The final initiation of being the weird kid is being told that life gets better in college. I was told this by my teachers and my principal. Even my parents said it until I held the promise close to my chest wishing that it would be true.

So I went to college orientation and put on my best smile and tried to put my best foot forward. Yet, I fell short of understanding the environment I was in. However, I was so convinced that I would magically fit in that I did the same exact thing throughout the first months of college.

I still feel pangs in my chest when I realize that I’m still having the same doubts I did when I was in high school. Have you ever heard a joke with a group of people and you couldn't get it, but everyone else was laughing? So you laugh along, even though you don't get it. And for a fraction of a second, you feel empty.

That's how I feel a majority of my time inside and outside of school. It's like I'm on the outside of life looking in.

I’m not saying that I didn’t make friends in college. I’ve met some people that I swear I’ll be friends with forever. But I still feel like I’m out of step with them. It’s like we’re reading the same book, but mine is on a different chapter, or I’m reading in a different language and I’m lost in the process of translation.

It’s a lonely feeling. And I don’t think it’ll ever go away. Just hurt a little less.

When I was in middle school, I was bullied by a group of girls relentlessly until I ate lunch in the nurse’s office. When people were throwing up or the nurse deemed it unhealthy for me to stay in the office I would eat in the cafeteria, but feel scared until the bell would ring. In junior high, I graduated to eating in the bathroom. This continued until early in my high school career. I then decided that I wouldn’t banish myself.

I was afraid of being abashed because I was different.

If I level with myself, I’d be able to admit that I’m probably not so different from other people as I think. There are millions of people in the world. Surely I’m not the anomaly, but because I was constantly bombarded into thinking that I’m some sort of creature among modern men, I can’t wrap my head around my own normalization. I didn't have the chance to adapt to the climate of social situations.

Maybe I’m too set in my own ways to change, but I don’t want to.

Maybe that’s where my life starts getting better. Maybe it didn’t stem from acceptance from other people but the acceptance from myself, to realize that I will always feel this nagging lonely feeling because of my history of self-isolation. Maybe I feel isolated because I’m still putting myself in that position. I don’t know right now, and I probably never will.

But I’m accepting this. And that’s a step in the right direction.