I Am Seventeen And Spending Thanksgiving All Alone. I Am The Loneliest Girl In The World.

I am seventeen and spending Thanksgiving all alone. I am the loneliest girl in the world.

thanksgiving 2006 by Ocean Vuong

Is it just me or is anyone else absolutely terrified of any and all forms of intimacy???? like when I had my first kiss, I wasn’t excited or giddy, I was literally shaking with anxiety. Idk why. Like I was so worried that I wouldn’t know how to kiss or that the kiss would be bad and it would be the one thing to send this person off.

Oh. I see…this is an abandonment issues thing. Of course. It’s always the abandonment issues

I used to loathe our friendship and the way you’d stand so high over me. I never thought I’d miss it, but I do. I miss it so much. I miss when we’d sit in those white beach chairs down by the lake, staring at our reflections and feeling the sun against our skin. I miss your touch. The way you’d hug me like I meant something. I miss how we would eat dinner and then go on walks around your neighborhood. Walking the loop, laughing, remembering old times. I miss our little talks. I miss you.

I’m sorry for calling.

You know the sounds of the house late at night make me sick.

The creaking floorboards, the swoosh of the doors, the desolate silence, the all-consuming darkness.

Alone, alone, alone…I thought of you.

You didn’t answer the call.

I tell myself it’s okay. It’s okay.

I mother myself and you never answer.

Alone, alone, alone…

I woke up the next morning. My pupils opened up toward the glow of the sun and I had lived to see another day. Just the night before, I had said my goodbyes. I had shed my last tear. I had made peace with my time in the world. But…my blood was still warm when I opened my eyes.

“You have been given another chance to live!” My sister wept. The words echoed in the back of my mind.

“But I don’t want to live.” I whispered. She never heard what I said.

Reminiscing on my “coming out.” I was so scared. So small, so shaky. So, so scared for so long. It had been over a year of sexuality related anxiety and OCD taking over my life. It almost drove me to take my life. I didn’t want to be who I knew I was that much. Finally…one day, I got the courage to tell someone. I told my sister. I really said it, I said the words “I’m gay” out loud. I did it. It felt like a relief. I was still terrified and shaky, but I was glad to have another person to hold this with me. And then…that same night my sister outed me to my entire family. She didn’t mean to hurt me. I found out that she had been cutting herself, so I told my mom for her safety. In an effort to take my moms attention off of her cutting, she outed me. In front of her friends and my mothers friends. It hurt me so much because this meant that she viewed being gay as something so bad and horrible that it could top her harming herself. I remember getting that text from my mom, feeling my heart drop out of my chest, feeling my throat tighten up. “____ is saying that you’re a lesbian. Is that true?” my mom texted me. She sounded so accusatory, like she was hoping my sister was lying. When they returned to the house, they looked at me differently. They acted nervous and unsure around me. Like I was some caged animal that could break out at any moment. I will never forget that night. It took me so long and it took so much courage for me to tell my sister, and I needed her support because I didn’t have it in me to give it to myself. But she didn’t give me that. She took my chance to come out on my own terms away from me. And she made it more dangerous for me. My family already treated me differently than my other siblings, but this pushed them over the edge. It was just another thing to other me, to separate me from others. I really understand the pain she was in and the reasoning behind her doing it, but I can’t forgive that. She took something from me that can’t ever be given back.