For other girls struggling with self-confidence, this is for you.
For other girls with jealousy issues, this is for you.
For other girls wondering if you are good enough, this is for you.
I’m here to tell you how I let my own insecurities almost ruin my now, wonderful relationship.
I’m here to tell you how I learned to love myself and accept who I am.
I’m here to tell you it is not easy. But it’s worth the world.
Self-confidence is a struggle for most, but for a girl battling anxiety and depression since she was 9, well it turns into a warzone, especially in relationships.
When I was 9 I remember sitting in my therapist’s office, not really knowing what was going on. I truthfully was just waiting for my lollipop. My therapist came in with my mom and told me I had anxiety and depression.
I grew up with my own insecurities, finally starting to understand what my therapist meant when she diagnosed me.
It’s hard for me to remember what the root of my anxiety and depression was. It’s more prominent now as a high school teenager.
My anxiety and depression truthfully eats away at my soul, as dramatic as that sounds. It affects my everyday life.
I know some people don’t see it. They see me as this girl with a loud annoying laugh, a stable family and a serious 2-year boyfriend.
But people can’t judge what other people are going through just by little factors that, frankly, mean nothing.
Every time I’ve liked a guy, they’ve liked me back and we end up dating. I haven’t been single for an extensive amount of time since 6th grade
The two relationships I had in middle school were pathetic if you ask me. Just that typical middle school crush that meant nothing. It was like, “Oh we’re friends so I like you.”
My freshman year I was in, what I thought, was an amazing relationship. We had dated for over half a year, talked about our future, hung out every weekend. The usual activities couples do.
But one day he texts my mother. Not me. My mother. He says he wants to break up with me but wants to wait until the weekend.
As much as I resented my mother at the time for this, she told this boy he had to break up with me that night because it’s selfish to lead me on. (Thanks mom).
He texts me later and breaks up with me, saying the typical, “It’s not working out. It’s not your fault. I still love you but I can’t be with you anymore.”
Out of the blue. Unexpected. And completely, utterly heartbreaking.
I was a vulnerable freshman dating a junior. Go figure.
Some things changed though, and this is where people start to judge wrongly.
My sophomore year I decided to go to homecoming and that day I met the most amazing guy. We’ve been dating for over two years now and are beyond happy.
However, that happiness didn’t come automatically.
I was still heartbroken by my previous breakup. Yes, I moved on, but the pain stayed with me for a while. I figured this guy would leave me like the last, so I didn’t get too attached.
I started out very awkward and quiet. Hardly talked to this boy even though we had been dating for half a year. I had trust issues. I still do if I am being honest, but they were worse during the first months of our relationship.
I’m writing an honest blog here, so I am going to give the honest and embarrassing details of what I did.
I told him to stop talking to certain girls. I asked to check his phone. I wouldn’t let him accept other girls follow requests. Along with other stuff that can fall within those three statements.
Wow, Kiley. I honestly want to crawl in a whole and never come back out. But this blog is to show how far I’ve come.
We fought day after day, night after night, in public and private settings and over text and over the phone.
So many hateful things were said by the both of us. We only had a “break” once and it was last March. The point of the break was to show him I could lay off and let him live his life and for him to show me he is not unfaithful.
Luckily for me, he loved me enough to help me learn to love myself and stop being so controlling.
It took a lot of time. It took some more fights and some more hateful things said for me to finally realize I needed to get a grip.
I realized it wasn’t about him anymore. I would be like this if I were dating some guy from Tulsa, Oklahoma.
My over-protectiveness was because I didn’t love myself. I thought he would see me how I saw myself and leave me for someone else.
But that wasn’t it. The only reason he would leave me would be because he did not love me enough to stay or enough to be faithful.
And that would have nothing to do with me. It would be on him
While we are still together, we may not be come 5 years from now. I would like to think we will be, but only God knows.
So I asked him to stop helping me. I needed to learn self-love on my own. Not by some guy telling me I am beautiful. I needed to say it and I needed to mean it.
I’m a girl that’s been battling anxiety and depression since she was nine. I am a girl that was never comfortable in her own skin. Comparing myself to other girls, starving myself by skipping meals, covering my face in makeup, telling my boyfriend to stay away from other girls because they’re better than me and having anxiety attacks during school because the one girl I am jealous of looks better than me. But that’s not me anymore.
I used to take three pills a day. Two in the morning and one at night. The pills I took changed whenever I bounced back to my old habits. I also bounced from therapist to therapist as I tried to find one that understood me.
Now, as 17 years old getting ready to leave for college and start my future, I haven’t taken anxiety medication since middle school and I haven’t seen a therapist for almost an entire year.
I used to stare at myself in the mirror and cry. I used to think I was fat and stumpy. I used to think my glasses were nerdy. My face, don’t even get me started. The only thing I liked about my face growing up was my nose. My darn tootin’ nose.
At some point, and I regretfully admit, I tried starving myself. My parents found out and they flipped but luckily they got me help. And, hey, now I eat 2 hamburgers and a whopping side of potato salad at every barbecue I go to.
I used to compare myself to other girls constantly. When they would post a selfie, I became obsessed, trying to find the traits that were better than mine.
Now, a girl posts a selfie, I’m going to see it, maybe like it, and keep on scrolling.
It’s nothing to me now. I will never, and I mean never, have traits like other girls. My hair is different, my face is different, my body is different, heck, and my nails are different.
Comparing myself to other girls never would have turned myself into another girl. I shouldn’t have to put myself down by wanting to be another girl and I shouldn’t have to put another girl down by convincing myself her smile is ugly.
I wear makeup now less often than I ever did. Truthfully it’s because I value my sleep more than I value my looks. When I wear makeup now, it’s because I want to. Not because my boyfriend and I are going on a date, and it’s not because I think some other girl in my algebra class is prettier than me. It’s simply because I got a new eye shadow pallet and I wanted to try it out.
But with that, when I don’t wear makeup, I still feel beautiful. My light freckles are seen, the natural redness on my cheeks and a few zits are evident too. But that face is just as pretty as the contoured one.
My body was the last thing I learned to love and I am still struggling.
I am short. I am 5’¼ to be exact and, yes, the ¼ counts my friends. Because of that, when I gain weight, it is noticeable. I have a flat stomach when I wake up and then when I eat a bowl of cereal it’s like. “Hey look there are my cornflakes.” I bloat. And it stinks sometimes, but that’s just my body.
I love myself now and I would do anything to go back to middle school and learn to love myself sooner.
I would much rather see my cornflakes evident by my pooch than have my stomach growl 24/7 because I am afraid even a gram of sugar will put me on My 600 lb Life.
I could have destroyed my relationship if I didn’t learn to control my anxiety. I wish I could go back and take away the nights he and I fought constantly and I wish I could apologize to the girls he stopped talking to and say, “He’s not the rude one, I am.”
But I can’t. And I am not going to sit here and pity myself for it. I am simply going to move on and continue to grow.
This wasn’t an easy process. I said numerous times how I am still struggling. Heck my face is breaking out right now and I scrubbed my face 7 times before I sat down to write this blog.
But it’s a process that is capable of being accomplished by anyone. My boyfriend thought I was always going to be a crazy and overprotective girlfriend and I am sure he is thankful I grew up.
I love myself now and I mean it. I learned to love myself without another guy telling me I am beautiful. I learned it by looking at myself in the mirror saying, “You are beautiful and you are worth it.”
Do that. Do that every single day of your life until you mean it. Because one morning you will look at yourself with your hair a mess, no makeup and a ratty old sweatshirt, and you will say it, you will mean it, and it will be the greatest feeling in the entire world.
