Memories of my childhood and adolescence suddenly flooded my mind. How much violence I witnessed played out before my eyes, again and again. I was bullied constantly — both at school and at home. Each experience, on its own, pushed me to my limit.

School Years

The reason my nose is crooked, for instance, goes back to an unfortunate moment during a primary school recess. A ball hit my nose very hard. I was very young, my nose bled, and it has been crooked ever since.

Then there was the bullying I faced in middle school. One incident stands out: during an ordinary school break, there were older kids lined up at the door. I said “Excuse me” to one of them — a fairly large boy — because I wanted to go outside for some air. It was recess after all. I don’t think I had ever received such a painful reaction at any point in my life. He grabbed my head and slammed it as hard as he could into the wooden boards nailed to the wall. It hurt so much.

When I paint a general picture of middle school, I was a child who was constantly bullied and psychologically overwhelmed. I was generally a dreamy and emotional kid. Every time I remember what happened to me, I feel sorry for myself. I went through a childhood with no strength to fight back. Every time I walk past a school, I curse it under my breath. Disgusting years, with not a single good memory.

It passed, of course, and at the end of the day I’m still here — but the fact that I survived feels like one great, enormous stroke of luck. I was always staring into the distance. Especially in the early mornings when elective classes began, all I did was look far away. I would watch the cars passing on the road and sigh quietly to myself. Every time I remember who I was, I notice that the dream of going somewhere far away was always there. Every memory I have is filled with that longing to escape.

High school wasn’t very different. I was mostly going through emotional crises. It was the beginning of my growing psychological problems — especially after 2020, things got significantly worse.

Home

I’ve talked about the home environment many times before, but with every blog post I write, I gain more clarity — so I can express myself more comfortably and honestly. That’s why I want to put these feelings into words again.

The fears I carry today, in the identity I’ve built as “Açelya,” have their roots in my family. The fear that rises inside me in daily life — and especially in one-on-one relationships — comes from the constant fighting at home and the consistently harmful behavior and hurtful words I received from both my mother and father. My mother constantly cursed at us and half-jokingly placed harmful words on us. When I was young, she and my brother would be physically aggressive. My father is a strange man. One who never kept his word, who got angry easily, who was a coward, who couldn’t stand up for himself, and whose mind was full of superstition.

A person doesn’t hate their own mother and father without serious reason. I have all of those reasons.

A two-faced person who doesn’t do what he’s supposed to do but acts as though he does. He never supported me in any real way — he just pretended to. That’s how his whole life went. The same in every environment he entered. Someone incapable of real communication. A fool who never educated himself and doesn’t even know why he believes what he believes. Incredibly prejudiced against anyone different from him, with a narrow mind who doesn’t even value basic personal hygiene.

The hatred that built up inside me is so intense that I struggle to express it calmly — but I want you to understand me. My adolescence was full of moments where my patience was tested to its very limit. This man was genuinely not there for me in any way. I want to give an example. Imagine you work at a school and you manage to bring home various books, pencils, and supplies. You take them to your child. But here’s the question you need to ask yourself: “If I hadn’t worked at that school and hadn’t brought all these things from there, would I have bought them for my child with my own money?”

Do you understand the whole point now? My father absolutely would not have. Everything he did through the help of others, he presented as if he had done it himself.

When I was preparing for the high school entrance exam, I needed to study — but I didn’t have the right environment. The computer I had was in the middle of the living room, and there were always guests in our house. On top of that, no one bought me the practice test books I needed. There were practice exams in the daily newspapers, so I was forced to cut those out and work through them.

Throughout all of this, the man called my father was as good as nonexistent. He was so indifferent and strange that my hatred only grew. Today, my only dream is to escape.

His way of showing affection was also deeply disturbing. He had no boundaries and no respect for privacy. He would go through my phone without asking and read my private conversations with friends. Every school year he would make promises and break them by year’s end. On top of that, he was constantly in conflict with God in his own way — if he saw someone on television he didn’t like, he would call them a “worthless piece of garbage headed straight for hell.”

Sometimes I wish I had known what it would be like before I was even born. Sometimes words slip out of my parents’ mouths and when I hear them, all I feel is numbness.

Before my parents married, my grandmother gave my mother to my father — and my mother once said, “They made me drink something.” That sentence has never left me. Who? What did they give her? What happened that led to their marriage? I wonder — but these feel like questions I will never find answers to. So many stories remain from those times, all hidden behind a few photographs. I wish I could look at those photos and understand the stories behind them.

I am afraid. Of everything and everyone. I am afraid of everything I was made to believe. I have nowhere to go, and so I am afraid. My efforts feel meaningless, and so I am afraid. I bring together everything I’ve lived through in my mind, and they all dance together in a strange kind of harmony.

Why do the fortunes they read come true? Back then, they used strange methods to tell fortunes — but how do they turn out to be right? I can’t understand it. I can only hope that God has kept my destiny hidden from me, for my own sake.

In my next blog post, I think I’ll talk about the dreams I had and the daydreams I built during childhood. Until then — thank you for reading.