| Ain't no place for a skinny blonde midget no more. |
I have just finished my week of work experience.
In Barry.
Don't get me wrong, my journalism work experience placement was amazing, I met some great people (including an 89-year-old woman who kept stroking my hair and asking if I was Scandinavian) and learnt a lot about the world of journalism, and my self-confidence increased as I had to make the 40 minute train journey by myself and phone people (part of my social phobia is an irrational hatred of phoning people... don't ask!), but still, it was in Barry.
Barry is actually quite a nice place. It's the largest town in Wales apparently, and it has plenty of shops and activities for a day out if you're bored. It's close to Cardiff and the countryside. The seaside is a stone's throw away. But some of the people I met really let it down. For example, the first day I was there, I saw 8 pregnant teenagers and 3 teenagers pushing a pram. I'm not 'judging' anyone who makes that decision at that age, but it was a bit of a culture shock as I've only ever met one teenage mother before in 17 years! The second day I was there, I walked past a group of girls and one said 'Jesus Lord above, what is that??', referring to me. I guessed it was because I look and sound posh, and I wasn't 'one of them', so I was automatically an outsider.
That's my main point. Why can't someone 'belong' just because they look a bit different or come from a different background?
Take the touchy subject of immigration for example. Britain is very multi-cultural nowadays, and that's in no way a bad thing. But it's still segregated. Muslim girls form groups in school and won't mix with other people, because they feel that they need to have the common bond of their religion to have a good friendship. That's not true. As the great Bill Bailey once said, you don't need to walk into the paddock to see the horse - you don't need to actually be a Muslim to understand their religion and accept it. It's the same with groups of friends who only seem to hang out together because they dress the same, or like the same group of music - why? Why not mix and learn something about another culture or another aspect of life?
People are so one-track minded these days, and by that I don't mean that they're blind to other people, rather that they wear blinkers around others. They see the outline of the person, the silhouette, but not the flesh that really makes that being, because they don't want to know if there's any chance that they won't like what they see.
To bring this post to my favourite topic of mental illness, that explains, in my opinion, why those with mental illnesses are often ignored and mistreated by society - people feel that if they've never been through it, they shouldn't even try to understand it because there's no way that they can. It's not true. It takes work for both sides, but what mentally ill people need is a connection to the outside world. If I hadn't made the 40 minute train journey by myself, I'd still be afraid to, and if I hadn't had to phone up people, I'd still be anxious about it, but because someone understood my inhibitions and helped me work through them, I managed it.
And, to be honest, I'm quite proud of myself for that.Labels: dear world, me, ow, rant, sanity |
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| Designer babies |
Why do so many very young girls feel so pressured to be beautiful these days?
I'm a Yahoo Answers user, and if you check out the Beauty and Style section it's full of 12 and 13 year olds asking 'can I be a model?', 'am I ugly?' and 'I'm 5'4", is 90lbs too fat?'. When I was that age, I still had uncombed waist-length blonde hair and wore scruffy trainers and fleeces. I didn't care about what I ate so long as I wasn't hungry. Fashion was something in the magazines, but didn't come into real life. Now, young children are obsessed with looking like the perfect plastic figurines they see plastered all over the pages of Bliss and Shout. They're too young; they're practically still in nappies and all they care about is lipgloss, boyfriends and diets.
Miley Cyrus helps us explain why this might be. At 16 years old, she cakes her face in layer upon layer of perfectly applied makeup, highlights her hair and has platinum white veneers on her previously average teeth. Was she pressured to do this by her record label, or by her lifestyle? Surely she would sell as many records with crooked teeth, but she might not get on the covers of as many magazines. That leads me to believe that she is just like the other young teenagers who just want to live up to the ridiculous expectations set by the media today. The media needs to stop treating children like miniature adults and let them have a decent childhood free from the pressures of being aesthetically wonderful and full of the pleasures of just being young. No wonder the rate of teenage pregnancies has gone through the roof; children are being more sexualised in the media than ever before. To go back to Miley Cyrus, at 15 she was posing topless on magazine covers, albeit covered by a blanket. Did they not want young men would drool over that image? The intention was to portray her as an attractive young woman, not an innocent teenager. If teenagers' access to these sexualised images of children - that's what a 15 year old is - is stopped, then maybe they will stop feeling such pressure to grow up and become sexually active themselves.
