# Very High and Very Low: How one comment can mean a lot. *Long*



## Xeros (Oct 19, 2006)

This is going to be very long, but as part of my total life makeover I wanted to write this. I'm doing this to make up for things I've lied about in the past both on this forum and other places and also as part of my new leaf I've turned over in the past 6 months.

I've hidden all of this since being on this forum because I was afraid of people not being able to empathize or even respect my past and the problems that it was a part of creating.

*November 2003:*

My peak in life. I'm on top of the world. I'm a sophomore in high school, have just gotten my driver's license and am having a picture perfect life:

-I've got a perfect scholastic record. I've never gotten a B in any grade and am currently #1 in my class with a perfect GPA. All without ever really putting much effort into anything. I'm able to do homework quickly just minutes before it's due and have never studied for a test. Due to my high grades on everything else, I tend to voluntarily take a few 0s on any presentations or speeches. When asked by other students, I just said I didn't want to do the work and wouldn't be hurt by the grades, which is not the real reason.

-I'm a member of every scholastic team the school has and even get selected as "Mathlete all star" (sounds nerdy doesn't it?) by the organization we compete in. Despite being offered, I never take a speaking or leadership roll in any of the teams due to my hidden anxieties.

-Advised by a college professor, I take the ACT a year earlier than most do. I end up scoring a 35 out of 36, which was one of the highest ever done by an underclassmen and turned out to be the 2nd highest in my class.

-Athletically I'm the only underclassmen to start on a varsity team. Not only did I start on one I started on all four sports I played (Basketball, Football, Baseball, and Track) I could dunk even though I was only 5'10", ran back 7 punts and kickoffs for touchdowns, could run a mile in under 5 minutes, and threw a 90mph fastball. Although I had always played sports and gone to practice, a lot of my taken was just natural. I never had to nor did I know how to work hard for anything.

-When the seasons end I am one of three underclassmen named to all-conference in football, one of four underclassmen named all-area for baseball, and the only player from Division A (smaller schools) to be given all state basketball honors. I'm also the only person to play both baseball and track as they occur at the same time. I would literally run my events and then put on my baseball uniform. I set two conference records in the 200m dash and 4x200 relay and end up winning the single A high school Nambert award that is given to the best pitcher of that season. I return kicks in the state 1A all star football game and got third place at the 1A state home run derby. I also end up being invited to a major Nike sponsored basketball camp in Chicago that features NBA players as coaches and is watched by many college recruiters. I even got pulled aside by the newly appointed University of Illinois head coach Bruce Weber at the camp for some basketball advice and to be given his recruiter's contact information.

-Somewhat because of my academic achievements, but mostly for my athletic abilities I had already gotten letters of intent drafted and written up by a few college recruiters. I had multiple full ride offers for smaller schools and one partial offer from a major Big 10 school with a highly ranked basketball team. I had numerous articles written about me both at the local and state level, and had a few of my games broadcast live on an Illinois tv station who I also did live phone interviews with after the games. I even had a dunk of mine shown on a national network during a high school highlight montage.

-The local paper as well as a few lawyers and "representatives" call to set up an event for next year in which I will sign a letter of intent to my college choice in front of local cameras and journalists. I even get a call from a car dealership owner to ask if I will wear a shirt with the dealers name on it during the signing, they couldn't pay me due to IHSA rules, but I got the feeling I could get a discount on a nice car if I wanted. I end up deciding not to due to the risk of looking like I was accepting bribes.

-Although I am quiet and pretty shy, I manage to mask that through my athletic achievements and having a bunch of friends who I'd known since I was very little. I hang out with the most "popular" kids in and after school at practice, but due to my anxiety I find myself skipping the big parties and end up hanging out with the less popular kids who I actually preferred anyway.

-Still in spite of my shyness, I get asked to homecomings and other events by numerous girls. I end up going with and dating one of the hottest girls in school who is not only a year older than me, but is also one of the captains of the cheerleading squad. We had also known and been friends since we went to the same daycare when we were just toddlers. Together we end up runner-up homecoming queen and king, and are voted best couple at the end of the year awards and had our picture taken together for the yearbook award section (I also won most athletic and she won "Nicest Person"). We were naive and young and had already begun talking about getting married someday and she was even planning on completely basing her future and education plans to fit where I would be playing basketball, in state or out of state. When I at one point was leaning towards a school we even went down to check out potential apartments we could get together. I was completely and thoroughly obsessed with this girl and we both thought that we were in 100% love.

So like I said. My life was a freaking dream. I listed all of the above not for ego or to brag, but to show how much things can change.

So fast forward a little while.

