I got in trouble with the law when I was 13 in 8th grade, a parent from my school knew about it then spread it around in a group chat on Facebook, after my friends left me and my case got dropped because I was innocent. A few months later the same parent that spread the rumor at school tried to re open the case but the police wouldn’t allow them to. 4-5 years later people still talk about it and spread rumors of me, now people won’t give me a chance to know me; stop being in a relationship with me; basically don’t want anything to do with me anymore. My dad said that if anybody asks what happened say “nothing happened”. People I’ve known since I was 5 have turned on me because of the lies that the parent said about me. And it’s really bad because people thought one of the kids spread the rumors around but it was the parent that started it. We’re gonna be 18 now and in senior year but people still haven’t gotten over it and I’ve tried to speak up about the truth for a few years now but people still haven’t heard me out it’s got to the point where I don’t wanna say anything anymore and as soon as I can I wanna move out of the town, possibly change my name and not talk to people from my town again.

I’ve suffered for many years with this and it impacts my health severely. Some days I get scared to go out in public and at night I’ll curl up in a ball crying about it wanting to self harm and regret that I’m in this world. I have a therapist I’ve been wanting to tell this to but I didn’t know how to say it. I know I’m a good kid I just made a little mistake. There’s been people in my area that have actually committed real serious crimes but people don’t worry about that so I don’t understand why people in my area don’t move on with what happened with me.