Here's my lonliest story of life when I moved in grade 10 highschool.

Halfway through grade 10 I moved from Quebec to Nova Scotia when my mom found a new boyfriend over facebook. At first I was totally psyched to start a new life at a new school. But right from the first day it was bad. I couldn't figure out my buses. I was getting in trouble for rules I wasn't used to... etc. A few weeks after starting up I had made no progress socially or anything. I thought my humor and confidence from the previous life would carry over... but it really didn't. The culture was so different too that I didn't find anyone's jokes funny and nobody laughed at mine. I made several 'wrong' moves that people criticized me for and I really just didn't know much better. I grew up in the ghetto. I guess you have to hop in to figure it out but... halfway through grade 10 and all the 'cliques' have already formed. Nobody is looking to make new friends by that point. And things only got worse.

After a while I just gave up and would eat my lunch alone in the hallways. I hoped something might happen that I could find a friend but I never did. I was so far beyond the point of being able to just walk up to people and chat etc. And it kept getting worse. I missed my friends from back home more than I could have ever imagined. The friends I would see every week for 7 years --gone. I eventually realized I was so depressed that nobody would want to be around me anyways. I didn't want to sabotage myself any more so I started eating lunch in the bathrooms too. I read many others have been doing this as well. Well so did I. At first I hated it.

But over time... things changed. I grew more antisocial and the depression got worse. I began to look forward to hiding in the bathroom because I could smoke my weed and listen to music in there and not be around anybody. But the worst... the worst of all was after school when I would be at home. I would spend hours and hours in the basement all alone. I couldn't stand my mom and stepdad at the time (that's a whole other story) but to keep it simple let's just say I wasn't in the most ideal conditions. Sometimes I would get into those loopy thought processes where you ask yourself questions like "Why don't I have any friends?". And then it spirals downwards into "I wish I could just die." And of course eventually I started making pathetic attempts at suicide.

Summer was the worst. Weeks literally of talking to nobody. Grunting here and there but generally just trying to sob in my own sorrow. I still today consider it a miracle that I didn't actually kill myself because I was close too many times.

By the beginning of the next year I had started to slooooowly get some respect from people but it really wasn't enough. And so the coping began. My imaginary friends were just as real as the screen you're reading this on. I started having big conversations with myself all the time. I had my own talking dog companion too. I would take him out for long walks/runs out in the country roads. This was how I spent a great deal of time just entertaining myself on my own. I tried not to think about how I was living the life of a 70 year old but it was just all I could do at the time.

Anyways I'm getting carried away. Long story short, by grade 12 I had a couple friends I didn't really care about but it was enough to get me on my feet. Once I started university everything worked out and my life was just awesome since. (I'm in 4th year university). I don't think about these times much at all anymore... but the only way somebody can understand the pain and struggle it is to battle the intense lonliness of having NOBODY for month after month is to have been there themselves. I'm about as carefree and easygoing now as a person can get. Things really don't phase me and I make friends with almost everyone I cross paths with. I have no problem staying motivated in school and I think all that suffering from the past has made me a much stronger person than most of the people I cross paths with from day to day. You can just tell by the way people see things and how they react to them that they've never experienced the same hardship. Of course the opposite is just as true. It's humbling when people 'get it'. All it takes is a few key words in a sentence and you know they're years ahead in maturity.

I've gone through other hard times as well and I always handled things by myself. Because I know I can. The truth is folks, if you can pick yourself up from the dumps you'll never fall back into them again. But if you rely on others to pull you up it will make you a weaker person. You need to define your own life. Your own destiny. And live it for yourself, not your friends, not your family, not your enemies. You need to live your life because it's your own goal and your own purpose. If you don't know what those are, then start meditating. It's all there.

Tadalaa happy ending though. I hope this wasn't too boring to read.