*Continued in next post below*


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## Xeros (Oct 19, 2006)

*Jan 2006*

My lowest point in my life. I'm towards the end of high school life as a senior. I've become a nervous wreck. The expectations of me as well as my always hidden anxiety has finally caught up to me. It destroys ever facet of my once awesome life.

-After a great summer with my girlfriend where we went on vacation together with our families as well as spending almost every day together, I make a mistake that is as stupid as it was cocky. While at one of the basketball camps I go to in Chicago I end up hanging out with one of the girls who was reporting on the camp as an intern for a newspaper. I'm not even 17 yet and she is a 19 year old gorgeous girl who asks me to hang out with her. I had a big ego and thought that that I deserved to at least go out with this girl once. Since it was 70 miles north in Chicago, I figured there was no way my girlfriend would ever find out.

A couple weeks later during the second month of school my girlfriend finds out from a friend of hers who heard it from a Chicago cheerleader at a cheerleading camp that I was with the newspaper girl. Even though I didn't she had been told that I kissed the girl while walking down the streets of Chicago. In the middle of lunch in the middle of cafeteria she, being the very emotional person she's always been, loudly confronts me and starts crying. I'm getting embarrassed and blushing tomato red so I try and ask her to step out into the hall to talk. She calls me an ******* and throws a cup of vanilla pudding on my lap and storms out. She ended walking out of the school and driving home, which got her a few detentions for skipping. By the time I caught up with her that night she had calmed down and made me confess to hanging out with the girl, but I insisted I didn't kiss her. She didn't believe me and said that hanging out with her was just as bad. That incident along with a few others led to us completely breaking up by the end of the month.

-Since my girlfriend and I hung out with the same group of people, it quickly became very awkward. She was still mad at me, and I was cocky and mad at her for being mad in the first place. She would get up and leave the second I walked into the same room as her, giving me the most awful look along the way. I ended up going on a few dates with other girls (including one who my ex completely hated), but never could be as open and comfortable with them as I was with the girl I had known since I was very young. My last date and really my last non-formal contact with a girl was just before Christmas of my Junior year.

-All this time I had been growing more and more nervous. From completely ridiculous fabrications that SA creates, the constant pressure and expectations to lead my teams, and at the growing pressure of having to decide on a school to sign with I started to fall apart. The bitterness and sadness that came from breaking up with my girlfriend really stomped things even deeper.

-My grades slipped dramatically. I found out that I did in fact not know everything once I entered some advance upper classes. I had no study skills, no self discipline, and no motivation. I rarely did homework, flunked tests, and didn't pay attention at all during class. I went from being #1 in my class my sophomore class to not even being in the top 50% by the middle of my senior year. I'm getting C's and even a few D's on my report card and have one partial scholastic scholarship offer rescinded due to this.

-A few weeks I actually became academically ineligible to compete in any sports. Which left my team and other students mad at me for not being able to help win. These problems coupled with a fight with a coach, a school suspension, and my lack of desire to play caused me to go from All Star four sport athlete, to not playing a single one by the time my senior year started.

-I had started using drugs to cope while still active in athletics. I literally had days where I came to school high on weed, and would drink vodka out of a water bottle at lunch. When practice came at the end of the day I would pop an ADD pill I had purchased from another student so I could get some energy back to play. It obviously didn't work too well and it quickly became a problem. I had games where I was literally bringing the ball up the court while not being able to see 10 feet in front of me due to the extreme dizziness and vision impairment caused by the multiple drugs I was usually on. I ended up becoming physically addicted to opiates and prescription stimulants. I even ran out of stimulants once before a came and ended up going through withdrawal by the the third quarter. I was benched for the rest of the game and the crowd booed the coach for doing so. I still maintain the opiate addiction to this day and have wasted thousands of dollars on it.

-I never signed a letter of intent and most of the offers expired. Even if they hadn't they would have denied me due to my recent exploits. I had a few reporters call me trying to figure out what happened and if I would be playing basketball again. They had heard about possible drug use and assumed that or an arrest was the source of my sudden disappearance. When in reality the problem was the extreme anxiety and social pressure coupled with the sadness of the breakup. A sports blogger for a newspaper writes a "Farewell to *my name*" after people find out I've quit everything. It's filled with criticism and cheap shots directed at me. It's also the last time my name is mentioned in any media outlet. The fact that I was a top recruited all star athlete is completely forgotten by the time I'm done with school. Nobody cares.

-So i've got all of the above as well as growing resentment and anxiety from the rest of my school. I'm still technically friends with some people, but they view me differently and a few even openly mock me for ruining everything. I routinely skip school and forge notes to get out, which leads to me getting multiple Saturday detentions and eventually a 2 day suspension. I eventually end up dropping out of High School four months before the rest of my class graduates.

