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I have been suffering from depression, low self-esteem, self-loathing, and trust issues for years after realizing that many of the people that I knew in high school whom I previously thought were my friends were actually bullying me, talking about me behind my back, and using me for their own personal benefit. Ever since then, I have taken the steps to not come across as that annoying, insufferable person that I was roughly 5-6 years ago, because the words still stick with me to this day, and I still feel the shame of how my past words and actions have affected my peers.
For reference, in high school I was one of those people who religiously consumed dank meme content and spent unhealthy amounts of time on YouTube and social media. Back then I labeled myself as apolitical, but was falling down the "alt-right pipeline" of Content Cop, Pink Guy, Change My Mind with Steven Crowder, Blaire White, and SJW Owned Compilations. I laughed at a lot of offensive, racist, and sexist content and memes, despite labeling myself a feminist. Around 2020, I finally broke free from this pipeline after educating myself on racial history, social justice issues, and how they affect both myself and my loved ones. I now identify as left-leaning, although unsure of whether or not I am liberal or radical left.
My fourth year of college, I was finally looking forward to making some friends, since I lost them all during COVID and have been struggling to regain those connections ever since. I ended up making a handful of meaningful friendships here and there, but had a hard time finding a social group of people where I felt truly welcomed (outside of the occasional hobby-based club). I formed a friendship with a guy from a mutual club that we were in that started off as very intense. He was the only person in this club that spoke to me regularly (everyone else in the club either would avoid talking to me or would keep a superficial connection with me). He would text me multiple times a day, and I eventually became hooked on the attention, because I had no one else (or so I thought). I was in a very bad place mental-health wise, and I thought that this friendship would finally be the cure for my loneliness, something to fill the void (bad thing to think, I know!) I knew deep down that this behavior was abnormal and toxic, since my friends that I have known for a long time will often wait a few days before responding to my messages or initiating conversations.
The friendship became emotionally intense (at least for me). We had several late-night calls and deep, long, multi-paragraph conversations about various topics. In our club's *** server, he would always mention me and be the first to respond to my messages. I suspected that he had a crush on me, but I don't think I'm his type romantically (plus I am dating someone, although I will admit that this guy was, in fact, handsome). We hung out several times a week because he was nearly ALWAYS available. Although, at times his behavior made me uncomfortable (especially with some of the memes he would share), and sometimes would trigger me because it reminded me of the person that I used to be back in high school (he is one of those engineering major dank meme guys). We began fighting and arguing more and more, and at times I thought he hated me or didn't respect me, so I distanced myself to avoid further pain. Somehow, on top of the constant texts, I would always run into him in-person, or at least see him within my field of vision, like he was haunting me around campus (Could it be fate? Who knows?). He would snap at me in my DMs, then mention me in the club *** like nothing happened-- I have a hard time reading tone over text at times, so it was hard to tell what he was thinking.
One day, he blocked me on *** and ***, and I broke down crying that night. When I confronted his friends asking what was wrong, he sent me multiple angry paragraphs unloading all of the things that went wrong in our friendship, including things that we cleared the air about months ago. I had an upset stomach for roughly a week. I got so scared that I expressed my fears to all of my friends about him potentially hurting me or lashing out at me (bad move on my end-- constitutes as gossiping/spreading rumors). When we finally came back to campus, it was as if nothing had happened. We managed to fix things and start over again, and I thought our friendship was fixed.
But I was right all along-- it was over after that. He made some new friends in the club that eventually turned on me. He turned cold and mean. He and his friends even made up things about me that were not true to "get revenge". I eventually got banned from the club ***. I had to go see a therapist for six months to gain clarity, wondering if everything was my fault. It felt like I had no social support system within the club, and no one really took my side. To this day it still kills me inside. I wish I had left the situation sooner, I wish I had the spine to say no and cut him off before things got worse. Now I am the one left to pick up the pieces while he is doing great things with his life in his fourth year of undergrad. I have considered going on antidepressants or getting an evaluation for a mental illness because I genuinely think that something is wrong with me. Maybe I was a snowflake, maybe I was overreacting or starting unnecessary drama. But I just wish he would've taken accountability for the things that he did.