School was once my sanctuary, the one place where I could escape the chaos of home. I eagerly anticipated each day, my mind racing with ideas, my hand shooting up to answer every question. I can still hear my third-grade teacher’s voice, not surprised I’d answered yet another query: “Well, John, you’ve just summed up my entire lesson.” My grades were a quiet source of pride, a small but sturdy anchor in a world that felt like it was always teetering on the edge of collapse. But I didn’t yet know how fragile that anchor was, how soon the first crack in my armor would appear.

In third grade, I was selected for the gifted education program—an after-school group designed to challenge students like me. It was a badge of honor, a glimmer of worth in a life overshadowed by turmoil. Home was a battleground, but in that after school classroom, I was someone. I carried that pride through the end of third grade and into fourth.

Halfway through the year, as I tidied the classroom in my usual routine before gifted class, I heard a voice behind me. “John…” My teacher, Mrs. W, stood there, her face pale as a ghost. “You won’t be going to gifted today.” Her words landed like a blow. “Why not?” I asked, my voice small.

“You’ll need to talk to your parents,” she replied, her eyes avoiding mine.

Tears welled as I boarded the bus home. I rushed through the door, desperate for answers from my mom. “We took you out,” she said flatly. “You don’t need that.”

The words cut deep. That program had been my claim to fame, the one thing that made me feel like I mattered. In an instant, it was gone, ripped from my grasp. I felt like nothing.

My earliest memory in life, is from when I was four or five. My dad, consumed by a drunken rage, tore our house apart. It’s hard to convey the terror of that night—a moment one had to witness to truly understand. He flipped every table, every chair, every appliance, every lamp, every bookshelf, smashing them to the ground. Cabinets were emptied, drawers upended, their contents strewn across the floor . I huddled behind a small armchair, shaking , certain I was next. That was the first time I remember fearing for my life.

He worked midnights, so eventually, he stormed out, leaving a house full of rubble, my mother, my brother, and me. No one explained what had happened. No one reassured us that we’d be okay. No one came for us.

The years that followed brought more of the same. One night, driving home from a holiday gathering at my grandparents’ house in Crystal Lake,  terror resurfaced. He was the black sheep of my mom’s family,  with no family of his own to speak of. I suppose I couldn’t blame him for drinking heavily at those gatherings, but that night, it became impossible to ignore. At seven years old,  somehow I knew he shouldn’t have been behind the wheel. I felt —this was wrong. He began playing “chicken” with oncoming cars, swerving into their lanes as he passed others. Each near-collision I gripped the seat harder and closed my eyes more. I screamed, begged him to stop, but he only laughed. I was terrified, convinced we wouldn’t survive the drive from Crystal Lake to Antioch. When we somehow made it home, I remember thinking: How could the person meant to be my ultimate protector put me in such danger?

The years that followed were a blur of broken dishes. I saw my Mom  thrown against walls, and my dad made relentless threats to end his own life. Those moments bring a weight that grows heavier with each passing day, like a disease that festers rather than fades. Good childhood memories are scarce, overshadowed by the bad ones that refuse to let go.

When I was ten, we moved to Grayslake, and I entered fifth grade with a flicker of hope. For a while, it was okay. But soon, the world closed in around me. One day, I walked into class, and the room erupted in laughter. I froze, confused, until the kid next to me explained: they were laughing at my clothes.

Junior high was a nightmare, the darkest chapter of my life outside of home. I had a few friends in the neighborhood, but they gravitated toward the popular crowds, leaving me behind. I tried to fit in, sitting at the popular lunch table, but that ended quickly. My family didn’t have much money, so my lunches were humble—store-brand juice boxes instead of Capri-Sun, no-name chips in a bag wrapped with a rubber band. The other kids noticed. They dubbed me “Generic John,” . I didn't sit there anymore.

My clothes were an even bigger target. I had only a handful of t-shirts, not enough to go unnoticed. A few kids kept a cruel tally of what I wore, announcing to the cafeteria whenever I repeated an outfit within two weeks. Their relentless taunting made me dread school. Mornings revealed anxiety to me for the first time. I’d feel physically ill. I didn’t want to go.

At recess, I stood alone. Girls called me gross, I had skinny arms. I was always picked last for teams. My worst fear was when the teacher said “Find a partner.” No one wanted me. The eighth-grade trip to Washington, D.C., was the worst. We had to form groups of four to share rooms, but I had no one. I was forced into a group of three misfits who resented me for being the odd one out. The trip was miserable. At school dances, I wandered the gym alone, circling aimlessly. A few teachers noticed, chuckling as they asked how many “laps” I’d do. I stopped going to dances altogether. By eighth grade, I skipped graduation. I just wanted out of there. 

That summer before high school, is when I think I started to feel down all the time. I tried to talk to my mom, even came home crying, but she brushed me off. “Get over it,” she said. “I'm not going to fight your battles.” All I wanted was for someone to tell me it would be okay. Instead, I felt myself giving up.

Today, I guess everyone knows what happened. They either pretend they don't or are upset it left a scar.  I would have given anything for stitches.