town which led to his parents deciding to sell everything and takeoff dragging their family with them in his late teens. Who eventually ended up homeless in a foreign country because his family believed it was god's will. During it all he nearly died from the lack of medical help to treat the problems that arose from severe PTSD, stress and isolation because he was stuck in a country where he couldn't read anything (he used to aspire to be a writer and loved books as a source of information and creativity so the impact was massive) because all the signs and reading material were in a foreign language. At the end of this entire fiasco (2 years) called 'The Trip' he went from an athletic person to a completely traumatized emaciated 98lbs (44kg) 6ft tall 17 year old due to the consequence of his parent's choices in which he felt he had no choice to obey because there was no other option in front of him.

The details of it all are a lot deeper, and more horrendous than I'm willing to remember. Three years later I still bear the scars of it all, but thankfully I had the strength to leave once I could legally move out on my own and spend a really long time in recovery. The scars are no longer easily visible, nor do the memories surface with the frequency as they used to, but it's still a work in progress.

Sad story ends

But yeah I'm really grateful for my university and the students there. There are many goals and dreams I had that I'll never attain now, but on the bright side, thanks to all my lovely friends, and opportunities that the university has given ( and is giving) I've achieved much more than former me thought the future held.

My friends don't know it, but they've helped me in ways they wouldn't imagine and now I'm starting to feel that while life is indeed unfair it is worth living.

Oh, and this was the first Christmas I've celebrated with other people since I was two years old, so it's something special and I won't ever forget it. It's a shame those who arranged it won't ever know how much it meant to me, but it's best that it stays that way.