“I used to see myself as a misandrist. I hated men. They just seemed so annoying and disgusting to me. Why? A lot of reasons, but majorly because a bunch of them were responsible for the major and most downplayed problems I had and low-key still struggle with: insecurity and body dysmorphia.
As a kid, I was literally the most comfortable and confident person ever. You could even refer to me as the ‘life of the party’—a way that I now utterly despise being described as because I was always so hyped, cheeky, full of mischief and laughter. I never thought anything was wrong with me. I never thought I was flawed in any way. I never thought I was inferior to anyone. Never.
Everything changed in JS2 (8th grade). I had been standing next to the window, laughing with a friend about something random during recess, and the next thing I heard was, ‘She is so flat, she really looks like this drawing board’.
A drawing board is a smooth, flat surface where people place paper to write, draw, or design things.
It was one of those moments when you don’t hear something, but after some seconds, you realize that you actually heard it. Loud and clear. It kept ringing in my brain as I turned to look at the drawing board in the hands of the boy who had made the statement and then at the classmates who were equally laughing.
Truthfully, there were two things going on in my head at the time. One, the boy who was being mean to me was—let’s face it—not very physically convincing, and I could point that out. I could have said he looked like a freshly harvested yam and probably would have had people laugh at him too, but I was too stunned to speak because never in my life had I ever thought that someone could be compared to a drawing board, let alone me.
Two, I was slim, but taking another glance at the drawing board, I knew I didn’t look like that. If anything, I looked like a Barbie. But then again, nobody would be laughing if I truly looked like a Barbie. Everyone loved Barbie.
I took my eyes away from the drawing board and, subconsciously, they made their way towards all the girls in the classroom, letting me notice what I had never really taken note of: even though most of us were barely 14, they had started growing breasts. Some big, some smaller; but me, none. I also realised that I was the only slim one, so maybe I actually did look like the drawing board.
I felt terrible that I was likened to a board. I felt bad that the guys were laughing at me. I felt bad that the girls were laughing too, but I felt worse that I had thought I looked like Barbie. Delulu.
When I got home that day, I rushed to a mirror. Maybe I would be able to see the similarities between me and the drawing board, and I did. This was funny because I wondered how I’d never seen it before. It felt like the blindfold had finally been taken off my eyes, and I was now exposed to the real world.
I even watched Barbie that night, but there wasn’t much of a difference between me and her. Barbie looked like a drawing board to me, too, but I guess the difference was that she was BARBIE and she had Ken. Ken probably loved drawing boards. I have looked forward to finding a Ken ever since.
Another thing I did that night was to get my mom’s sewing kit and adjust my school uniform skirt to be tighter on me. Perhaps it’d make me look different from the drawing board, but it didn’t. When I walked into class the next day with my drawing board in my left hand, everyone laughed as the mean kid yelled, ‘Twinsss!’ Believe me when I say it was more embarrassing than the first day. I had to run to the bathroom to loosen the adjustment.
I later transferred to a different school (boarding, this time) after JS3 (9th grade). It felt like a relief for me because I had to spend the last two years walking on eggshells and being timid while struggling with my inferiority complex.
I was thankful. It felt like a real fresh start. I didn’t know anyone at this new school, and no one knew me. My mom bought me padded bras (even though I still didn’t have the kind of breasts that needed one), and best of all, the new school’s uniform came with a flared skirt instead. It was a relief that my bum wouldn’t be paid attention to because the skirt was neither tight nor straight.
Everyone seemed nice. I saw some slim girls like me, but I was still low-key anxious. You don’t expect my self-confidence to come back magically, do you?
Being the new girl at this school was a roller coaster. There were very few students in the school, so it was easy for the news to spread that there was a new girl. Some people were friendly, some people were snobby, and some people just kept on trying to access me, which made me feel weird.
I had gone into this school with my guard up, but somehow, I started buying into the niceness and attention I was getting. I let my guard down completely. That was the beginning of my mess-up. I completely loose-guarded.
Somehow, I became a pushover. I was desperate to boost my confidence, earn friends, and whatnot, so I started people-pleasing, lying to look cool, and letting people treat me anyhow. It became evident to me at some point that I was making a fool of myself, but it was already too late to correct the impression.
The fact that they could ride on me was already registered in their heads. It felt like whatever I tried to do to stop it would not be taken seriously. I decided to carry on with the people-pleasing and validation-seeking, but things got worse because I became hated and bullied. My classmates—girls and boys, seniors, everyone. I think I was even a joke to the juniors.
I can never forget all the times my class boys made me cry by making reference to how ugly I looked or how weirdly I walked or how “flat” I looked. On one occasion, my teacher even told one of the boys that in the future, I might be hot, and he’d like me after years of bullying me in school. He’d said “God forbid”, and I did too. But his own hurt me more. Did he think there was no way I could ever be good enough?
The class girls weren’t left out of the bullying. I remember being called a ruler by one of them. So basically, at that point in my life, I had been called a drawing board and a ruler. Isn’t that lovely?
I felt so suppressed in that school that I loved it at home. At least nobody thought I was a ruler or a drawing board there. Except for my mirror.
The mental stress was so overwhelming that I ended up writing a letter to the senior boys in SS2 and SS3 (11th and 12th grade), asking them to please forgive me for whatever I had done wrong. They were nice to me for a while, until I had to cut off all my hair because it was growing unevenly and I was nearly going bald. I just wanted it to grow back properly.
The taunting came back in double folds. I was called every bad thing you could think of, including an idol. As in, the stone- the object that is worshipped as a god, which is often used in religious or spiritual contexts.
The worst experience was the day a couple of girls and I went to fetch water from a tap close to the school compound, and those senior boys were all sitting nearby, talking and laughing out loud. Unfortunately for me, while heading back with my bucket of water, I fell right in front of them in a dabbing position, and they all started laughing and making ambulance noises.
It was so humiliating because even the girls laughed. I had always wondered why girls liked to laugh when boys are making fun of their fellow girls, but you’d never see a guy laugh when a girl is making fun of a fellow guy. I felt so bad, but still kept my cool and counted down to the day I would graduate.
Life in the school became better in SS3 (12th grade). My walls had started coming up, I was standing up for myself a lot more, my major bullies (the senior boys) had graduated, and I had started speaking to a few of my classmates cordially. It felt like I was beginning my rebranding process. I was going to launch it the moment I graduated.