‘’ So who am I? I am a happy girl who worries but still finds time to help others. That’s me’’
We have the privilege of sharing a short story written by Emily aged 13, who is a young carer.
Often what we find, is that young carers are greater at putting people first before themselves which is a beautiful trait to have, but one that can be quite detrimental too. Emily has demonstrated beautifully how important it is to check in with one another and how we must all practise the ‘don’t judge a book by it’s cover’ motto, for we can never know how one must be feeling unless we give the time to ask. If you are a young carer and would like to share a creative piece to us please attach it to an email and send it to hello@suffolkfamilycarers.org, we would love to see more of your creations!
Let me introduce myself, well I’m an ordinary book on the shelf, I look the same but I have a different tale to tell. Different people have different opinions and visions of me, the vast majority see me as a funny girl who knows everybody and everything, however few know the other part of me; the scared and worried part. The part whose past haunts her like a ghost and future dawns upon her and sits there and just waits for her. Waiting staring right at me in the eyes, yet I wouldn’t see it coming even if I tried. Nobody knew the other part of me and I was even starting to doubt myself.
During the night that is when my greatest fears always struck me. Under my faint nightlight I can distantly see the shadows of the memories that are entwined into my mind like vines on a tree. Whispers often hisses, preventing me from sleeping. At night when I can’t sleep I’ll go for a walk in the crisp winter air under the warm glow of the snow coated streetlights, watching me as I stroll past with my thought and my music blasting through my headphone. My warm breath transforms into a cloud and soon disappears before my eyes. The cold air often made my eyes start to tear up as it came hitting me in the face. The rejected people of the streets would all huddle together like penguins, for warmth on a cold night to shield away from the viciousness the winder night had given them.
After my walk I am brainwashed. I have not a single worry in the world. Carefree, I can go to school and nobody can guess that I am anything more than happy. I paint my short bitten nails bright colours to disguise the dullness they show. Piano was another form of distraction; the peace and tranquillity it unveiled pushed me away from my worries and daunting thoughts. It was a place where I wrote songs, the only way I could get my emotions and keep away from the dark world I was blindly looking at in the face.
So that’s me. The girl who may seem happy all the time who actually is hiding more than what meets the eye. I am someone who things about the future and the past, I am someone who hides when they get to, I count my blessings and think about the great mystery we call life. What does it mean to others? I often enjoy hiding as a stranger of the night then the therapist during the day. Silly as it sounds, solving other people’s problems guides me to find my way around my own. A discovery I found in life is that friends are your maps, people change people. When you have nobody you will feel like you have been buried alive and suffocating. If you have friends you will be more happy and most probably more sociable and if you build your problems then the world will seem darker and will end up having the feeling of being in a small room, walls painted a white brighter than imaginable, ears tingling as whispers tickle your ears, there will be no windows and the only light source is the flame of fire surrounding you as the smoke dances making you hallucinate. Letting you see the subconscious memories you have and chose to forget.
Everyone is a book if you think about it because there is always a part of everyone that’s sensitive and not as displayed. The world is basically a library and similarly to what I said we are books and every single person is a different tale. Life and the way it’s shown is as if there are different genres in the mystery isle. We’ll see books of people who always have some kind of mystery or a question that they will go out of their way to find the answer. With the fairytale books you will most probably find the people who somehow always manage to keep their ‘perfect’ lifestyle so amazing but you will grow to see that it is likely that they will have a sequel in the mystery section. Firefighters and people from the army are often known to be the bravest people in the world, there is a huge possibility that they have a river of tears and the dam they built is about to come flooding apart. There’s always going to be that one book not many people like but there is always going to be a few that enjoy the book a bit similar to life because some people are not liked as much as others however, there is always bound to be at least someone that wants to be your friend and there for you. That’s who I aim to be. So who am I? I am a happy girl who worries but still finds time to help others. That’s me.
