The Moment I Realized I Was No Longer A Child

It Was A Hard Question To Answer...

In English Class, the question "When was the moment you realized you were no longer a child?" and I stared at that pretty startled. There was really no definitive moment, but I will explain that in the post. In this post I will talk about what happened to me and I will add on to what I said, because I did not have enough time in class to answer the question to it's entirety. 

Note: Some of my new thoughts will be intertwined with what I wrote for class.

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The moment I realized I was no longer a child was the day that I realized the world was not a good place. There was no time, place, or reason for it, I just remember one day that I sat in my room crying for hours at the thought of how horrible the world is and in a way, I still try to keep a sense of innocence and immaturity. It is a beautiful thing to be a child, there is no care and worry. You see the beauty in everything and then one day it just goes away. That is why it's very confusing, but I think I will always live in an imaginary world. There is no reality for me, the thought of death, growing up, drama, it just saddens me and I'd rather not deal with it. I feel like you lose your innocence bit by bit, too. As you keep progressing through life you learn about so many things and each one will make you think (or not) and then somehow that piece of innocence that you had is gone.

When I was three or four, my mother read me the Bible, and being me, I loved to ask questions. There was a part in the beginning (Genesis) where someone dies and I ask my mom "Why do people die?" and she explained that everyone does. I then proceeded by asking, "Not everyone dies though, right?" and she said, "Yes, everyone dies." I was shocked for a split second and I began to cry. I did not want to die, I still do not want to die. I NEVER want to die. It's just a sickening, saddening thought and I think that bit in my mind that I have not yet fully processed is what keeps me a kid at heart.

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Death: Learning about death and experiencing seeing people die is something I don't like to see. I don't like to think that every moment in the day could be a moment I die or someone else dies. I know we're supposed to die, but it's not something I'm particularly fond of thinking. I'm afraid of what's on the other side and when I was a kid and even now, just thinking of death made me worry so much that I had to cry. Why do we die? Why do we see others die? What does death feel like? It all runs through your head for a while.

Love: When you're a child, love is love from everyone. Your family, your friends, people you trust. They all love you. When you get older and you see so many painful things that go hand in hand with love, such as divorce and affairs, you acquire a different perspective on something that was so wonderful before. For me, learning that divorce occurs made me have a different perspective on love as a whole. Do people really love each other? Why do they separate? You can't love someone temporarily. At least that's what I thought. Knowing that love is not as simple as it should be is what scared me. It never really makes me cry though, it just makes me feel like no one will ever truly love me. I'd rather have the love of my family and friends, then the fake love of someone who does not love me for who I am.

Santa/Easter Bunny/Tooth Fairy: You're probably thinking, well kids don't care about this. Yes, we do. Personally, I'm against telling kids these guys are real. When you tell them that they aren't real, they freak out and rightfully so. Imagine your whole life thinking something is real and it's not. It just freaks them out and makes everyone else look like a liar. Lying is a bad thing and when that part of us realizes it, we may not do anything about it at the moment, but after a while we begin lying ourselves.

Race: I hate the moment you realize there are other races. I liked it better when you were a kid and everyone was your friend regardless of how they looked. You didn't even know what Black, White, Asian, Hispanic was when you were a kid, because it wasn't something you had to worry about. I remember when I realized this, it didn't bother me, but a lot of other people became pretty racist. They made racist jokes and they meant them and they expected you to do something, because of what you are. Right now, I don't really care. I make jokes like that and I make fun of stereotypes, but I don't do it to be malicious. I do it, because everyone needs to realize that it's all in fun. The thing about kids is they realize that and every little moment they don't just breaks them apart and makes them less and less innocent.

Sex: I find this to be the thing that does not necessarily break a child's innocence, but it's something very scandalous when we do find out. For years we'll laugh at everything that has to do with sex, whether it be positions (which is more of a middle school thing) or private parts (which is definitely an elementary thing). We think it's something we shouldn't talk about at all and that the word itself is horrible and shouldn't be said. It makes us laugh, but why? Do we think that knowing this makes us any less of a child? I think so. The last piece of innocence that really does go away does have to be sex. The moment you lose your virginity is probably the last innocent moment of your life and then it's gone, but I don't think a lot of people realize that until after they regret it.

Bad Words: Bad words, like sex, they make children laugh. Children think that for some reason saying those words makes them so very grown-up, when they're really just giving away a piece of their child-hood. I don't think I said bad words until I was eleven and that was really hard for me. I thought it was really bad of me until it became normal and still today I don't try to say bad words, but it just becomes so a part of you, that you don't really stop.

My whole point is, once you lose your innocence, there's really no taking it back, so the least you can do is try to hold on to it for as long as you can, because things don't become the same again after it's gone.