Since childhood we're propped up to believe that highschool/puberty will be a time where we have more friends, get a girlfriend, have fun and experiment in life.
I remember that my mother excitedly told me my face was going to become more attractive when I hit puberty. How she hypothesized about my jaw widening and my cheekbones becoming more shallow.
The opposite happened. My jaw did not widen. It became thinner. My cheekbones never became shallow. Puberty transformed into a very hideous being.
And ofc, I was in for a rude awakening. I realized that no matter how much I tried, I was a freak. People my own age were repulsed by me. Adults were repulsed by me.
I had never been treated like this before. Either completely ignored or the target of obvious disdain.
One of the most brutal experiences is rotting in isolation while your teenage years pass away because you don't want to be mocked.
Being outcast from every vestige of socialization you have left.
To this day I feel like another species when I'm around people. The way they look at me with disgust, flinch, quickly scurry away. Only if I had been a normal human instead. A privilege that was ripped away from me by fate.
