I miss her. That sweet voice and those innocent eyes. All the questions that she had in her head waiting to be answered. She was always ready to learn and that is all she wanted to do. When she would fall asleep in the car and wake up in bed. All that mattered to her was making sure she didn’t get into trouble so that she could have her full ‘golden time’. There was no ‘what if’ there was just infinite possibility. I close my eyes and there she is, beneath the makeup and the clothes. I am still that little girl on the inside. I have just gotten bigger thats all.

When I was a little girl I remember finding my big sister in tears over her exam work. There is a twelve year gap between me and my sister so I was very young. I gave her a big hug and she stopped crying. She told me then not to grow up. That it was overrated and that she wished she could go back in time and be my age again. If only I had listened to her.

Of course I know that you can not not grow up but I know that I rushed the process. I was very mature for my age. My real childhood seems very short compared to everyone else’s. It seems to me that I acted about three years older than I actually was. I think this is partly to do with me being the youngest in my whole family. Maybe I was trying to fit in with my siblings or cousins, I do not really know because my memories have faded. One thing is for sure, my way of thinking is most definitely the opposite of what it was then.

I am now running away from my future. I panic when I think of being even just a year older. My first week or so of high school was living hell. I suddenly started having problems with anxiety and I started taking panic attacks. Most people don’t know about it. I am not one for looking for pity so I hardly ever bring it up. It also is not very pleasant to talk about or even think about. It was caused by my fear of growing up, although I did not know that then. I wanted to physically run away from everything and that is what I did. Luckily it does not effect me as much anymore. I have learned not to run away from problems, well at least in a physical way.

It is almost a state of denial that I have gotten myself into. I do not feel as if I am at the same stage as all of my peers. The must see me as being a very calm person because I don’t show much stress towards the future but really I just don’t think that its happening. Obviously I know that it will happen but right now I feel numb. In a year I will be going through what my sister was going through all those years ago. It scares me so much when I think of it so I just don’t. I just tell myself that its not really happening. Which probably is not the best thing to do because at some point I will have to come back to reality and my anxiety levels will be through the roof.

People do not really realize how immature I am. I manage to conceal it most of the time. I do this by dressing older and wearing makeup. I do this to try and balance out my now immature personality and way of thinking. It works well I think. My outside appearance and personality balance each other out to make me seem the age that I should be. To make me appear ‘normal’ to everyone around me.

I have found myself desperately trying to hold on to pieces of my childhood. I do not like chucking things out because I feel like I am letting them go. I try to memorize things. Things like the sound of my dads van driving up to the house, the sound of the keys turning in the door, the sound of my parents footsteps and everyones laughs. I want to spend as much time with my friends as possible too because I do not ever want us to drift apart.

I have made a promise to myself. It may sound silly to others but it is what I want to do. I will grow up, it will happen but I promise myself that I will never let the little girl inside of me die. I will follow her dreams and be who she wanted to be without caring about what others think just like she did back then.

I have a true fear of the future but does that mean that I don’t want it to happen? I don’t think so. I just feel as though I am not quite ready for it to happen yet. I need more time. Time that I don’t really have. I don’t know all the answers to everything I will need to know in life, I could but I just need more time. I can’t have more though. I will have to face the fear sooner or later. I do not really know how that work out but I am sure it will be alright in the end.