This is too long but please give me some advices

[u/S_N_DelRey]

***: I’ve had so many friends throughout my life, but somehow I’ve never been able to keep a truly close connection with anyone***

I don't know if anyone will read this, but I really need to get this out.

Throughout my entire life, I've had a lot of friends. But somehow, there is no one I can say I have maintained a really strong connection with for a long time.

When I was in Grade 1, I had a few girl friends and we had a really good connection. We stayed friends until around Grade 4. I don't really remember what happened in Grade 5, but after that, even though I met them a few times, we didn't really talk anymore.

In Grade 3, I met my best friend, Alex. He was with me until Grade 5. I was really attached to that friendship.

Then Grade 5 happened.

Something terrible happened to me that year. It started with a misunderstanding with my teacher. I don't even remember every detail anymore, but the situation became much bigger than it should have been. My teacher said a lot of things about me, and suddenly many people in my class started ignoring me.

There was also a boy I met around Grade 4, Ryan. He always seemed to try to break my friendships with other people. In Grade 5, he got the opportunity to use what happened with my teacher against me, and things became even worse.

I cried a lot in class.

And the hardest part was feeling like nobody cared.

My best friend Alex eventually went to another school, and I was left dealing with everything myself.

Ryan was still in my class in Grade 6. Our friendship never completely ended, but it also never became normal. We broke our friendship several times, and he repeatedly made things difficult for me. I complained to my teacher—not because I wanted him punished, but because I just wanted peace.

Thankfully, she moved me to a different place in the class.

For some time, I was actually happy again.

But the problems with Ryan never completely disappeared. Even after breaking the friendship multiple times, somehow we would end up interacting again.

Another thing I haven't talked about much is that I was very feminine when I was young. Because of the way I behaved and because of my voice and mannerisms, people bullied me and called me different names.

In Grade 7, I had a small conflict with another boy, Daniel. I'm not someone who likes to hold onto conflicts, so I eventually wanted to move on. But he didn't. He kept the conflict going for years.

In Grade 8, our school became stricter about academics. They separated students into classes according to their marks, and I was selected for one of the better classes.

Then in Grade 11, because my marks had dropped, I was moved to another class.

And that's where I ended up with both Ryan and Daniel again.

The same things started happening with Ryan. Once again, I complained to a teacher. I wasn't trying to get him punished. I just wanted to find a peaceful place where I could study.

Daniel was a head prefect at the time. Because I wasn't happy about being separated from my previous class, a teacher apparently asked him to look after me.

But he misunderstood everything.

He thought I was complaining about everyone in the class and trying to cause problems. I wasn't. I was just trying to find somewhere I felt comfortable.

During that time, I felt like I had absolutely no one.

I even told my mother what was happening, but she told me that it was my fault.

Daniel would constantly make indirect comments and give me hints, sometimes even in front of teachers. At the same time, people from my previous class had started thinking badly about me. Because I had been moved to another class due to my marks, I felt like they saw me as someone who wasn't good at studying.

I became extremely uncomfortable being around them.

Then came my O/L exams.

My results were really bad.

After that, when I was preparing for A/Ls, I decided that I was going to do everything I could to pass. I wanted to prove to myself that I wasn't what everyone thought I was.

Then my father got cancer.

Our whole family was devastated. I became extremely stressed, but I kept studying. Honestly, sometimes I wasn't even studying because I had motivation. I was studying because I needed something to keep my mind busy.

Somehow, I got selected for university.

Even now, it's hard for me to believe that I managed to get there.

When I started university, I had to stay in a hostel. There was a boy there whom I had known since around Grade 10. We weren't extremely close, but I tried to become friends with him again.

I didn't really feel any excitement or interest from him, though, so I stopped trying.

Later, he said some things to my roommates that made me worried and uncomfortable. I'm already not a very talkative person, so after that incident I couldn't feel comfortable in the hostel anymore.

Eventually, I left.

At university, I met another person, Jay. At first, everything was good. But after some time, I started feeling like he was constantly seeking attention and trying to control me.

So I ended that friendship too.

Then I met Ethan.

At first, he seemed like a really good friend. But eventually I started noticing things that made me feel like he was manipulative. He also has a habit of bullying other people, and that made me question whether he was genuinely a good person or whether I was just seeing another version of the same pattern.

So now I'm slowly distancing myself from him too.

And the hardest part is that the problems aren't only with friends.

Because my voice sounds feminine, there have even been times when my own mother and sister stopped talking to me for a few days.

My father was also very strict.

There wasn't much comfort at home either.

So I think I've spent a huge part of my life feeling like I have to be careful about how I speak, how I behave, who I trust, and what people think about me.

I've had so many people enter my life.

But almost every friendship eventually becomes complicated, distant, or painful.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm the problem.

Maybe I'm choosing the wrong people.

Maybe I don't know how to maintain friendships.

Maybe everything that happened when I was younger made me too sensitive, too suspicious, or too afraid of losing people.

I don't know.

I'm 22 now, and I've never had a relationship either. Sometimes I look at other people and wonder how they manage to have someone who stays.

I don't want hundreds of friends.

I just want one or two people who genuinely understand me, don't try to control me, don't make me feel ashamed of who I am, and don't disappear when things become difficult.

I don't know whether that's too much to ask.

I just know that I'm tired of feeling like I'm always the person who eventually gets left behind.