THE LONGEST NIGHT

   "In the long dark night of the soul, you may found darker shades of night's knowledge like sheets of papers of a black book. You might easily lost yourself in its pages. At the end of the night, there will be a blinding divine light that will blaze darker shades into nothingness but night's shades latched themselves into you. After all, ABYSS would gaze into you. If you don't let the light into you, your inners will be darken with time but if you do, battle between the dark and the light will start instantly in you. That collision, that resistance of two sides will bore a new dawn in you. After all, LIGHT shines through all. There, you will find the truth."      -   Article: Dark Night of The Soul

    I used to be a silent child. All you could see would be an introverted, numb and shy child. Within that silence, there was a threatened, fearful, depressed, bored child. No one were able to see it because that child was trying to survive from the threatful people by not showing anything at all.

-----------   Kindergarten days   -----------

<>  LOSERS CLUB, THE DEVIL AND THE ANGEL

   My father used to wake me up at 7 AM but he was too angry for some reason that I couldn't guess. He was giving me commands with anger. If I were to do anything stupid while preparing myself, he would shout me across from kitchen with an angry, ashamed face. He was dropping me off to the school with a normal face. For other people, he needed to look normal but not at home.

   I was at school again. My heart kept beating hard and fast. I wasn't supposed to act weird around other kids or they would have a moment to bully me. So because of that I've had to calculate every move I could take: move your arms and legs exactly the same angle while walking, do not make eye contact with others which would make them angry or have a reason with me so look to the floor or to walls instead, obey the rules and don't complain with anything. 

   I've had a group which contains 4 of my best friends. Our group had no name but if it could have a name, it would be "Losers Club" since we've been excluded by other kids. 

Our group had 5 losers:

  -  a girl who looked ugly in other's eyes with a bad reputational family but have a boy's physical strength

  -  a boy who wears glasses, had a black belt of karate and had a curiosity with army and army planes

  -  a boy with a horny side and a bad mental health who used to do funny moves to make others laugh

  -  a boy who used to act and talk feminine, love pop culture songs, love cooking but brave than most of kids

  -  me who had a talent to draw and curiosity to computer programs, building things to create machines but sensitive as hell about human relationships

   We would hang out in school and out of school but above all, we were happy. Yet we were being bullied by all school kids and some of our teachers. I was always on alert if they would stop us on our way to fight with/bully us. I was sort of a group's leader but not at the same time because being a leader meant great danger from outside threats and my father wasn't teaching me how to defend myself both emotionally and physically.

   Later that day, school day was over and I was heading to my home at 2 PM. There was my angry father, there I was returning to my everyday prison. I've had to calculate and control MY EVERY MOVE with fear in order not to make my father angry: walk normal, talk less and cautious, do not ever let things fall on floor which may make him shout at me, eat every plate normal ---> do not make loud noises with spoon/fork or do not spill/drop your drink/food, do not show emotion since he could look to me with an angry face, do not show your own thoughts since he can think they were stupid and would be angry again. This calculation and control process would last until 7 PM where my beloved mom would arrive home from work. I would run with everything I had and hug her legs tightly. DO NOT CRY, DO NOT FUCKING CRY because if you do, your mom would fight with your dad and you would be the main reason and therefore when your mom left the house for work, your dad would treat you even worse. Show only love to your mom. She would bent down towards me with a huge warm hug. From that point I was free to show my emotions but even then I would look secretly to my father's eyes to see if he was angry with my moves.

And then I've had to sleep at 11 PM which I would hate to do because when I would sleep and wake up, all the painful process would start again until my mom would be at home. Yet, sleeping and dreaming about nice things would give me comfort as a child.

This process kept continuing for almost 8 years.

-----------   Highschool Days   -----------

<>  A NEW LIFE

   I was different now. I was going to a GYM near my home and do lots of workouts with my best-friend who had feminine moves. We would gossip about the good looking muscular men on GYM. The result of our huge exam was finally there and we won our next schools. We were studying at the dedicated course building for the huge exam for almost 3 years. We work our asses to get there and finally we won but we won different school. So we were splitting our loser's club. Yet I was feeling like I won the gift of starting everything over. I would have different friends, different places etc.

