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| We work so hard to see each other. It's worth that much to us. It's actually a good place to expend extra energy. Which, although I have mono, I still seem to have. My body is tired, but my brain never rests.
There are so many things I've been slacking on lately (journaling, exercising) that I'd like to blame on being busy. But as I'm finding out, it's simply because I'm too tired. My body is betraying me.
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| A very good friend just said to me this:
"Sweetie, if you're scared, then fight it. You're stronger than that now, remember that."
It was simple enough to instill in me a warrior.
I will fight it, all of it.
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| Enter away message subpar0: Amanda, you're really cool. subpar0: But that joke was terrible.
Sometimes it's good just to laugh. :]
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| Is the revision of my essay really going to impact whether or not I get into UVM?
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| Here is a rough draft of sorts of my college essay (comments are very, very welcome):
When choosing to write about a significant event in my life, I am forced to look back on a very painful time, and relive the thoughts and feelings associated with this time. In writing this, I am embarking upon a whole new experience in its own. I will, for the first time, recount the most heart wrenching three months of my life. In the January of my junior year in high school, I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder. To my great apprehension, I was informed that I would be admitted to Four Winds Psychiatric Hospital. Due to the severity of my depression, along with unfavorable circumstances in my life, I was hospitalized three times, spending a total of three months in the hospital between January and June. In these three months, the picture of my life was flipped upside down, stomped on, and shattered, and then picked back up again. However, when the pieces began to reassemble themselves, I watched as they formed a picture foreign to the one that the same pieces had previously depicted.
Let me begin by telling you a bit about life at Four Winds. Can you imagine being confined within one campus for eight weeks straight? This is precisely what I endured. Life on the residential unit consisted of having a room with a roommate (sometimes of questionable sanity, and sometimes one who will become your best friend,) coming out of your room for therapeutic groups, meals at the dining hall, and school, which lasted for two hours each day. Monitored closely by a well trained staff, very specific rules were enforced strictly, such as the forbidding of physical contact.
This sounds simple enough. However, you must keep in mind the emotional factors. Everyone in the institution was there for a reason, a reason known or unknown, but a reason grave enough to land them there. There were many times when I weould return to my room and simply break down, because of issues of my own, or those of others. Groups addressed many gravely emotional topics, which might leave someone in tears on the way out, or even on the way in. These groups, along with individual therapy (usually very fortunately during the hated two hours of school) changed my life in ways that cannot be described with mere words. The experience left me much more mature, learning ways to coped with things that would have previously evoked an immature reaction on my part. This maturation was also a result of living without my parents for three months. You might be surprised how liberating this experience was. Without the influence of my parents, I was able to explore areas of my own self without their filter.
My experience at Four Winds taught me to love everyone, no matter what their flaws may be. Forced to live with nineteen other people for an extended length of time, it can be inferred that one might judge these people upon first impression. After time, however, learning about people's pasts and perspective futures, it became apparent the underneath, everyone deserves love. In this way, my stay at the hospital made me a more accepting person. On the topic of accepting people and their faults, you might also be surprised at the amount of friends made at Four Winds. Everyone living in the same situation, it became quite easy to relate to each and every person. One might expect that living in a room with someone for eight weeks may result in irritation with this person. At Four Winds, however, this does not happen. Especially with one of my roommates, named
Emily. Emily and I would talk late into the night, sometimes about material covered in groups or therapy, but sometimes simply about our lives or insignificant experiences. We also learned to laugh together, despite our grave surroundings. Emily and I still often see each other to this day. Whether roommates or not, friends are very easily made at this psychiatric institution. A lot of these friends with issues such as depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and anger ghanged me a significant amount during my stay, and continue to do so.
I belive that a stay at a psychiatric hospital is an experience like none other. It teaches, matures, and changes you and the picture of your life, which is altered to the point where it might not be recognizable to an outsider. However the experience affected me, negatively as well as positively, looking back on it I can see that it was a great opportunity to learn, fix, and make lifelong friends. You might think it "crazy," but in retrospect, these were the most lifechanging months of my life.
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