When I was being tutored for the SAT , one of the passages was about a girl who was the "happy one" out of her deep, twisted, depressed group of friends. They were all smart, funny and beautiful, but all not right in the head. I wish I had friends like that.

I wish I could be truly happy, like everyone around me. I wish I could shake off this torment, this questioning of existence. I wish I wasn't a masochistic and a perfectionist. I don't understand why I still want to die when I'm in a land of potential with parents and friends who take help me take advantage of it. I think, if I was a poor rural woman somewhere far away, birthing children in a hut...I know I'd already be dead. Have you ever read The Awakening?
Perhaps I am ungrateful, perhaps I am trapped--I don't know, and neither gives any solace. Look at me, having overcome my social anxiety. A success story with everything going for her, a paragon, a winner. Talking to everyone, laughing with everyone, joining in on life with everyone. So I'm not afraid of people anymore. But,
I'm still afraid.