I am 5'0" tall and weigh roughly 95lbs. This gives me a BMI of 18.6 - healthy, although a little on the low side. In an experiment, I asked users of Yahoo! Answers whether they considered that to be overweight. Four people said that they thought that it was ridiculously low, and one person said I should lose 10lbs. If an impressionable person were told that they should lose 10lbs, the risk is that they will decide to do just that. If I were to take that person's advice on board, I'd become unhealthy. It's people like this that pressure us ordinary people to become perfect-looking, Barbie clones, and if we stand for it, we risk our health and our society, as hyperbolic as that sounds.
The media blames children for their own downfall because it cannot bear to admit that it is its fault in the end.Labels: fashion, rant, sanity |
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| Your craziness is my sanity. |
I'm clinically mentally unstable. I do have a mental illness. It's not one of the cool varieties that people are afraid of or write horror films about. Instead, it's a very common one. Yes, I am a recognised sufferer of clinical depression. Who isn't, nowadays? But anyway, being one of the crazy elite, I've come across a few questions from skeptics who want to think that I'm just making it up to try and stand out from the crowd. What is craziness? What defines insanity? What makes us mad as opposed to just 'quirky', or 'different'?
Now, I'm no expert, but I would define crying for hours on end for no reason and having panic attacks in the middle of the night as being slightly more than just 'unique'.
Craziness affects us all in different ways at different times. Sometimes I just want to shout it out from a rooftop, from every rooftop, to stop the bastards asking questions ('why do you care about that so much?' 'What do you know about mental illness? You're not an expert!') Sometimes I want to make everyone just shut up about it, but not usually.
Usually, I want to find the twatheads that did this to me and scream in their faces, 'look what you've done to me, look what you've done because you thought it made you look tough in front of your mates'. But I won't get the chance to do that now.
However, there is a fine line between craziness and the normal workings of the brain.
And that is why I don't tell people that I'm ill.
I have told three people. The first person, my best friend, was understanding, and accepted it. She said she didn't know how I felt, but that she would try and help me. That was a good response.
The second person said, 'oh yeah, I had depression too.' I was surprised, and asked how they got over it. They replied 'I just did'. It emerged that they classified 'depression' as a mood, not an illness. They had once been sad after getting a bad grade in school. I gently explained the difference between our conditions, and they remained adamant that it was the same. I then shouted that years of sexual and psychological taunting is slightly more likely to cause depression than a C in art. We've barely spoken since. What a shame.
The third person said that they had also had depression, after their dog died. Now, of course, they were very sad, but clinical depression is diagnosed by a disproportionate reaction to trauma. With me, the bullying I endured ended, but for months and months afterwards I was still crying every night, still couldn't go out in public on my own, still depended on others to look around the corner for me in case someone was there of whom I was afraid. I needed months of therapy and confidence building to be anywhere near normal. But, you know, I suppose I shouldn't dwell on it. People that dwell on things just get annoying. So hopefully by writing all this down, I can stop thinking about it and just be more normal. Yay.Labels: me, sanity |
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| Why set up this blog? |
I am but an average, random teenager. No-one really cares about what I have to say. They'd be mad if I did. I don't tend to approach a surly adolescent in the street and ask for their opinion on the Gaza conflict or the economy. Perhaps I should. I'm sure that they would have an opinion as valid as any other. Perhaps even as valid as my own. I'm not sure. We teenagers can be hypocritical.
So, that returns us cyclically to the inevitable question; 'why set up this blog'? The truth is that I set it up not only to force my opinions on the realms of the internet and shamelessly self advertise, but also to hopefully give others a little insight into the minds of a mentally unstable teenager. Naturally, I shall retain my anonymity, at least until the publishing offers come pouring through (in what parallel universe?). The mind of a mentally unstable teenager is a terrifying place. Its geographic equivalent is probably the Grand Canyon, full of steep cliffs of unfinished thoughts and cognitions, dangerous opinions and seemingly impossible climbs. The teenager is an intimidating being. No two are the same. And no two are sane. Not even you.Labels: introduction, me, sanity |
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Name: AnwenKya
Home: Cardiff
About Me: I am a 5ft blonde teenager with an overactive imagination, bad temper and terrifying sense of humour. Hear me roar!
See my profile...
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background by tayler
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posted by AnwenKya at 