During the winter of my senior year at boarding school, I found myself stuck in a rut. Being at school did not feel right. I had been accepted into my first choice university, and I should have been stress-free and excited for the future. However, I still felt as though I was crumbling under imaginary pressures that I had built up in my head. I felt myself spiraling into depression and I had lost the positive and light-hearted demeanor that I was always known for having.

To sum it all up, I had stopped loving myself.

Because of this, I made poor choices that lead to me facing a short suspension. While the repercussions of my actions only left me suspended from school for three days, I boarded a plane from Newark, NJ back to my home in Charleston, SC and I stayed away from school for one month to get the time off that I needed. I remember crawling into bed the night I got home, with puffy, post-crying eyes and absolutely no hope for ever returning back to the school where I had spent three years building a life and finding success. I remember receiving stern and disappointing texts from some of my best friends at the time which only lead to more tears and more self-shaming. I could go on and on about this night, but this article is not meant to be a sob story about that time I got suspended.

There were so many people that thought differently of me just for making a mistake that I acknowledge was pretty stupid and easily avoidable. There were people that tried to convince some of my best friends to start hating me just because I had made a lapse in judgment. However, there were also people that had my back throughout the entire ordeal. It is for those people that encouraged me to love myself again that I am writing this article to say thank you. Ultimately, I made the choice myself to go back to school and to seek help in turning my life around, but I certainly would not have reached so much self improvement so quickly if it were not for the support of the people around me.

To anyone facing hardships due to their own mistakes, and to anyone who feels like they are becoming a worse version of themselves: you will find the light you need by reflecting on your actions and by accepting the love from those who care about you. Do not push this love away. Although this time period of my life is in the past and I have moved on from it entirely, there are still moments where I lie awake at night and think about how eye-opening it really was. It took hitting my personal rock bottom to show me who my real friends were and to realize that all mistakes have equal consequences and are learning opportunities in the end.

(Over a year later and still thanking you endlessly for your love and support. This is for you: SL, CN, LW, JSS, HU, JS, ERK, and of course, AH.)