Academic Pressure And Hidden Sadness In Kashmir

By Madeeha Farooq

She always had a smile on her face. Even on dull mornings in her hometown in Kashmir, her bright grin made people look twice. Friends leaned in when she spoke, strangers stayed a moment longer. Her cheer was like a warm scarf, you could feel it, and it made everything feel a little safer.

She liked this part of herself. She liked the idea that she could make people feel lighter. Even the saddest souls seemed to walk taller after passing her. She thought she was gifted, chosen to lift the weight of others.

But underneath that bright and buoyant body language, a small voice whispered doubts. That voice told her she was unworthy, imperfect, and unfit for deep attachment.

Lifelong friendships never took root. People stayed at the edges, close enough to enjoy the warmth but never to see the ache behind it.

When she was alone in her room, the tears came like rain on tin roofs: sharp, relentless, and unobserved. She wiped her face, adjusted her scarf, and stepped into the streets again, smiling as if her heart had never cracked.

School had its battles. She stumbled academically. Teachers doubted her, peers whispered.“She won't make it,” they said, and she heard the words as sharply as knives.

She passed her board exams with a score that silenced the whispers, a small triumph that tasted of iron and honey.

Later came the NEET exams, a crucible that she failed despite her efforts.

Failure could have been a wound, but it became a bridge. She found friends who believed in her, who celebrated her existence beyond grades and results.

Four friends, scattered across different cities, yet somehow their affection remained unshaken. Letters, calls, late-night messages created a small constellation in her life. For a time, the“happy girl” and the“loser” lived together: one in the world's eyes, the other in her own secret sphere.

Then the transformation came without warning. The laughter faded. Her smile became a mask that strained against the shifting landscape inside her. People began noticing.“Why do you look so sad?” they asked. She laughed and said,“Nothing. I'm okay.”

Pressed further, she snapped:“You're the problem. Always asking me what's wrong. I'm okay. Did you get it?”

Her cheerful halo began to tarnish. People speculated, judged, and withdrew. The absence of her closest friends, the weight of unshared worries, the fear of burdening her parents combined into a suffocating fog.

Her mornings became exercises in endurance. She wished she could stay in bed, away from mirrors and other faces, away from the relentless expectation to be“happy girl.” Her colleagues noticed and advised her to focus on herself, breathe, and step back.

She repeated the words that had become armour:“I'm good. Nothing is wrong with me.”

She withdrew from the world she once lifted. Her laughter no longer travelled the streets. She moved among people like a ghost of herself, seeing their warmth but feeling none of it. The mirror reflected a stranger she neither hated nor recognized.

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