  It was a summer time. I was swimming and I was playing games: I was enjoying my vacation on my older sister's home. She had a big pool where I can play and swim but I was all alone. Because of that I was messaging with my loser's club friends on Facebook chat and on sometimes MSN. 3 of them was busy too much and it almost felt like they didn't want to be friends with me anymore. So I kept messaging with my gym bud. Then he messaged me. He said that he was a bisexual person, he would be sleeping with men and going to different countries in the future. First I was shocked and I've kept my time for thinking. I was also thinking men sexually but also have love for women... but all of the bullies called me gay just for hanging out with him?? I knew I couldn't keep being friends with him because I wanted to be normal and be treated as normal. I couldn't bring him with me to my new future or new people also would call me gay just because hanging with him. I knew I had to end this 8 year long friendship. Unfortunately, I have had to treat him like I was a homophobe. I needed to treat him bad to end this friendship. So I did and what I did had started a shameful circle to feel shameful for rest of my life. I did something selfish and I wasn't know how bad it was to make a person feel lonely and unsupported. But nowadays I look back and I understand that I didn't had the bravery which he had on that day. He was very brave for opening himself that day and I wasn't brave enough be next to him to support him as his best-friend. From then to my first high school day, I was lonely because I had broken bonds with my last friend.

<>  HIGHSCHOOL & MY FIRST TRUE LOVE

  At the first day of my new school, my heart was beating very fast. I went to my new classroom and I sit to the desk next to the window. I was watching outside from the window as I was wondering how my next school days will be without really knowing that Highschool era would be 3 times more worse than the last school. A boy sit next to me and we greet each other. We started to talk and he was my first Highschool friend. Class hour started and teacher started to meet with us. Then several students started to walk into classroom one by one. Last of them entered the classroom and stole my heart. He was a boy and I was confused by what I was feeling in that moment. School kept going for months as I've got the know other students. Of course I was searching ways to be the most close to that one guy but I didn't know how. I started to become more close to students. At first, we were laughing and doing fun things but then bullying period had started. I was still shy and introvert. I was still calculating every physical and emotional step that I could ever take. Because of my physical calculation, they bullied me by calling me "Robot". They bullied me because even though I had a slim body, I had fat on my several places of my body. They bullied me recklessly. Even when I calculated every step of mine, they bullied every calculated "Normal" step of mine. They bullied with me the way I move, the way I talk. They simply bullied me because I was just existing. The worst thing was the boy that I was still in love with was the head of the bullies. Everyone's bullying was hurting but whenever that boy was bullying me, it hurt the worst. They called bullying a way to love somebody. So whenever they saw me sad, That boy and his closest ones would come next to me and say "You didn't feel sad. did you? Because we love you." and laugh as they left my side. You see problem was me being a pure hearted kid that believed their lies. They bullied me everyday to make others laugh and I believed they were doing this because they loved me. And also, my father was still angry but this time he was angry even more and I was still calculating my every step.

<>  WRONG LOVERS

   I discovered that if I allowed that boy to bully me and laugh, I would be more and more close to him. One and a half year goes like this. Everyday I was silently in pain again and again and again. I even let THAT BOY to make me date with a girl who was his childhood friend just to get his friend's girlfriend to date with him. It was simple: I would date with his girl-friend and he would date with his girl-friend's girl-friend. I wanted to make him feel happy so I approved this. Then, that boy, his new girlfriend, me and my new girlfriend who I'm secretly unhappy to be with went to watch the Amazing Spiderman on cinema. As my "New girlfriend" squeezing my hand and hugging me while watching the movie in audience, I was watching THAT BOY secretly. I was so in love that even in cinema's darkness I was watching every part of his face with a smile on my face. After several weeks, I broke up with "My girlfriend". I had to because I was in love with his brother(THAT BOY). But I need to address that there weren't any sexual love, I was in pure love with him. It was only unbearable, pure love. Yet, I knew that my love for him wouldn't have a respond because he was not like me, or at least I was thinking he wasn't different like me.

