Does it REALLY get better?

[JackFetch]

Middle and high school are terrible experiences for a lot of people. I consider it the worst time in my life. I was a cutter, and tried to take the easy way out a couple times. I remember burning myself with a lighter every day at one point. It's hard to understand at that age that you aren't alone, even if it feels like it.

Part of being a teenager is learning to step into the world without mom and dad's help, and the first lesson is usually that people are assholes. If you are "different" it's a hard lesson to learn because you are getting constant negative attention. Once you make it to college it all changes. Everyone is all the sudden real adults making real life decisions, and what used to be important in high school isn't anymore. Instead of all those kids you grew up with, you are surrounded by strangers who are more willing to accept you for who you are.

[poingjam]

It doesn't get better, but it starts to make more sense eventually. I am I guess happier than I used to be and more in control of my life, but when it hurts, it hurts a whole lot worse now. It's like life comes more into focus, that you can see why you think people are horrible and why you're miserable despite having good things, but you can't necessarily change any of it, nor will any of it reliably change of its own accord. Shit continues to be shitty, but you come to see beyond the shit.

[stabbyhappy]

But still, very few people will give a shit. Especially if you are a lesbian.

[Cretaceous Bob]

Originally Posted by poingjam

It doesn't get better,

Wrong.

[marina]

Originally Posted by poingjam

It doesn't get better

Originally Posted by Cretaceous Bob

Wrong.

Yeah, I think if you have major depression and you refuse to get help for it, you're going to feel that it doesn't get better. However, as adults we have a choice to face our troubles and deal with them, or hide from them and suffer the consequences.

The decisions get a lot harder, and the stakes get exponentially higher, but nothing ventured nothing gained.

[DWarrior]

Like I said, it gets better, and I don't want anybody to kill themselves. If you do choose to suicide though, please arrange to post pics. Just throwing it out there.

Carry on not killing yourselves.

[Ansur]

For me, it got a lot better. When I was in high school, all the social stuff there seemed like the biggest deal in the world. None of that crap matters the day after graduation.

All the pricks you are forced to see on a daily basis now are suddenly gone from your life. You only have to keep in touch with the people you want to. If I don't like the people I work with, I job hunt, and then leave. In high school, if you're one of those kids who gets picked on, it seems like there is no end in sight because you have been going to school almost your entire life.

Like I said, the day after graduation, that's not your life anymore. If you go to any decent college, people are looking to be more open minded and tolerant. Where you might get beat up and called a fag in high school if you look a little fem, in college you could be considered awesome if you dress like Frankenfurter for a Rocky Horror Picture Show screening.

Now, I did ok in high school. When I went to my 10 year reunion, a lot of people remembered me. But I didn't have a clue who most of them were, because high school wasn't nearly as fun as my 20's, and they were not important to me. I only even went because the girl I was dating thought it would be fun.

Just remember that high school is not the rest of your life. Real life begins AFTER high school. The four years that end a few years before your brain is fully developed should not be the best time of your life.

[william]

Originally Posted by Junkenstein

yeah, what lanfy said. You get more choices, more power, more freedoom.

crappy people and crappy things are still there, some times they're even worse. But you get stronger and you can fight back and build yourself a better life. Eventually you can be very happy.

True, but High School is the bridge towards a day of opportunities, while as time goes on, careers, family, duty, forethought, energy, past history - all narrow those possibilities that were open when you were 18 and fresh out of High School.

Not all wind up in positions of "more power, more freedom" - rather (sadly) some wind up still obligated to the Man (sans homework) who rules their day and forever chasing a payoff which will place them ahead.

My strongest advice to anyone out of school still trying to find themselves is to avoid being in a job you don't enjoy for too long, for before you know it, it may wind up your career.

Unless you're working to support yourself, High School is a great time to begin to understand oneself. To think that scant four years before Transformers and Harry Potter held your dreams and now you find yourself thinking more about who you are and where you will really be one day - that it's such a rapid evolution of the self leads one not to wonder why it's a period of angst, doubt, and confusion.

[sagzy]

I like to think of it this way; life is a play that has different acts and with you as the director. You move through to different acts as you progress forward and like other people here said, there are highs and lows. Only thing asked from you is to take those and make the best of things. Generally life does get better but only along the lines of the decisions you make and the consequences that come with those decisions.

[Bob-Diesel]

Read this article (especially #3).

5 Reasons Life Actually Does Get Better | Cracked.com