Can I stop faking and still be popular?

Post Reply New Topic

I transferred to this new school because of bullying at the old one. I was, frankly, the object of everyone's hatred since I was "clueless". However at my new school I am extremely popular because I am very funny in their eyes.(I found an interesting mix of social deficiency and humor.) now that I got a diagnosis I want to be myself again. Faking so much has caused tremendous stress in my life and are starting to cause meltdowns at school, which I am trying to hide but are getting out of control. I am also getting depressed. Can anyone recommend some good ways to cope??

The same thing happened to me, when i got to a new school i learned from the old one and became quite popular aswell. Anyhow, once you`re popular you`ll have to slowly go back to yourself, not at once or they`ll think your nuts.

So yes, you can stop faking, Slowly transform back to yourself.

This happened to me in the last year of high school, i went too far into the "cool" and felt trapped there, with total strangers knowing my name and randomly sitting next to me to talk about god knows what. All the time. I fixed it by going to university but before the end of the year, i had still managed to get left alone a bit more . I didn't do that by shaking the "coolness" off, only the "approachability". Be rude to strangers. Answer in monosyllables. You can still be nice to your friends, but you can limit the crowd by not looking at anyone else than your "friends" and not letting strangers chat you up. They'll still think you're "cool", probably even more so, but you will feel less pressure. What causes the meltdowns and the "omg this has got to stop" feeling is the huge number of people you perform to, limit the numbers, limit the pressure.

I was bullied most of the way through school, but in the sixth form (which is age 16 - 18 in the UK - not sure how that relates to the US system) I changed schools and managed to get on ok with my classmates. I would not say I was excessively popular, not part of the "in" crowd, but I had a few friends and was not bullied there, and I was myself. I attribute this partly to people being that bit more mature and tolerant of difference by that age and partly to my social skills having improved somewhat as I learnt and grew myself.

I don't know how old you are, but are you able to find some sort of "happy medium" between being bullied and being everybody's friend? You don't have to be the most popular kid in the school not to be bullied, if you have a small circle of good friends that will normally be enough to put the bullies off as, in my experience, they tend to be cowards who target kids they see as loners.

If you're faking to be popular, then you're not really popular, the fake you is popular. I can't imagine anything more stressful than that.. I recommend not faking, and if people mock you or whatever, that's their problem.

I never felt like I was faking anything in school, and some people did deliberately antagonize me and it was stressful, but I was simply insecure about dealing with those situations in general back then and looking back it all seems rather silly. Being young and never having those sorts of experiences before it all seemed very momentous and massively meaningful, but now, it all seems meaningless. Maybe it will help to keep in mind that school is not much like actual life.. which might make you wonder why we bother with school, eh?

I have been faking for most of my adult life. I'm learning to stop and just be me (because the stress was literally endangering my life) but the results of doing this - dropping the act - so far have been exceptionally painful.

I still hope, however, that being me will make things better for me in the long run.

A series of medium steps, that both feel right to you and observe the social feedback (of course a lot of random flux and luck plays a role, too, of course it does)

In general, the goal is engagement, not conformity.

And maybe you can multi-task in some classes. One reason I recommend pre-studying math and science classes is that you can then sit in the back and watch other people's reactions, almost like an experience poker player. You can occasionally even be a low-key leader and help out the class, just don't overdo it or it becomes showing off.

no.

This, really.

I think that is the best way to do it!