It has been this way since 1st year. I lived in halls but was too nervous to spend time with my house mates which I know hurt. I then tried to make friends with people on my course and joined church but I had no luck. I guess its because I am hard to get to know (I have been told in the past) and don’t have an outgoing personality at least straight away. I take a while to warm up to people. I guess i also pull back from people although i want to be friends with them, because i don’t want to get hurt or because I feel like I have nothing to offer.
This social anxiety stems back to growing up. I moved out of London to Hertfordshire when I was ten and the new area was mainly white people. In secondary school I was singled out for being black.
I lost my dad at the end of year 8. I moved to a school where I thought I would be happy as there would be more black people. I was so wrong. I was picked on for being ‘too quiet’. I personally felt that I wasn’t given a chance. The black students were the ones who hurt me the most. There is an expectation that even black people reinforce more than white people, that black people have to be overly loud all the time.
The worse thing was that I didn’t recognise myself. In my previous school I would describe myself as loud then and as a child in primary school. I guess that I started to change after my dad’s death and started to view the world differently. Looking back now I think I was also scared to be loud and talkative for fear of being obnoxious or too much as I know some of my past friends did think that. I started to view loud people and extraverts in a negative way.
I felt stuck in the label of ‘quiet’ and it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. I became awkward, distrustful and irritated by people always expecting to be entertained, expecting an instant bond. I am also ‘pretty’ so I am told so being quiet is seen as ‘stuck up’ or ‘she knows she's pretty’.
This has since been the story of my life. I will admit that I am no angel, I sometimes said things that offended people out of passive aggression or mere lack of social etiquette.
I know I need to widen my interests so that I can relate to people better but I feel so overwhelmed with the information available in this world.
I have tried to join societies in uni, but I always end up leaving cause I don’t fit in. I want to join a society this year that hold various challenges like London to paris bike ride but I don’t want to be on my own.
I am even distant from my family, I know they know I have no friends and I think they’re disappointed that I don’t have any fun uni stories to tell. I think the feel like they don’t really know me which is sad.
My future worries me especially impressing employers and the social aspect of working.