<>  AWAKENINGS

  It all started that curious day. I was questioning other kids because their love plus their bullying wouldn't make sense to me. I was so pure and stupid that I was believing something was wrong about me. Because they were saying to me that they were loving me but why this love was hurting me? This doesn't make sense at all! The friend that I first met sit next to me and we started talking. He then started to sayin this: "Don't you realize? They see you as a weakling. They make fun of you just to gain a rank among the crowd. They don't love you, they are using you! Wake up friend. You are a pure and good person but they don't know the value of your existence."

Yes, that day the world collapsed on me because I realized that he was right. But why they didn't love me? Why a person could do that wicked thing to me? I was trying my best to be their best -friend. And that boy... he was using me like everyone else was?

That day something has awoken in me... something insidious and wicked. I started to become more open eyed. I started to analyze every move of the people around me without making them noticing anything about awakening. I started to copy their character and moves to act like them without making them noticed. More it went like this more I struggled. They kept hurting me again and again. I was still in love with that boy but my pain keeps getting bigger and bigger because of him.

<>  A PAINFUL CHOICE

   My friends and that boy were still bullying me and I was not pure the way I was before. I was hating them, I was holding grudge against them. They were evil people. At the day where we would play football at the Astroturf next to our school, something bad happened. Something happened that I said to myself that it was enough! All was well that day, except the behavior of that boy. While I was playing football, I accidently hit my head to that boy's head. At least, that was what he was believing. In truth, he jumped in front of me to hit the ball with his head and landed his chin on top of my head. He was angry because of this. When the football match was over, we headed to the locker rooms. He started to act angry just like my father. He reminded me of him. I froze there and look straight to him while he was acting angry. Then I said "This is over." and started to walk fast as I can before their preparation was done. Normally, we were walking to the bus station as a group and everybody would split up there but I was trying to get there before they could catch me on the road. I acted really fast that when I looked back, I wasn't seeing anybody. My first objective was to get there and get on the bus. I did and I sat one of the empty chairs. I started to think what happened while I was watching from the window of the bus. I didn't know I was crying before I stopped thinking what happened. When I got to home, I didn't even think how angry my father would be while I threw my bag to wall and stormed off to outside. I went to my favorite cafe to smoke hookah. I couldn't help myself crying. I was smoking and crying at the same time in spite of the fact that cafe had lots of customers. I called my sister with an unnoticeable normal voice and she was next to the cafe that I was in. I asked to come over. We started to talk and my mother secretly come to the cafe. She thought that I would be at that cafe when she couldn't find me at home. We keep on talking about what happened and I was crying all the time. My sister suggested me to go to different school. I was very happy about this. My mother figured out I was in love with that boy at that day.

   Since that painful day was the last day of school, I tried to enjoy school's half year break. My sister and my mother began to search for a school for me and they did find one. That school unfortunately was the same course place where I was used to go to prepare myself for the Highschool exam. All the memory of my loser's club group was built in there but I had no other choice. There was actually one more bad thing too: I have had to wait for the school to finish the school year completely before I could apply for a new school. So I would have to endure the last months with those bullies and that boy. Being away from him was hurting me but being next to him was also hurting me. I was sick of being hurt again and again. So I chose to be away from that boy and his bully group.

<>  ALL IS WELL

   After the half year vacation month came to an end, schools were open again. This time I was full of more hatred, anger and grudge. Back then I couldn't understand what I was turning into. Last months of my school, I was trying to stay away from that bully group & that boy. I focused more on my notes and degrees. I started to become more successful and hardworking student. I was so happy. Sometimes I was catching the looks of that boy, he was in pain because I'm not friends with him anymore. In time, that boy started to value me and we became friends again. He was still bullying me but this time I was not completely close to him. I was letting him know that I would break the bonds with him. Because of this, he was bullying me a little and show friendly love to me more. Days past like seconds and we were now on the last two weeks of the school.

