"I'll see you in August."

I had a lot of issues with depression and suicidal thoughts in high school. Junior year, I took a college history class with a teacher who was known to be laid back. 

When the end of the year neared, I became wary of the summer because I would no longer see this wonderful teacher. He had become the only thing I looked forward to, and I think he knew that. 

When I went to say goodbye, I asked him, "What was your favorite part of this year?"

He smiled and said, "You were my favorite." 

With a few tears cascading down my face, I said, "I'll miss you, you know?" 

And he nodded, smiling, and said, "And I'll see you in August." 

It was because of him telling me I had to be back there in August that I stopped feeling suicidal. I stopped feeling as sad. Following a pretty awful breakup that summer, and a summer of pains, coming back to school and seeing my teacher's bright face and calming demeanor made me feel whole again.

I realized that he wasn't just my teacher. He surpassed that and became my friend. And seeing his face light up with such simple joys, well, it made me feel at home. And there is no place I'd rather be.

"He wouldn't have watched us undress..."

"He wouldn't have watched us undress if you'd just changed under your clothes like I did!" 

- My friend, 10 years old, speaking to me, also 10.
 

"Did you always have all those little dots on your face?"

I started attending a spiritual group for a few weeks, and I quickly grew to love it. After the meeting, a bunch of us would go eat at this little restaurant and just have a good time.

An older gentleman, an amazing mad scientist, soon joined. I was totally fascinated by him and I was eager to talk to him one-on-one. 

One day at the restaurant, we ended up sitting next to each other and chatting. All of a sudden he said, "What is that on your face?" 

Confused, I asked him to clarify. 
He replied, "I didn't have my glasses before. Did you always have all those little dots on your face?" 

I was stunned, and I managed a quiet, "Yes." 

I never returned to the group after that. I was plagued with mortifying thoughts of how he could ask that in such a way, as if it wouldn't offend me. 

My skin is clear now, but this still sticks with me. 

"It's okay; I'm fat too!"

When I was 9, I was a little more developed than everyone else. One day in class, I walked past a table of kids and I heard one boy say, "Oh, she's so fat!" 

I confronted them, and soon the teacher came by to see what was going on. At first the kids denied having said anything, but eventually the boy confessed, saying, "It's okay; I'm fat too!" 

As if that made it okay. 

A year later, I changed schools and met my two best friends. I'm fifteen now, and we're still best friends. They don't care how I look, and because of their love and support, neither do I. 

"Nobody cares."

When I was in first grade, there was a girl who liked to tease me in a rather simple but hurtful way. I was a very talkative child, but every time I said something, she said to me, "Nobody cares." 

Eventually I stopped being talkative and became a quiet child. Now I am a quiet 20 year old struggling to talk to people, with barely any friends.

To top this all, my parents say I'm a very boring person. They don't believe in mental illnesses or disorders that I could have, so they just tell me to get over myself.

I just honestly think that nobody cares.

"If she were smaller, then sure."

As a kid I was always taller and more shapely than everyone else my age.  In 7th grade when all of my little petite friends were getting "boyfriends," one of my friends asked my crush if he liked me. 

His response was, "Oh, she's pretty, but she's just way too big for me to be with. If she were smaller, then sure." 

I have never forgotten that. And now, ten years later, I still have anxiety every time I look into the mirror.

"Suck your stomach in."

When I was in 5th grade, we took a class trip to Canada. 

While we all walked around a beautiful mansion/ castle, my best friend's mom looked at me and said, "Suck your stomach in. In a year you will lose some inches off, and you won't look as fat."

"Just don't stretch them out."

I had this friend in high school who would sleep over at my house a lot. One time she left a pair of leggings in my room, and I mistook them for mine, so I wore them to school one day. 

She saw me wearing them and asked if they were hers, and I realized that they were. I apologized, telling her she'd get them back. She told me it was okay, adding, "Just don't stretch them out." 

I've always had bigger thighs. And I never used to care a whole lot. But now I hate them in every pair of leggings I put on.

"Look, she's so fat!"

When I was in 7th grade, nobody knew me yet in my new classes. There was this guy who was known for being a douche, yet I still had a crush on him.

One day he and a friend were walking behind me, and I heard him say, "Look, she's so fat!"

A few months later, we were practically best friends in class. He called another girl fat, but I thought he was talking about me. When I asked, he said, "No! Why would I call you fat?" To which I responded, "You actually have before. Ages ago. You said it while you were walking behind me." 

He then spent the next seven minutes completely denying that he ever said this, that he didn't even know who I was at the time.  

That was the first time I that realized how easy it is for people to make comments that may be insignificant to them but everything to you. So insignificant that they don't even remember making them. So insignificant to him, but so scarring and formative for me. 
 

"I told you that I would be the pretty one."

My cousin and I were inseparable our whole lives. She was always beautifully curvaceous, and I was always stick thin. Her dad use to fat shame her, telling her that she had to look like me to ever be loved. 

Fast forward to this year when I was pregnant (but hadn't told anyone yet) and she was starving herself for her new beau. She called me and said, "I told you that one day you would be the fat one and I would be the pretty, skinny one." 

She even encouraged her boyfriend to make fun of my weight.