Still, it feels differently for me.

I mean, I get that situations like these aren't ones you can't avoid - for example by being perfect all the time (not that I haven't tried lol) - but still there's this deep-rooted fear in me of disappointing people.

It's an anxiety I've had practically my whole life through or at least as long as I can remember. That's why I always stuck to rules and I tried very hard to please others for the sake of making them happy and thus avoiding the disappointment of them.

Nevertheless, like I said, you can't really escape it. So every time I get for example a bad grade, I feel like I've let the teacher or literally anyone else down. Someone will always be disappointed.

I also feel like this is the real reason why I'm so keen on getting good grades. Everyone thinks I'm just really reaaally ambitious but it's more like I just can't not study and not give my best because in the worst case scenario I MYSELF would be the one ending up disappointed by myself.

I notice this fear in quite a lot of situations, even more of them lately.

One time in 7th grade, for example, I forgot my French stuff - exercise books and all that - for two lessons in a row and each time I of course went up to our teacher and told him about him. The second time I did, he told me square in the face that he was disappointed by me as I was one of the best students in our class. 

I shrugged it off afterwards, laughing about it but truth is, it stuck with me longer than I'd like to admit. And after that, I never raised my hand in any French class again up until a few months ago.

This may seem very irrational to someone who never experienced that kind of anxiety, the kind that takes every air out of your throat up until that stinging feeling of tears hits your eyes and you try to hold it back but as soon as you're alone, trying to sleep at night it hits you and it just flows and flows and flows.

Another time was actually just in September last year. We had to do these little dialogues in French (why do all my disappointment stories have something to do with my French classes?! I really don't know) and my partner, well she isn't that good in school I have to say although she usually nails speaking French. Anyways, we did the worst we could and wrote down full sentences so when our teacher passed by to listen to our dialogue, we clearly nearly didn't have anything and she told us if she would've given us a grade, it would've been a D and there it went again, the feeling of being a failure, the tears but gladly I held through and I really hope no one noticed because I'm a bit ashamed of it to be honest. 

People my age don't cry because of stuff like this, they skip lessons and they practically don't care at all what any teacher says. But I guess I'm just different somehow.

Anyways, what I want to say with this is that I'm struggling with this each day and I'm still trying to improve myself in this kind of way or at least learn to not immediately say that I as a person am a failure or a disappointment as soon as I make some small mistake.

Maybe I will experience this change someday. If I do, I will update you. Until then, I hope despite all the struggles and anxieties in your life, you manage to find a life of your own.

xxx Sarah