The Sadness That Comes With Help

We have all had questions that we feel could come off sounding dumb or uneducated. Whether we asked them or not is another story.

We’ve been told that if we have a question, someone else probably has the same inquiry and we should just ask in case the other person or people are afraid to ask for themselves. I have never been the person to raise my hand and ask the question, I have always waited for someone else to ask it first. There have been too many times where the question has gone unasked by me or my classmates and I have just been left feeling confused and lost. Aren’t we all supposed to have the same questions? That’s what we’ve been told. So, why did no one ask? Is everyone just as afraid as I am to sound dumb?

As previously stated, I don’t typically ask the questions on my mind, I leave them unspoken. In all classroom settings, I get worried that the people I am in the room with are smarter than me (some of them definitely are) and will think my questions are stupid, so I won’t ask for help. Unless I have a presentation that I need to present in front of said, smart people. If there is a presentation coming up I will ask everyone (I mean everyone) if they can read over what I have written, never trusting that my work is good enough and that the previous reader has lied to me.

This year being my senior, we have been tasked with writing a commencement address and doing a speech for the class. When we were first told about this I was so worried that I wouldn’t get it done on time (being the huge procrastinator that I am) but I managed to get it done with a few days to spare. Having it done before it was due was new for me, it left me with so much time to worry that it would never be good enough and everyone would laugh at me, saying it “was the worst piece of writing they had ever heard” which was mostly just my paranoia talking but still I was paranoid. So, I thought of all the things that I could do to get out of reading it aloud, contract a deadly disease, have a heart attack, be laid up in the hospital for a bit, or drop out of high school on my last day. None of these are actually reasonable things to do or even possible for me to do on command. This led to me having to ask for help. HELP. That is one of the hardest things for me to do. But if I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of my peers then I would need a few proofreaders.

The idea of having anyone look at my work made me feel absolutely sick to my stomach but it needed to be done. I asked my mom if she would read it, never having been allowed (by me) to read my work before, she jumped at the opportunity. She read it and she laughed at the appropriate times and told me that it was really good. I did not believe her. I needed a second opinion, so I asked my dad. He did not laugh but that was to be expected with him. He said that it was a great piece and he really liked it. I did not believe him. I needed a third opinion. I asked my best friend. She read it and said that she loved it and that everyone else would too. I did not believe her. I needed a fourth opinion. I kept asking people to read it and they all told me the same things but I didn’t trust them. They were my friends and my family, it felt like they were obligated to tell me that it was good. I needed to ask my teacher for his opinion. I once again felt sick to my stomach. Asking my teacher to read over my work was one of my worst fears (irrational) but it was very needed. I asked him and he said of course. The entire time he was reading it over I was panicking, what if it wasn’t good enough for him? What if I did everything wrong? He came back to me with three comments for the whole essay. Only three. That had to mean that it was good enough. Not for me. I asked him hoping to ease up on my worries but instead, I was still worried that I was being lied to (honestly I think I’m just losing my mind) which is not logical at all. Why would the teacher lie to me? He wouldn’t (at least I don’t think he would), not about an essay.

Asking for help was a huge struggle for me to overcome. After I asked I regretted it, I was still freaked out and worried that it wasn’t good enough. To ease my anxiety was the only reason I asked and it did not help me. My question was not stupid. It was a perfectly reasonable thing to ask. Even if I did not get the answer that I wanted.

“Essay Time (Rousseau and Women): My desk at the library” by tim.riley is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.