Hmmmm.
So I started sixth form five years ago, and at that point I'd just put on loads of weight - I was heavier and bigger than I am now - which wasn't great. But at the same time there were loads of house parties, and we started clubbing for the first time, so that was pretty cool
The next year, I kind-of flunked my subjects because I really wasn't enjoying them, and ended up with one A Level (an A in English Literature) and a couple of AS levels. At this point I started to realise that I was definitely more than a little bit attracted to guys
but for some reason I stayed in the closet... and I also had kind-of fallen in love with one of my male best friends but yeah...
Start of 2009 I decided to come out and tell my friends, and also the guy that I was in love with him. That was... in retrospect it went really well. He obviously didn't have mutual feelings, but he was really okay with it and although things were a little awkward for a month or two we carried on being good friends. But uh... I dunno, I was a bit messed up back then. My family aren't the most tolerant or liberal of families, so I found it difficult coming out to them. My mum always sort-of knew, and she seems okay with it most times, but occasionally when we argue over something petty she'll bring up something awful like "I'll never give her grandchildren" or something
I told her I was bi so it was still a possibility
but yeah...
Then in May my oldest brother died. The last time I saw him, I was going through this phase of taking night walks, and I bumped into him at about 2am on Torquay's main high street... he was doing the same. It was weird, and after he went into hospital I found it difficult to go see him. He was diagnosed with some form of leukaemia... he was addicted to heroin for the best part of twenty years, and despite attempts at getting clean I think he was just surrounded by bad people. So yeah... at the end of May my mum told me the doctors were talking about turning off life support, so I went to see him, obviously, but... I just found it horrible, I'm useless in those situations, I don't know what to say, and my mum seemed disappointed with me because I just really wanted to leave. In retrospect I can see her point but I'm just not good at dealing with grief at the time.
So obviously that was a huge blow to family life... my mum's been diagnosed with depression ever since, since he was her first born, and yeah... in a way though it's made us all a lot closer.
A couple of months later - September to be precise - my dad went into hospital randomly (I didn't even know he was ill), and my mum woke me up the next morning in tears saying he died. I still haven't really processed that to this day. It was so unexpected and our relationship was so awkward - they were separated, he was an alcoholic, we always got on but were never like... the type of father/son to go fishing or whatever
But yeah, that one just floored me. Later in the month I got drunk with the best-friend-guy and fooled around with him and I don't know... at the time I was not in a good place, and I kept mistaking all of these small gestures from him, and silly things like sharing a bed, as something more. At one point I just messed things up and we had this massive fall-out, and I didn't speak to him for about a year.
So 2009 wasn't good at all. But one thing that did come out of it was that I went back to college to try and make up for better grades, and I met a handful of really cool and interesting people there.
2010 was somewhat improved. I started writing more, I was getting good grades at college, and towards the end of the year I kind of patched things up with the friend, because we have all these mutual friends from way back to 2004, and the same friend circle, so I felt guilty because I'd made it hard on them. I'd also completely betrayed his trust so, I felt guilty there... and after a couple of really awkward and angry communications, I invited him to this Christmas get-together I'd arranged and we just sort of naturally made up again... it's been pretty good with him ever since, but we're nowhere near as close as we were before 2009. I don't mind though really, because it's helped me get over him
So yeah, things were a bit quiet because all my friends had pretty much gone to Uni already
I became best friends with this girl though who's still my best friend (Greg and Mark met her hai/) and that was a big bonus because she's lovely and sweet and caring and everything. Mid-2011 I got the rest of my A Levels and the results were so good that I ended up in the local paper with my photo
So I enrolled at Bath Spa in September...
First year of Uni was pretty amazing for the first term, constant parties and clubbing. But in January it was made clear that we'd have to move house back home because our house was condemned, because my landlord (coincidentally my uncle) was a neglectant prick who didn't give a **** about my mum or the house... blamed the problems on us kids (like mould? give over). So my mum was constantly in contact with me, and at this point was when her depression was diagnosed, so obviously this panicked me and I took my eye off of my studies... so yeah, ended up failing first year.
Have since got back in on appeal, though, am now living with some amazing people, and am pretty bloody happy overall.