-After leaving high school I spend my days going to an alternative school for "troubled" kids to try and still graduate. The teachers there constantly ask me why I'm there since I'm literally the only one who doesn't need help with schoolwork. I just shrug my shoulders and keep quiet and never talk to anyone the whole time I'm there. I end up completing it and getting to graduate with the rest of my class, but I get too scared about showing my face there again that I skip my high school graduation completely. I heard that they even announced my name and no one walked out.

-Over the next couple of years I spend my time sitting around at home, lazily applying for minimum wage jobs, and continuing my drug use to mask it all. I actually try out for a semi-pro basketball team, but quickly realize that my apathy and drug use has ruined my athleticism and stamina. I get destroyed and don't even come close to making the team. I have no friends, no money, no college education, nothing. I literally didn't even talk to anyone I wasn't related to for a couple years. I stole money from family to buy drugs, and spent any money I didn't steal on them as well. I came close to dying a few different times from mixing too many drugs and was hospitalized twice.

-During one particularly bad time I end up committing myself to a mental hospital. I was actually put in a padded room for an hour while they set me up. I quickly regretted going and that night I broke a part off of my bed and was planning on threatening the night guard to let me go. I felt guilty and admitted my plan before carrying it out. Later that night I was released.

I was at rock bottom.

*Final words in the next post*


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## Xeros (Oct 19, 2006)

So there it is. I went from having everything I ever wanted to a completely worthless loser who was doing nothing but using up resources better used by productive people. 

So what is the point of this extremely long post? Well not too long ago I ran into my old girlfriend. It was awkward at first, but we eventually spent awhile talking. While talking at a food court, a kid from our class walks up to visit. The kid was a bit a reject in school. He had tried out for things, but wasn't even close to being athletic, no matter how hard he tried. While sitting there, he says something to me that although sounds meaningless, completely changed me.

"You were awesome in high school. My little brother still talks about watching your games. I'm sure you'll be awesome in everything else."

He said this and then left. Leaving me staring at the spot where he stood. I turned to my ex and she agreed with him. Right then and there I started to break down and spent a lot of the night fighting off tears. I told her everything and she told me to get out and fix things. I told her I missed her and she shot me down as nicely as she could and then left.

Since then I've taken a business I helped found and have grown it into a good size entity employing quite a few people. I've lost 50 lbs and am actually lighter than I was in high school and working every day towards getting back to the way I was. I'm also playing basketball again in an adult rec league, and have even gone out a couple times with new people. Even more recently I've started to get compliments and flirtation from a few girls, as well as messages from online dating sites.

I've got a long way to go still. I still get pretty anxious, I still have regrets that I can't get over, I still have an addiction, and I don't think I'll ever not miss the attention I once had. But I'm so much better than I was and am actually making my parents proud. Sure I wish I could've made them proud by appearing on national TV during March madness, but I still feel pretty good about things now. Plus it's unlikely that I would have gone far in college athletics anyway.

And all that from one simple comment from a kid I probably ignored in high school and who I know I knocked over and insulted during a basketball tryout. He got made fun of, picked on, rejected by girls, and wasn't liked by teachers. Yet through all that he still was pretty successful and a way better person than I ever was. He could've easily kicked me when I was down and made up for some of his embarrassment I might have contributed to in the past. Yet he decided to compliment and encourage me out of nowhere. I'm very thankful for that comment and have recently told him so. I felt like an ******* for allowing myself to fall this far. I was feeling sorry for myself even though I had everything at one time. This kid had never really had much, yet was still a good and kind person. If he could do it, it should be no problem for me.

So maybe you don't care about all this. You probably didn't even read it, and you may not feel bad for me at all. I am in the process of reworking and improving my life and thought it was important to write this stuff out. I thought maybe someone would like to read it or at the very least I could let people know how a simple compliment can mean so much.

Thanks for listening.


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## shadowmask (Jun 22, 2009)

That was a great read. It's good to hear you're headed down the right road again, keep at it.


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## GoldenHeart (Jul 1, 2011)

:clapReally can't say anything else.


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## josh23 (Nov 26, 2010)

That was an awesome read bro, and I'm glad things are turning back around for you!


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## WalkingDisaster (Nov 27, 2010)

Your life would make a good movie!


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## Wildman (Apr 9, 2011)

Really nice story, glad you posted it. Quite amazing how that one moment turned things around for you; it's one thing to feel moved and motivated to turn things around for a few days, but it's a whole other monster to actually persist, maintain that motivation, and really change. Impressive to say the least.


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## purplefruit (Jan 11, 2011)

That's really friggin amazing, I can't say anything else but I wanted to make sure the thread stays on the top for everyone to see.


