I'm my own knight in shining armour
Another tale from my past that has come to mean more than I could ever believe it would.
Hi, I’m Becky, an artist and writer based in Derbyshire. I write about my life in what I hope is an honest and open way. I write about mental health, autism, sobriety and simply trying to find my way in this world. Please subscribe to support my work and to read more of my posts.
Hi,
How’s things?
Today I am going to tell you another story from my past and how time has allowed lessons to form. I hope you enjoy it.
Stan
To tell the next story I have to refer to someone who I would have once referred to as one of my monsters. I have now grown up and healed some of my old wounds and leant that my ‘monsters’ were mainly just flawed, broken people.
The next name I was considering giving him was Fuckwit McGee because I have grown and begun to heal but I’m not perfect. I am, however, funny.
I am not going to refer to him as Fuckwit McGee because I am also an optimist and I like to think that now he is a fully grown adult who has healed his own wounds and is now a better person.
So, I am going to refer to him as ‘Stan’ because I have never met a Stan so the name holds no good or bad connotations. It’s just Stan.
So, who is Stan?
Stan was someone I went to school with. We were not friends or even acquaintances. We ran in different crowds. Different worlds, really.
He was ‘popular’. I was a ‘weird’ kid.
There is a certain type of popular kid who is popular whilst being a self-assured, confident, decent person. A person who just happens to run in a different crowd but there is no malice. The ones who when you’ve grown up and left school say ‘Hi’ when they see the ‘other’ people in street. They live with the knowledge that school is done and the divides never really mattered, if they ever even really existed.
And then there is the other sort of popular kid.
The ones who when they see you and your fellow weird kids have to be cruel. They have to say a mean comment.
You know the ones - the dickheads, the monsters, the bullies.
The ones who make people dread school. Make you cry every morning. Make you hate yourself.
And even when school is over, they still see the divides. They question when people from their popular world speak to you. They still refer to you as ugly, a freak or a goth.
School is long over but they still see the divides because they don’t know who they are without them.
Stan was one of the latter ones.
And Stan did all these things. I know this because he did it to me.
The story I want to tell you is from an evening in the pub and two of Stan’s friends are talking to me.
And Stan is hollering across the pub:
“Why are you talking to HER?”
“She’s an ugly, tattooed freak!”
“She ugly!”
“Stop talking to her!”
He is irate.
They are breaking the divide that keeps him safe. Keeps him the popular one. I know this now but at the time I was just really upset.
His friends tell me to ignore him. Tell me that he’s struggling, life isn’t going how he thought it would, he’s still living at home.
Upon hearing all this, I start to feel sorry for him and tell them that it doesn’t matter and I still live at home too.
They stop me.
“Don’t feel sorry for him. He’s a dickhead.”
At the time, I felt some form of vindication. An “A-ha! Even his friends can see him for what he really is!”.
Fast forward 10 years…
I am now working with a fabulous coach and, over the course of our time together, Stan comes up.
Over the years he has become the amalgamation of all the cruel people I have ever encountered. He is the face. He is the voice. He is the villain. He is one of my biggest monsters.
We talk about that night in the pub and I realise that I was waiting on someone to save me.
Yes, his friends told me to ignore him and to not feel sorry for him but no one, in a crowded pub, told him to stop.
I had, like I often did on my quest to find love in all the wrong places, separated myself from my friends. My friends, my angels, weren't there to help.
And no one else cared.
When I went back to that moment with my coach and saw that I just wanted one person to save me, one person to see that I didn’t deserve this kind of treatment, one person to tell him “Fucking stop! Leave them alone!” what I was really wanted was someone to prove my worth.
I wanted a knight in shining armour, not realising until ten years later that I could have been my own knight in shining armour.
I could have saved myself.
I could have told him to stop, to leave me alone, to shut up, to grow up. I could have been the one to tell him that I was a fucking human being, just like him, and I did not deserve to be treated like he was treating me.
Because, as with all situations like this, Stan did not know me.
We had never (and still have never) had a conversation. He did not know me so his dislike of me came from inside himself.
And I could have told him all of that except I couldn’t. Because 2011 Becky was not 2024 Becky.
2011 Becky was a broken shell, desperate to please, to be liked, to be loved. Willing to bend and break, to become whatever men wanted me to be. Willing to do and go through what men wanted to do.
Without saying a word and always believing I was the problem.
I was less than.
I was unlovable.
I was ugly.
I was a freak.
I look back and I feel their pain all over again. I can’t rid it from her or me but I can learn from it.
I can learn that I always had it in me to save myself because I am powerful.
I am a freak but I am now a proud one.
I am beautiful.
I am enough.
I am my own knight in fucking shining armour.
I am because I say I am.
With regards to Stan, I haven’t seen him in a now over ten years and, I will admit, I am grateful for that.
I hope he has found happiness and peace with who he is and with his life as a whole.
I hope he has healed.
And if I ever do see him again, I hope we treat each other as exactly what we are: complete and utter strangers.
Thank you so much for reading.
As always, if you enjoy this letter or if anything resonates, please let me know by replying to this email or by leaving a comment. And please share or restack! Thank you. 🙏
I hope you have the most wonderful week.
Take care of yourself.
Love,
Becky
🖤✨🌈
How powerful that you're able to go back in now, Becky, with the strength, wisdom, and badassery of your 2024 version...while still holding your 2011 version near and dear, knowing they also showed up with such heart and hope and courage. Here's to celebrating all of it, even as you step into your new story - one starring YOU as the hero!
I'm really proud of both 2024 and 2011 Becky, and I love to see you celebrate all the strengths, skills, courage and agency you've claimed in the time in-between. There is a real compassion here for 2011 Becky and everything that was hard and painful for them. I love the way you've been sharing these memories, it's been really inspiring to see. I've been thinking about memory a lot in my own writing and seeing you share these past experiences so authentically - as well as drawing these threads between past and present - is really affirming and powerful. Keep up the good work, Becky - this is a beautiful body of work you're building!