I Tested Positive This Weekend

To all of my dearest friends:

It is with a mass of anger, anxiety, confusion, and depression churning within me that I deliver this news to you all publicly. I am still having trouble accepting it. This weekend, I had myself tested, and the results returned positive:

I am 13% emo.

After insisting to myself for so long that there was no chance I carried the infection, I began noticing too many overt symptoms to ignore it any longer. It was probably the longest wait in my life while the results came back to me. This weekend, after over a year of disregarding all of the warning signs, I finally took the test.

I really didn't know how to react to the results at first, and though I am getting a better grip on them, it's still terrifying to me. After all, I've spent a good part of my life hating people that carry this disease. It's kind of ironic that I so blindly hated them for an affliction they probably weren't fully aware of or ready to deal with. And now I find myself unprepared to tackle this malady as well.

Luckily, at this point, my infection doesn't show a critical mass of symptoms — just a handful of individual ones that aren't readily apparent on the surface. I also have full control over myself as well. In the more advanced stages of the disease, one's life it totally is affected by it and it's pretty obvious that there's a full-blown infection. My doctors did tell me, however, that since I've probably been infected for well over a year and I'm still only 13% emo, there's a good chance that I'll never progress beyond this point.

If this is true, I will carry the disease and continue to exhibit some signs of it, but should be able to carry on a mostly normal life as I have been for the last few years. No one knows why some are more susceptible than others to the disease, and there are many theories on it, my doctors' being that since I never willingly practiced the behavior that encourages the disease, I retain some level of immunity to it. I hope they're right. I am bound and determined not to allow this disease to dictate how I live my life.

I'm sure all of you will have your own reaction to this news. Whatever your reaction is, it's fine. I didn't write this note for sympathy or attention or to shock anyone. I wrote this hoping that you will all just take a moment to realize that this can happen to anyone, even those of us who aren't emotional or trendy. I don't want what I am going through to be in vain.

Thank you. I love you all.

Sincerely,

Trollaxor