Dear high school self:

"These four years will be the best of your life." What they didn't tell you was that they would actually be kind of sucky. You're going to lose friends, discover yourself a little, but lose yourself a little at the same time. You'll think you have many 'friends' up until your sophomore year when you take a step back and take a look at your life. The people you continue talking to through your senior year you will talk to them still in college.

Freshman year you'll pick up a new sport, you'll fall in love with soccer. You'll workout a lot and then fall a little behind on that in college. Junior year you'll make a big mistake by quitting cheer. I understand why you'll do it, but really you should've just stuck up for yourself. Senior year you'll pick it back up all because of coach — you need to thank coach for that. Senior year you'll make some mistakes including not playing soccer because your knee was bothering you and you needed to make more money so you worked more, and you messed up with that decision. You'll still get to kick the ball around sometimes in college though don't worry.

You'll study well in high school which will help you out in college. You'll be very thankful for that. Thank you high school me for paying attention (sometimes). You won't have to take anatomy and physiology 1 your second semester of college because of it so be happy. Although you will still have to take BIO, but you love bio. I know senior year you'll sort of slack off more but, you'll make good grades and you'll have many teaches to thank for all of their help. Dueker will be your best science teacher, she'll teach you mostly everything you know right now about biology and anatomy. Brooks will never let you down and will always be there to talk and help you out with any subject when you needed it. Let's not forget about your coaches, they'll be some of the best people you know. They pushed you to your limits, but you always had a great bond with them no matter what.

You won't spend as much time with your family as you should've. You'll want to go out and do things with your friends or you will be working so much that you don't know what to do with yourself. You'll be happy with all the money, but not so much with yourself. You'll make good friends at your job and hangout with them quite frequently. But, you need to take a step back from the job and hangout with your family instead.

The boys you'll worry about in high school won't matter to you in a few years. You'll cry because of one on New Year's Eve your freshman year and your friends will be there for you. You'll cry the night of your junior prom because of one and your work friends will be there for you at Steak and Shake. Lastly, the last one that will hurt you in high school will come back to you many times once you two break up and you wanted to get away but, you didn't. You'll eventually get away from him and be much happier I promise.

You eventually meet a great guy who's a senior at SIUE, and he's everything you could've ever dreamed of. You'll adopt a dog with him, and she is precious. You'll stick with him for a long while, trust me on that one. You'll meet some new friends, one of them at Chick fil a in the line, and you'll become bestf riends with her. You'll spend your Fridays with her in SSC drinking Kaldi's or Starbs and working on homework.

High school me, you'll make some mistakes, you won't be around your family enough because you'll work so much, and you'll realize that everyone is not who they say they are, but now you're doing well. You'll be passing all your classes in college and getting ready to apply for nursing school. You're not where you need to be yet, but you're getting there. You're trying your best and that's what matters. Lastly, the best is yet to come.

Love,

College me