Shattered Mirror World – A Teenager’s Diary

Years ago, I was different too.

Tears.

Disappointment.

And more tears.

I needed all of it to become the person I am today.

It was a long and painful process.

The fragments of a heart that had never been completely whole shattered into atoms.

Even today, I am still trying to fit the pieces back together.

It does not work.

The first blow came in February 2014:

Cancer.

The perfect image of our family began to crack.

As the fight became more intense, the destruction threatening my world seemed to move closer and closer.

My grandfather lost the battle.

He left.

And we remained.

Together.

Yet somehow alone.

Time did not stop, but I was given a period of mercy until the summer of the following year.

It was August.

I was fifteen and happy when my father — who until then had contributed to my existence mainly in the biological sense — suddenly pulled me out of my familiar life for twelve days.

Twelve days so he could later tell everyone that he was a good parent.

That he cared about us.

That we were the ones shutting him out.

What did the previous fifteen years matter?

Years in which he had given us practically nothing except lies and false promises.

Still, we went.

Back then, we still believed in miracles.

We spent 288 painful hours there.

On the surface, they seemed dedicated mainly to boredom.

Underneath, however, something darker lived.

Deception.

Manipulation.

“Are you depressed?”

“I’m so glad you’re here!”

“Has your mother ever hit you?”

Love expressed through words while reality said something else.

He did not know me.

He had no idea how deeply I rejected everything I was receiving there.

I did not want to spend every evening with someone I did not love and who did not love me.

I did not want him to send me away again with the command:

“Live!”

I had been living.

And until then, I had even loved life.

When I returned home, fate — or something resembling it — finally gave me something that seemed to prove the old idea that something good always follows something bad.

How naïve I was to believe it would last.

Nothing lasts forever.

I began succeeding in many areas.

I enjoyed every moment.

And I had someone I loved more than anything.

Then that ended too.

I tried to please too many people.

Everyone.

In the end, I pleased nobody.

Sadness became my tuition fee.

Every breath hurt.

I could no longer even write.

I had no idea which words could express the unbearable pressure inside my chest.

I tried again and again.

Every attempt failed.

Nothing remained that could calm the storm inside.

Sleepless nights.

Endless “what if” thoughts.

Every one of them felt like a blade in my heart.

When I cried, people laughed at me.

That was when I realised how alone I actually was.

By then, everything inside and around me had turned upside down.

Eventually, I created a perfect mask.

I smiled.

I loved the world.

Right until the moment I was alone.

I believed the mask would work.

Then one March night proved how little I had actually processed the past.

Inside my head, everything seemed organised.

There was only me.

Or rather, the new person I had sculpted from myself.

I did not believe one photograph or one badly phrased sentence could destroy every wall I had built.

It began as an ordinary party.

Then I made another mistake.

Something broke permanently.

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The pain I had locked deep inside finally took physical form.

It felt almost like the way some patients have to learn to walk or speak again after a serious illness.

Only I had to learn life itself again.

I had to learn that the first person whose standards I must meet is myself.

Why was this the path given to me?

I wish I knew.

The only thing I know for certain is that my first eighteen years have taught me one thing:

Accept what I cannot change.

And always, always keep fighting.

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