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## DarkComeSoon (Jul 2, 2011)

Wow, that's a really impressive story. Amazing how such a comment can turn your life completely around. Keep it going! :clap


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## Xeros (Oct 19, 2006)

Thanks for the kind words. They really mean a lot. I don't tend to get many kind words from people who knew of me back then.

I actually had the sports reporters from the local newspaper call me up and want to do a story about where I went and what happened. Every time I go back to hometown to visit family, I get approached by people in public asking what happened. It's extremely embarrassing to try and explain it to them, and a lot times I just try and get out of it. So I thought explaining everything on a full page newspaper article would get people off my back.

So I spent a day at the newspaper's office posing for a few pictures, and telling these two sports writers what happened. 7-8 years ago they were calling me one of the best athletes to ever come out of the division, and now I'm sitting there telling them about what it's like to buy heroin in the ghettos of south side Chicago at 2 AM.

The article never ran due to my former high school not wanting to be associated with the drugs and other terrible things I took part in while attending the school. I'm kind of glad it didn't.


I'll shut up now as I don't want to come off as an attention seeker. I could tell a ton of stories about the illegal and dangerous stuff I took part in, but it would all eventually blend together in a massive pile of immorality and ignorance.


Thanks again. I mean it.


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## RockIt (Jan 8, 2011)

This is your future. Just live it. -Nike


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## johnstamos (Sep 9, 2010)

This is a hell of a story man, extremely lugubrious but inspirational.


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## applish (Jul 14, 2011)

Thanks for sharing! Very inspiring. I'm wondering if you have overcome the fear of public speaking?


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## sherbert (Jun 24, 2005)

WOW! This is an incredibly well told story. Are you gearing up for your memoirs? Remember, it has to be pronounced mem-wahs in the most pretentious way possible... LOL

Seriously though, this is very thoughtful and insightful stuff. It's beautiful how at the end you're able to acknowledge being a bit of an *******, while viewing other's lives with a sense of compassion. That's a huge change and one that should not be taken lightly! I think that one comment was perhaps the 'straw the broke the camels back'. I've had a few moments like that too. Everything just seems like it's going to sh&^ and that one comment or look seems to put everything in perspective or to shatter that one last shred of hope left.

Since you're on this path now, there's obviously no way of knowing 'what if', there simply is today. It's a long journey, as you have discovered, but once you have been to the bottom, you start to completely reassess what is _really _important in life and who truly deserves your attention. All that stuff Oprah spoke about... it's not bunk, well, not all of it anyways. You have to love yourself and you have to take mental-health very seriously. It's one of those things that can run away quickly if not kept in check. I am constantly reminded and humbled by my emotional fragility, BUT at the same time I am appreciative of having so many good people on my side. That's something to acknowledge; there's a lot of good people out there.

As socrates supposedly said,' the unexamined life in not worth living'.


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## steve21 (Jul 17, 2011)

Thanks for sharing your story, it was a great read. It really sounds like you're figuring things out. I'm sure you're on the right track to get where you want to be.


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## sapik (Aug 30, 2011)

Kudos. I hope you'll get better and graduate from this stuff.


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## Xeros (Oct 19, 2006)

sapik said:


> Kudos. I hope you'll get better and graduate from this stuff.


I have pretty much. I still have a pretty heavy opiate addiction, but it's not like what you see on TV. It's basically like a morning coffee routine. I need to take it or else I feel terrible and will literally get sick. I'm not impaired at all by it as my tolerance is too high. It would actually be far more dangerous for me to try and drive after going 48 hours without any of the drug than if I drove a little bit after taking it.

Other than that I'm absolutely loving life. Just got a new apartment and I think I have even found the love of my life with my current girlfriend who I've been dating for a few months now. My business is booming, I'm making more money than I thought possible, I have a boat load of friends, and there is not one single trace of the crazy anxiety that once completely ruined my life and almost took it.

I think I'm just lucky. I just had a moment of clarity and was able to build of it. I'd like to think that everyone with somewhat similar problems (I doubt to this extreme) should be able to have that moment too and fix their lives. It's not something you can be told or forced to do. I have fundamentally changed my way of thinking and outlook on life. I didn't destroy the old me, I fixed my defects and am now the best I can be.

I actually went to a SA support group to tell this story a few weeks ago. Most of them were really interested although a few of them heard the word heroin and immediately decided I was a terrible person. Oh well, glad most of them got something out of it, at least I hope they did.

Thanks


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## Selbbin (Aug 10, 2010)

The power of words. I bet that guy doesn't even know how his one honest comment changed so much. Imagine what comments we make that change things for better or worse, hopefully better.


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## jenkydora (Nov 11, 2003)

I read most of it and get the gist of it. 

If I could say one thing now, would be to pay it forward and good for you. 
We dont always see what others see.


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