I was eight when I first heard it.
“What’s wrong with you?” my teacher had asked, half in disbelief.
A bully had pushed me first, called me names and then laughed when I cried. So I pushed him back, and he fell. That’s it, that’s all I did. Those little fights we’ve all had as kids. Nobody was hurt.
But, for the first time in my life, I had defended myself.
And yet, the question wasn’t for him; it was for me. I remember how I felt: my hands clenched, my heart racing, as I stood there silently, wondering why standing up for myself was wrong.
The next time I heard it, I was thirteen.
A man on the bus, his hand slowly sliding under my skirt.
My heart beating faster as I gasped for breath. My stomach twisted into a rope. I felt paralysed.
But my voice — my voice was loud.
“HEY!” I shouted. Every eye in that crowded bus turned towards him as I yanked his hand away. I saw anger (or fear, I’m not sure) in his eyes, like he’s never seen a child yell and resist. The audacity!
“What’s wrong with you?” someone asked.
I looked at the man, expecting him to answer the question. But what I saw were eyes, staring at me, murmuring, as if I was the one doing something wrong.
As if I had overreacted. As if I had made a scene. As if I was supposed to let it happen and stay silent.
That day, I learned something about the world: my anger, my resentment, my self-defence, and my refusal to accept what was happening made people uncomfortable. It was easier for them to question me than to confront what he had done.
At sixteen, the question came from my parents.
“What’s wrong with you?” my mother asked, her eyes fixed on my grades, which had begun to slip away.
I had been waiting for someone to notice that I wasn’t quite myself.
So that I can tell her I was exhausted, that my mind felt heavy, that sleep never felt restful anymore, that I wasn’t being…
