To anyone who knows me, I'm awkward, I'm self-conscious, I'm weird, and I'm also really bad at knowing who actually wants to be my friend and who doesn't. Due to this, I just assume that anybody I meet who I've never met before hates me. This may seem like jumping to conclusions, and it is, but let me explain first.

The other day I was on snapchat looking at the daily stories, which is normally a task I never do. I was gooing through the daily mail snap news or whatever it's called and I stumbled across an article that headlined, "No One Showed Up for My 9 Year Old's Birthday Party."

Now I think we all can remember what it was like getting an invitation to a classmate's birthday party in elementary school. It was quite possibly one of the most exciting things to ever occur during school hours. And the other night I had to read about nine-year-old Gerald Hamilton, who was devastated when no one showed up for his birthday party. It said he invited all thirty people in his class, and while only twelve responded saying they could attend, no one showed up.

Now I don't know if there are more details behind this story that we don't know, but what I do know is that no child should have to go through this pain.

I would know because this also happened to me.

I was in fifth grade and I invited all the girls in my class which in total added up to around eighteen girls. Along with my classmates, my family including my siblings, cousins, aunts, and grandparents would be there because that's just how my family hosts parties and events. We had rented out an ice skating ring and went all out for this party. This was around the time Webkinz was popular, so in each of the goody bags there was a Webkinz, and I can remember how excited I was because I was finally better and had made a couple of friends. Socializing and making friends with kids my age was something I've always struggled with but this party was going to prove that I was getting somewhere and improving. However, the days to the party were dwindling down in numbers and I had to start asking at school if people could go or not.

I guess everyone was just busy that day because they all said they couldn't make it.

Even my 'best friends.'

The day of the party comes, and I had invited three maybe four girls who I was friends with on my basketball team outside of school and some of them were able to attend. Not only that but my family was there so that helped a lot, so in the end, I forgot about my school friends because I had all of these people around me who were actually there. It turned out to be one of my favorite birthday parties ever. Regardless of how many kids from my class attended or not.

When I was in 5th grade, social media such as facebook and Instagram weren't prevalent to us. Mostly because our parents never let us use it, but that's beside the point. I'm sure had facebook been as popular then as it is now my mom would have written something along the lines of what was written about Gerald Hamilton's party. And yes, it's heartbreaking and no one should have to go through the pain of crying because no one at school likes you but there's nothing we can do about it. Kids will be kids.

And while it's not fair, there is only so much that people can do about it. So do me a favor, and if you have any younger siblings try your best to make sure they can go to their classmate's party. If there are actual reasons as to why you can't go then that's totally fine, but don't just not go because everyone is not going. It's mean and you don't know how it'll impact the kid in the long run.