I made the wrong choice by approaching one about my depression when I was in the 9th grade.
Since my school changes our schedules every
semester, I had never quite experienced something like this before, being a newcomer to the
high school experience. The sudden change of classes sent me into an
emotional void and I was saddened greatly. When I sat in her office,
crying, she started asking me questions about my homelife. She seemed to have the idea that every troubled
child was truly sad because of a bad homelife. Granted, my homelife isn't exactly the
Christian Family Network but more along the lines of
Daria, and this had nothing to do with that. I even tried to explain it to her.
Also, last year when I was in the tenth grade, before I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, I had a certain manic episode in which during I wrote crude words on the computer in my literary magazine advisor's classroom. Thinking she was doing the right thing, she turned it in to the guidance counseler (a different one from the last story) and I was called in to her office during my history class. She was telling me, that from reading this thing I had written in 72 point font in less than a minute, that she knew I had the soul of a poet. Continuing, she asked me how I felt. For one single moment, I felt understood as I explained that I was more of an outcast among those around me, and that I felt like I was on the outside looking in. She said I needed to get out more and do things. She didn't think there was anything wrong with me because I had colorful barettes in my hair (in her own words, "Well anyone that has a guitar and rabbit barrette in their hair SURELY can't be that sad!"). I scoffed at her and her weird assumptions, and left. I never spoke to her again. I was angry that she had won the teacher of the month award for my school district. I plan never to see one of these women again unless it has something to do with fixing my grades.