<>  FEELING NUMB

   My home ambience got toxic with time because I stopped calculating my moves. I wanted to be and feel free. So I started to resist my father's obligations, anger and my friend's bullying attitude towards me. My father was the biggest issue at that time. My sister was creating so many problems for my family including money issues. At a certain time, my family was broke as hell and because of my sister's selfish wants, I couldn't be able to ask from my mom and dad anything. I was wanting things as well but knowing they don't have any money, I couldn't ask but my sister was asking for every bit of money. Those days were the worst days for us. Then a day came which I had to get an appointment from school because it was nearly vacation time and teachers wouldn't teach us at the end times. Also lots of students make their parents get an appointment to not go to school in those end days. So I asked my father nicely. My father was too angry and he was swearing at me because of my calm attitude. My mother came next to us and she said that I didn't do anything to create such anger. She said that she was watching and listening us and saw all the things my father did to me. I got up from the couch while crying and I said "I can't hold my strength against such injustice anymore" then I walked to my room in a fast pace. I closed the door accidently fast. and started to throw whatever I could find against the wall while crying loudly. My mother came in the room and hugged me. I tried to hug her but my arms and hands were like a stone.

YEAP, That was the day that I had nervous breakdown.

   Later that day, my mom told me what happened after I closed the door loudly: "When you closed that door loudly. Your father get up from that chair by pushing the chair back forcefully and he was almost like running to your room. I stopped him by pressing my hand to his chest and I said to him that if he was enjoying this moment, if he was liked what he did to you. And then I came into your room and I hugged you. If I wouldn't stop your dad, he would beat you with his hands."

He started to take all of his belongings to live with my older sister. Then, me and my mother started to live alone.

   When I first told my feelings and the decision to move to a different school due to the bullies, he was furious. He told me that 3 of our female students also came to us to inform us that they were decided to quit school just because bullies tried to remove their hijab. He asked me to think again but I was quite sure that this school's bullies will no longer get to me again. Several weeks later, the main teacher also told me that the bullies were right and I was wrong because my character was too pure for this world. What a bullshit! Just because I was a good person, the bad ones were right, eh? What a huge disappointment.

<>  THE GRAND FINALE

   It was the last day of third year of High-school. I was walking to the big metal door to reach to the schools garden. Everyone were waiting at random locations for the school principal's arrival. I've walked next to the bully guys and I stopped. I greeted only one boy from that group who I was not that close to. He smiled and tilted his head down to greet me silently. Then I started to wait just like them. In that final day, I was silent and I didn't talked to anyone except my main teacher. All of my friends were smiling, laughing etc but all I could see was fake smiles of the people who treated me bad. We took our photograph as a class members for the last time on the school stairs and everyone started to walk away as I remained still. That day was the day I said to them "Enough!" by not standing next to them. Afterwards, I went to my highschool to find the teacher and he signed my internship files. Then I have walked highschool stairs as a free teenager who left all the bad memories and friends behind. I was happy that I have changed my life's state.I left my hometown for a vacation.

  During my vacation's last week, I have created a whatsapp group and I only added several friends along side with a guy who may send my message to the ones who caused so much trouble back then. He was just a messenger but he didn't know it. I shared all the news of me changing schools at my fourth year as a highschool student. Everyone behaved so well and I was sitting on a sidewalk in the middle of evening when one of my friends called me to talk about my decision.(This friend was my first friend in the first day of my highschool) He wanted to talk me through this to make me give up on my decision but whatever he said he couldn't turned me from my decision. At the end, he respected my choice with a low vibe because he was caring about me. None of them didn't know what I have went through but there were signs. They didn't noticed the signs and in the end they wanted me to stay but it was too late.

-----------   University Days   -----------

  I have started my new journey to University life by the first year as a prep-school student. I have always been interested and loved dealing with English classes. That's why I wanted to take my English skills to the next level by having an academical prep-school classes. Couple of weeks passed as an A1 student but I was more advanced in English skills but unfortunately I have missed the exam which calculates your English skills. Life's sick joke was present at that days because my classroom has a familiar face in it: my old best friend who had fallen in love with me. She didn't know that at that past time when she confessed her feelings towards me, I was already in love with a guy who was our close friends for 3 and a half years. I wanted to stay as besties but she couldn't make it since she couldn't be best friend with me while she had feelings about me and I respect that. Even at a certain time, with an arduous English class topic that no one can understand well except me needed to give a little lesson to her and I taught her this certain topic without having any emotions. She thanked me in a cold face.

