I Have To Mingle With Society Again Soon

I haven't set foot in a school for 1 year and 5 months. I have found the absence of school hard to deal with. I actually enjoy work as my mind is very important to me and I like to keep it stimulated. I was too ill to work or even get out of bed for the majority of my absence and it's only been recently that I have started to exercise my mind. I've rediscovered my love of psychology and I'm really enjoying teaching myself new things. I have absorbed more knowledge than I would in any classroom which makes me wonder whether I should even go back to school. I don't mind the work aspect of it, it's the people. More so those of the female persuasion.
I have never been able to stomach other girls for as long as I remember. I even find it hard to stomach my own mother at times. I hate bitchiness. It is a form of bullying, I don't care what people say. "It's just girls being girls" does not wash with me. I would ignore things because I believed that it was just girls being girls/normal. But since I have left school I realised how low my self esteem was. And why was it so low? Girls.
I'm not the prettiest chocolate in the box. I'm more of the studious type. I'm also a lot more mature that my peer group so I always have to pretend to be someone else whilst socialising. I always appear to have a lot of friends, but I always feel lonely.
When I start school I will be with people who are younger than me because I'm having to start again as I never completed the year. When I went for the interview not too long ago I noticed that the majority of the people on the course were female. And extremely immature. And orange. I've never seen so much make up in my life. And their little orange faces kept screwing up whenever I was near...you know that stare girls give you when they are judging you? I seem attract that attention a lot.
So I'm not looking forward to school. I will be studying art...something that's not going to give me a lot of career options. I was going to go to a different school so I could take academic subjects...but I hate doing that. I find it boring and it doesn't inspire me...it drains me. I constantly have to live up to everyone;s expectations as well. Less than an A isn't good enough. It doesn't seem to matter that I tried my best.
I'm probably going to end up poor with a crappy job but I think I would rather do that than be permanently stressed and miserable. But I still worry about the future. I'm not a materialsitic person so I'm not worried about the financial side. As long as I can survive I don't care all that much. But I worry I will hate my job. I need to do something that inspires me, where I can be creative and think freely.
I've also never not had company at school. I've always had a lot of friends but this time I don't think it will be that way. I'm nearly 19 whereas the other girls will be 16. I don't think I'm going to find it easy to make friends if I am going to be myself. I'm weird, I'm quiet and I'm awkward. I could just be insincere like I used to be, but I can't do that anymore. It's not a case of not wanting to...I actually can't do it. That's what lead to me having a breakdown...trying to be perfect all the time. I have pretty much accepted that I am a flawed human being and that is okay. What I haven't quite got the hang of is not worrying about what people think. Criticism is crushing to me and I work so hard ot avoid it. I think I need to learn to just brush things off...