It is me. That person you've heard talk about on various tv shows, interviews and movies. The cynical human being who would go to incredible extents to get the attention she very desperately wanted. A heartless organism who is capable of making up anything and everything just to get what she wants. The person who would fabricate the most intricate tales to lure people in. Yeah, I'm sure that's how you would probably imagine a catfish would sound like. Just so we're on the same page, catfish or catfishing would be defined as ¨luring (someone) into a relationship by means of a fictional online persona. ¨
In reality, at least in this case, it's not even close. I'm not a bad person. I wouldn't kill a bug. I had a common, monotonous life leading up to this. A very boring life, actually. I didn't plan on it. I didn't want to hurt anyone. I thought it was just a game. Something that my friends and I could laugh about and then dust off never to be spoken about again. I thought it was child's play.
How do I even begin to write about the one decision that changed my life forever? I remember everything so distinctly; with such detail. I was sitting in a 10th grade world history class with my best friend and a lightbulb in my head came on brighter than the 4th of July fireworks (or so I thought) and it ended up almost ruining my life forever. To be completely honest, I don't really know why I'm writing about it. I mean it was years ago, I'm over it. I should be over it. Am I over it? I really don't think about it that often but when I do, there's this really strong voice in my head that demands me to share this story. And that's exactly what I'm trying to do.
Before we embark on this journey and I cringe thinking about my mistakes as I write about them, I do want to mention that all of the names I'll be mentioning in this book are not the real ones. Also, I definitely want you to know that in no way do I justify any of my actions. Although everything turned out to be acceptably okay in the end, some people did end up getting very hurt; including myself. I will be sharing everything with you exactly as It happened. No reservations. I need to write it down, let it out. For some time, there was a strong feeling of guilt that was eating me from the inside and I could not stand the pain it was inflicting anymore. I'm not at all proud of what I did but I think sharing it could end up helping other people make better decisions.
I don't think anyone would have expected anything even remotely close to this from me. I was always bullied and tormented because of the fact that I had been overweight my entire life. And even so, I managed to have an average social life. My family always made a huge effort to make me realize I was hurting myself by overeating but frankly, the anxiety I had to calm with the food made a bigger effort. Even though I was always made fun of, I did have a small group of friends who would stick by me no matter what.
All through high school, I did try to project an image of a young girl who was confident and embraced her ¨curves¨; which to be honest they weren't even curves anymore. You know, I was trying to own the fact that I was ¨plus size¨. The worst part was that I was always the girl who got the ¨you would be really cute if you lost some weight¨ or ¨you have the most beautiful face¨ or ¨you have really beautiful eyes¨ comments. Which by the way, are the most hurtful ones because you're literally complimenting based on a ¨ what if¨; something that doesn't even exist. But every time I was alone and looked at myself in the mirror, I absolutely despised what I saw. I tried dieting, excessive exercise, and every other method under the sun to lose weight. Nothing ever seemed to work.
I desperately wanted to be noticed. I craved theattention. A misunderstood teenager who wanted to be noticed was onecomplicated-ass combination. I wanted to be called hot, beautiful, pretty,sexy, attractive, etc. I was in 10th grade and I had never even hadanything close to a boyfriend. I hadn't had my first kiss. I felt different;almost out of this world. So, this disaster of a self-esteem I was trying tomanage led me to make the biggest mistake I could have.
