Ever since I was a small child, trouble found me like a shadow that never lifted. I wasn't just difficult—I was relentless in my disruption. Rebellion wasn't something I chose so much as something that lived in my bones, a constant hum beneath everything I did. Teachers would exchange glances when I walked into the room. Parents of other children learned to keep their distance. Friends drifted away faster than I could hold onto them, one by one, until there were fewer and fewer left standing.
Looking back now, I can trace the pattern with painful clarity. Every friendship I had seemed destined to fracture. Every group I tried to join eventually found ways to exclude me, though honestly, maybe I helped build those walls myself. There's something in me—something restless, something destructive—that makes people uncomfortable. I cause problems and i cause sins. Not occasionally, not accidentally, but constantly, persistently, in any way and every way possible. I leave wreckage behind me without fully understanding how the devastation happened until it's already done.
So it became natural, almost expected, that I wouldn't be included. Groups closed around themselves without me. Conversations moved forward when I arrived and resumed after I left. Connections that others formed easily felt like languages I couldn't learn, doors I couldn't open, invitations that never came my way. I have fewer and fewest friends than I can count on one hand. Sometimes zero. Sometimes I wonder if anyone remembers me at all anymore.
Now I spend the days wrestling with a question that won't let me sleep at night: Am I cursed? Is there something supernatural about this loneliness, some spiritual weight placed upon me for reasons I don't understand? Or is this simply the harvest of seeds I planted long ago, consequences rippling outward sin through time?
And the honest answer, the one I've come to accept with heavy certainty, is that it's the latter. It's always been the latter.
There are no curses that could surpass the damage I've caused myself. I made my enemies. I created my foes. I drove away the hands that reached out toward me. Each broken trust, each betrayed confidence, each moment I chose pride over humility, anger over patience, destruction over repair—all of it adds up to the life I live now. A decade has passed since I started taking stock of these things. Almost fourty years of watching youth fade, not like dying—far from death—but like a flower wilting slowly under sun I cannot escape. The energy that once burned bright has dimmed to embers, and sometimes I'm not even sure those are still glowing.
My age is moving forward regardless. I'm older now, middle-aged approaching, perhaps already there depending on how I count. But growing older hasn't brought the wisdom I expected. It hasn't softened the edges or taught me better ways to relate. Instead, the realization has grown heavier: I have nobody to talk to. No one who knows the weight of my thoughts. No one who waits for messages I send. No one who checks in when I disappear for weeks at a time.
Being a hikikomori—withdrawn from society, trapped within four walls—this is where I live now. Some call it a disorder. Others call it a choice. I'm not sure which label fits best anymore, and maybe the difference doesn't matter. What matters is the silence. The walls close in. The internet becomes my window to the world, but it's glass I cannot break through. People pass by in videos and articles and forums, but none of them touch the skin of my reality. None of them sit beside me in this room. None of them ask how I'm doing without expecting anything in return.
Writing has become my only reliable companion. When the thoughts grow too loud, when the isolation presses against my chest like a weight I cannot lift, I put words on screens. Something about arranging letters into sentences makes the chaos feel manageable. It gives shape to feelings that otherwise would drown me. I pour everything into these pages—the regret, the shame, the confusion, the questions—and at least then the pain goes somewhere besides staying inside forever.
But here's what breaks me: I've lost the spirit for small talk. I've lost the energy for meetings, gatherings, anything that requires me to perform normalcy. Going outside feels impossible. Leaving this space requires effort I often cannot summon. Stepping into the sunlight feels like stepping into interrogation, like every eye would judge what they see walking among them. Even simple errands—a trip to the store, a walk to the mailbox—feel like climbing mountains.
I know this comes from whatever disease carries me down this path. I know there's a name for what I experience, clinical terms doctors use, prescriptions that try to manage symptoms that never quite resolve. Knowing the diagnosis doesn't make it easier. Understanding the mechanism doesn't change the reality that I am trapped. Medicine explains why, but it doesn't show me how to climb out. The weight remains no matter what label we give it.
And so I lie awake at night thinking about the future. Not with hope, exactly. Not with despair, either—not anymore. Just wondering. What will tomorrow look like? Will it be the same quiet prison? Will another year pass without voices entering my home except mine? Will I wake up decades from now and find myself exactly here, or somewhere worse, or somewhere I cannot imagine?
The future holds unknowns I'm afraid to name. What if nothing changes? What if this is permanent? What if the isolation becomes total? What if the world forgets me entirely? What if I am dying and nobody notices for days, weeks, months?
Sometimes I think about all the chances I could have taken differently. All the conversations I could have listened to instead of speaking over. All the apologies I could have offered before resentment built higher walls. All the moments when I chose defiance over reconciliation, anger over vulnerability, pride over surrender. If I had been gentler, kinder, softer—would things be different now? Could the people I hurt be forgiven and restored? Could I have friends who stay?
But time moves forward. Seconds become minutes become days become years. The past cannot be undone, only acknowledged. The consequences remain, whether they feel fair or unfair, whether they feel like punishment or natural result or something else I don't have words for.
Still, I wonder—if I could speak to my younger self, what would I say? Would I warn him? Would I tell him to choose differently? Would I promise that somehow, someday, there might be relief even if he cannot see it yet? Or would I tell him to brace himself for decades of learning lessons he's not ready to learn, carrying burdens he didn't know how to put down?
Perhaps the question isn't whether I'm cursed. Perhaps the real question is whether I can change when the past has built so many walls around me. Whether someone who spent decades breaking things can learn to build. Whether someone who learned to isolate can ever relearn community. Whether someone who caused so much pain can receive healing or must simply endure it forever.
I don't have answers for those questions yet. Maybe I never will. For now, I write. I speak into the void and listen for echoes that might tell me something is out there listening back. Until then, I carry this weight day by day, trying to understand whether the future can hold anything different than the past, or whether this is simply who I am and always will be.
No human being is truly righteous or innocent. The Bible clearly states that all have sinned (Rom. 3:23). And all sinners deserve to be punished, eternally. That’s what makes God’s grace so amazing! In understanding that truth, however, it must be admitted that on a relative human scale, righteous and innocent people exist. That is, some people are more moral and virtuous than others and some are more innocent. Consider, for example, a person who strives to live out the Golden Rule, or another who gives generously to the poor. And certainly most consider small children to have a naive innocence. So this question could be rephrased: “Why do little children and people who live exemplary lives suffer?” This question reveals the assumption that there is a direct connection between righteousness and innocence on the one hand and pain-free living on the other. There may be a connection, but it is not direct. Indeed, sin eventually does lead to suffering, but suffering is not an infallible indicator of sin. Job’s friends could not see beyond this point. For them, a person’s suffering was always an effect whose only cause could be that person’s sin. The righteous and the innocent do indeed suffer for a variety of reasons: 1) Sometimes righteous actions in a sinful world involve suffering—as when a righteous person sacrifices his or her life for another; 2) Sometimes the sins of others involve the righteous in suffering—a child may be deeply hurt as a result of his or her parent’s actions; 3) The righteous and innocent are not exempt from the painful situations which arise in life in an imperfect and sinful world—like toothaches and smashed fingers; and 4) People sometimes suffer for no specific reason that can be clarified. Job is a perfect illustration of this last experience.
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Mental Health