Being alone during childhood

After our fourth therapy session, I told my psychologist that I couldn't understand why I had always felt so different from everyone else. She asked me whether I could remember any moments from my childhood where I had noticed that difference; times when I had felt strange, out of place, or unlike the other kids. I told her that I could think of quite a few. She suggested I write them down so we could go through them together during our next appointment.

And then I thought: if I'm going to write them anyway, why not leave them here too?

Maybe one day they'll help me understand myself a little better. Or maybe someone reading this will recognize a piece of themselves in these memories and feel a little less alone.

1. The first time I remember feeling "different" was when I was four years old, during preschool. Because of my parents' schedule, I attended the morning shift, which meant we had breakfast at school every day. I remember one morning especially vividly. I was standing on a small step that let me look over the entire classroom. It was loud; dozens of children talking over each other, chairs scraping the floor, laughter bouncing off the walls. Everyone seemed to have found their place, everyone belonged somewhere.

Everyone except me.

Even the girls I considered my friends had already sat together without inviting me over. I don't think they were trying to exclude me on purpose; they were just… existing as normal children. I stood there holding my little tray of breakfast, completely overwhelmed.

Instead of trying to squeeze into a table, I walked over to my teacher and quietly asked if I could eat in the library instead. Technically, I wasn't supposed to. There were rules against it, supervision protocols and all that. But maybe she noticed how uncomfortable I looked, because after hesitating for a moment, she said yes.

From that day on, whenever I could, I ate breakfast there instead of with the rest of the class. I liked the silence. I liked that no one expected anything from me. I could simply exist without worrying about conversations I didn't want or knew how to join. Eventually another little girl noticed where I disappeared every morning and started eating there too. I remember feeling oddly angry about it, it felt as if she had invaded something that belonged only to me. Looking back, I don't think it was because I disliked her; I just didn't understand why someone would willingly interrupt the one place where I finally felt comfortable being alone.

2.  I've always been the kind of person who gets bored easily. Unfortunately, I've also struggled with falling asleep for as long as I can remember.

When everyone else in the house was asleep, I often found myself wide awake in the middle of the night, wandering around quietly, looking for something to do. I wasn't scared of the dark. If anything, nighttime felt calmer than daytime. Sometimes I'd open the kitchen cabinets and line up random ingredients just to look at them, imagining recipes I had no intention of making. Other nights I'd sit in the living room with the television on the lowest possible volume, watching cartoons while trying not to wake anyone up. And sometimes I'd simply walk outside into the backyard and stare up at the stars.

Those were peaceful moments.

I remember wondering whether there was another child somewhere in the world who also couldn't sleep, who also felt strangely awake while everyone else seemed perfectly content inside their dreams. I assumed there had to be. There are billions of people in the world. Surely someone else was looking up at the same sky, asking themselves the exact same question.

3. By the time I was seven or eight, I had started primary school on the afternoon shift. Every afternoon before classes began, we'd have a snack outside. I'd always choose a shady spot where I could escape the heat and quietly eat by myself. I didn't really know how to make friends or maybe a better way to describe it is that I didn't know how friendships were supposed to happen. Everyone else seemed to instinctively understand the rules;how to approach someone, how to join a conversation, how groups naturally formed.

I didn't. So instead, I watched.

While everyone else ran around playing games together, I'd sit there eating my snack and observing them. I wasn't lonely, and I wasn't particularly sad either. I was fascinated. It almost felt like studying another language. I'd watch who laughed first, who followed whom, how arguments started, how they ended, why some children seemed effortlessly drawn to each other while others drifted between groups. It felt like I was trying to solve a puzzle.

The only part I disliked was when teachers would notice me sitting alone. They'd insist that I should go play with the other kids.

"Go join them!"

But… why? Couldn't they see I was perfectly comfortable where I was? 

Eventually I'd wander off to a hidden staircase where hardly anyone went. It was quiet there. Peaceful. I could continue being alone, but without people constantly reminding me that they I shouldn't be.

4. When I was eleven, I switched to the morning shift for my final year of primary school. Another new classroom. Another group of classmates. Another fresh start. The few friends I had slowly managed to make over the previous five years were suddenly gone, replaced by complete strangers. By then I was already used to having to rebuild my social life every few years, although "rebuild" might be too generous a word.

I mostly observed.

I remember being strangely entertained by the little dramas between my classmates; the arguments, the alliances, the friendships that seemed to end one day only to resume the next as if nothing had happened. It all felt fascinating.

I did have classmates I got along with, of course, but none of them were really my friends. We were simply too different, and they never let me forget it. I'd constantly hear things like, "You're so quiet," "You know you're really weird, right?" or "Do you even have friends to hang out with?" I don't think they necessarily meant to be cruel. To them, they were probably just making observations. It made me wonder whether I was actually strange, or if I simply experienced the world differently from the people around me.