  Then, our teacher decided to give me and my male friend a chance to upgrade our classes to go to higher classes by offering us an advanced exam. We have completed the test successfuly and went straight to the upper class of Intermediate level class. Getting used to the new classroom had its own difficulties but eventually we got used to it. With this upgrade, we were able to get to the degree of C level and took a TOEFL test at the end of the year. I had the score of 68 which put me second on our classroom's leaderboard. When I successfuly finished my prep-school, I had 4 certificate because I was in school newspaper, debate player etc. I brought all of my certificates to the family gathering and showed them to my father. I was expecting some proud moments but not too much since we were fighting at that time and couldn't get along very well. He looked to all four of them and noded his head while handing them back to me. Afterwards, he walked to my cousin who was standing at the center of the room and put his own arm on my cousin's shoulder, he started to show off about my cousin's high school performance in front of our so called ''big family''. I was silently watching on the corner while my expectations and image of my father shattering silently inside me. Then I turned my back to them and left all of them there to go outside. They didn'T even noticed me leaving, they didn't ask where I was going. I told everything that happened that day to my mother. She was of course really angry at my father. My father only had one family and his family was his brothers and sisters and their children, his family was not us. I will never forgive him for what he did and what he didn't that day.

   Me, my male bestfriend along with my 3 other female bestfriends have begun to our first official University years as a Computer Programming students. In time, I have came out to my friends in secret first time as my first coming out experience. All of them was okay with it and my freedom began with this cannon event. I have made several mistaked along the road until I finally graduated from my university. It was both a speehlessly good and an awfully wrong experience. I started to my second university because I want to finish my university as a fourth year student. At that time, I started to live with my sister since my dad and I weren't doing so well. I was doing fitness-gym exercises, dying my hair to blue-purple-red etc. I was trying to live my full sexual identity while also trying to discover who I am. I was trying to find a software developer job for 2 years and unfortunately I couldn't find any opportunities back then. I was on low mood because of that.

   Then my sister situation started to happen. She started to change. She was becoming rude, she was saying things like "You can only be a playmate for my daughter and nothing more." Like I was her uncle and she was my niece. We were playing so much as friends but I was living with my sister for too long and my decisions + rules started to get in the way of her motherhood disiplins about my niece. She was the worst version of herself back then. She was attanding to Tiktok live with men, drunk alcohol so much, had unstable feelings and lifestyle. Her parenthood was awful and my silent rules/disciplines about my niece crossed with her worst parenthood decisions. That's why she said that 'playmate' sentence to me while being drunk. She was even having panic attacks at those times and needed to go to a hospital really drunk after coming to home in midnight with a strong odor of alcohol. Her life really a mess but could you blame her? She was searching for love while finding low-grade men, living as a single mother in an expensive part of the city trying to raise a young daughter. She was lonely and losing all the hope that she had.

