Bullied. Pushed around. Made fun of. Beaten down; school. I’m a freshman attending Shell Lake High School. On the outside, my life looks perfect. Growing up, I was an athlete year round, I had excellent grades, I had lots of friends, life was great. Until seventh grade. A lot happened in seventh grade. Long story short, I was diagnosed with not only depression, but anxiety as well. These make life very far from perfect. Every day is a battle against yourself. I used to love going to school, but I always find this one person who constantly puts me down for my mental health disabilities. I can’t control this. I don’t choose to be my own worst enemy. I don’t choose to have zero confidence, zero motivation, constant worrying, a past addiction of self-harm, I don’t choose this. It’s a chemical imbalance in your brain. I was told to keep this short to get to the point, but I know this is important. I constantly get picked on and thrown to the ground by one person, and it makes me feel like garbage. I’m not the only victim of this person's ways either. Say their name to any high schooler, and they can probably tell you some awful things they’ve said/done. Typically, this person would get written up, but they can’t because they’re our very own principal at Shell Lake. When you think of a leader, what comes to mind? I don’t know about you, but for me, I see someone powerful, understanding, determined, and thoughtful. To be a leader, you need to be open to other people’s ideas. You need to be willing to hear people out while taking control of the situation. You need to want change and stick to it. You need to be able to motivate and excite others. One of the most powerful roles of leadership in our school district is the Principal. Now, do you think someone, ignorant, selfish, rude and dictating, is fit to be a leader? Do you think someone who makes fun of kids for their mental health disabilities and makes them feel guilty for qualities that they cannot control, is fit to be a “role model?” Our principal at Shell Lake is constantly putting not only the students down, but the staff members as well. I’ve witnessed her making more than two staff members cry, and that’s just terrible. I have very bad experiences with Mrs. Cox. Whenever I would have a panic attack at school, I would go into the bathroom or the guidance room for some peace and quiet. I didn’t want judgy eyes on me, or to disrupt the class. I have full permission from all of my teachers -besides two- to take a lap around the school if needed. I was in one of the teacher’s classes that didn’t allow me to walk out when needed, but I had to. I walked out without asking, but only because I could feel my breathing getting heavy; I could feel the hot tears stinging in my eyes. The last thing that I wanted was for people to see me like this, so I walked out to go the the counselor. She was gone, so I walked back to class. Mrs. Leeper sent me to the office, and Mrs. Cox talked with me. I was respectful, but what she said made me so furious. She told me that I needed to stop with these, “anxiety attacks.” This “leader” said, “If you chose to have one during class, you need to at least be respectful enough to tell the teacher.” Well, I’m sorry to break it to you, but I can’t control this. If I could, I definitely wouldn’t be like this. It made me feel alone, and worthless. These things that inconvenience her, and are such a burden to her, is what I have to deal with, first-hand, on a daily basis. Since then, it’s only gotten worse. Even if I’m in the hallway, in tears, unable to breathe, she yells at me to get back to class, and calls my mom saying “I’m walking on thin ice.” If I was at the point that I was a year ago, that could push me over the edge. I’ve gotten a better grip on my emotional state with my writing, but I can guarantee if I were as emotionally unstable as I was last March, I would have probably transferred schools to stop me from completely hating myself, but I’m working on my mindset. Now, I’ve attempted suicide three times. My mom finally brought up the courage to write a post on Facebook about my story, and it ended up going viral. Everybody is afraid to talk about suicide, and depression, etc. But it needs to be talked about. That’s why I’ve been writing a book about my personal struggles every day; I have a voice, and it needs to be heard. Mrs. Cox doesn’t agree. As soon as she heard about my mom making that post, she tracked her down and basically told her how embarrassed she should be to be my mother. “Why would you want people to know that?” I felt like a total screw up. It’s just so sad that even the people that preach about helping, cause terrible self-esteem issues. To you, maybe you see a messed up kid overreacting, but I invite you to put yourself into my, and everyone else’s shoes that attend Shell Lake. Is this someone we want people to look up to? A bully; everything that we teach kids not to be since they were in Kindergarten? We emphasize how wrong bullying is, and how we don’t know what someone’s going through; so always be kind, in our school district, yet we hire the biggest bully I’ve ever met to lead us, students.