   One day, me and my mother prepared a well-thought dinner and my sister also said that she was coimg home early that day. Because of this knowledge of her, we started to wait her and didn't start to eat. Hours passed and we kept calling her phone but she wasn't responding. Eventually my niece started to worry and cry. Wet ried our best to calm my niece. Even my niece knew that my sister had men in her life who had dangerous mindsets, that's why my niece started to worry. She arrived home close to midnight. We had already ate without her and my niece fell asleep in her own room while waiting for her. My sister went straight to my niece's room and calmed her down. She has that strong alcohol odor again. My sister came to the living room afte she changed clothes and grabbed herself a glass of wine. Then started to say awful things to us like " You two, as a so called adults, couldn't even calm a child?! Can't I rely on you about my daughter??" we were saying things like " We always knew how dangerous men you have in your life for so long that when you didn't respond to our calls, we have worried. We couldn't hide much longer from your daughter. Eventually your daughter started to panic for you as well as we did." then she said " But you should hide this whole process from her! You two as two adults couldn't even do that!" Conversation turned into fight and she told me and my mother such rude and unbeliavable words that we were shocked. " Of course you two had sided with each other, mother and sun become one towards to me. I understand what you two are doing right now." My mother became enraged after she have heard that. My sister's last line was her own daughter my sister said to us. I immediately counterattacked her by asking her " You said I could be oly playmate for your own child. Did I also crossed the line that day sister???" She froze for a moment in a shockwith a teary eye and turned to me to say " I don't remember such a thing." Of course she couldn't remember since she was heavily drunk while saying that in the past! She said that she hated my mother's and my father's parenting and that they had never been there for her. Really sister? I understand your feelings about my father because he was shitty parent to me as well but my mother? My mother was always there for you! She protected you against my father and your ex husband who beat you for two days in a locked home! My mother sensed my sister could be in danger and left my niece to me while she was a little baby and my parents went to my sister's house while my father was trying to stop my mother going there. My sister was brainwashed, feared for her life, full of purple spots on her body. Her ex husband tortured her! When they learned the true reason for this violence which was about my sisters normal talk in real life at outdoor with hers ex-lover. Her husband thought they were making love but only she was talking as a friend. (Unfortunately, in spite of my mother's all warnings, she kept talking with her ex-lover as a close friend and her ex-husband figured out all) My father didn't do anything to be on my sister's side while my mother started to beat that guy because my mother's belief system doesn't allow violence to her daughter: they can divorce, they can argue but violence? Not on my mother's watch. My mother did all these things and more to her but she was blaming my mother but not her own actions in that evening. As evening turned into midnight, my sister was still mad about me and my mother's 'unsuccessful attempt' about calming her own child. My mother said " We are always your family" and my sister said " You two are not my family." Mom looked at me and started to cry silently, I was crying silently. My mother's tears was not about the rude things she said to us, her tears were about seeing her own daughter became a monster. After that my mom acting like sleeping, in the dead of night I was in deep thoughts while smoking hookadh next to an open window, my sister came next to me ans starting to say sweet things to me after what happened. I was thinking as 'Fuck you honesty, fuck your apology. You told me and my mother to get the fuck of your own house. I will not forgive you' but I said nothing. My sister went to get a sleep. Little she did know, my mother and I bagged all of our stuff and left the house at the the first light of the day while my sister and my niece were sleeping.

   Then I was at my home again. My room was exactly how I left. I unbagged my stuff and organized my room. I powered my laptop on as I gave up on both studying for my university exams and finding a job. I was at my lowest and we were hurt my one of our family members.

   One day later, one of my female best friend from my old university years has reached out to me. She said that there was a job opportunity in her Company and I have accepted it. I did an online meeting with the company's coworkers and prepared all the files. Then I started to work as a remote virtualpos NightShift worker. My first ever profesional work life started on 01.11.2021 after the day that I gave up and lost all my hope on life. 

-----------   Nowadays   -----------

   I had changed teams in the same company, now I'm not a nightshift helpdesk worker. I'm now a systems technician worker for 1+ year. I have proved myself by coding applications, prepareing databases and making almost every tech section of the company healthly available to my colleagues. Life is both hard and fruitful now.

    Yet my problems started to become like a mountain after I started to get stuck in between my religion and my sexuality. I started to creating a graph where I used every research that I made for 5 years to form a map/a graph/a guide. I wanted to solve this once and for all. Islam was saying so many things while not providing any viable solution but I know my sexual identity and what it was like to live like this. One side of me is a strong believer with powerful belief system + spiritual experience and other side of me is a freedom lover where wants to live my own sexuality fully. Each of them fighting with each other and I'm stuck in between them while having painful wounds in the process. I'm making process but each day that I couldn't find the truth, more my wounds bleed.

    I'm tring to live 3 lives: I'm still studying in my university, I'm working in a fintech as a systems guy and I'm trying to figure out my own life. Yet my loneliness, my inner struggles and my lots of past traumas getting in my way and making my life hell.

In all this noise and life paths, I'm still trying to find who I am and what I'm living for.

This was the summary of my life. Now you know what happened to me until now. ❤️