I strongly believe that everyone needs a support system to be there for them when they are in need. Whether it be just because they need someone to vent to or to get someone’s advice I believe that everyone should have a strong support system, especially when in high school. I struggled academically and if I would have a support system I would have had a more positive academic experience.
Growing up, I was living in the shadows of my brothers, my mother, and my father. For both of my brothers, math was their strong point, my mother has an accounting degree, and my father has a finance degree. As a result of that, no one in my household had the patience to sit down and help me with math. My brothers had moved out and my mother was one of those “I’m not doing your homework for you” parents. So, that left my father. I distinctively remember this one time, I was in third grade and had asked my father to check my math homework - seems like an easy task doesn’t it? It led to my father yelling at me for three hours straight for not understanding how something so simple, like multiplication tables, seemed so confusing to me. This happened numerous times while I was in middle school. Yet no one questioned it, everyone including myself and teachers brushed it off saying that I was just “bad at math, that I was creative and I couldn’t add or do multiplication tables,” however I was doing photography so that made everything fine.
It wasn't until my freshman year of high school that I began to notice that everything was not fine. Just the thought of going to math class made me get this pit in my stomach. I felt like the dumbest person in the room if the teacher would ask me a question I got this deer in headlights look. When I got tests back my grades where low, but I never once thought it was because I had a learning disability. Instead, I thought It was because I wasn't trying hard enough. All of my energy and time I spent studying for my math quizzes and tests, resulted in my other grades dropping significantly and my math grade never improved. When It came time for our parent-teacher conferences, my advisor would tell my mother how I wasn’t focusing in class and how all my teachers knew I could do better but I wasn’t trying. This went on for three years. The same comments, the same grades. I felt like I was drowning, I went on for so long with everyone thinking that I just wasn't trying and eventually I came to believe it.
At the end of my high school experience, I finished with a 1.9 GPA, and my ACT scores were raising a few eyebrows. I took the practice ACT at my high school and scored a 32. Which meant given my GPA if I were to score a 32 on the ACT I might actually have a shot at college. However, when I took the actual ACT, at my local public school I got a 16. I dismissed it because I just didn't study. Over the summer before my senior year, I took ACT classes at my high school, for those tests I was scoring in the 30s as well. When I took the ACT for a final time I scored a 17. I remember walking into my college counselor's office feeling frustrated and I looked like I was about to cry, because in that moment I felt like college was so out of reach and I was going to amount up to nothing. I will always remember how my college counselor looked at me and told me that I should get tested for a learning disability. He recommended I get tested, so I did. While I was waiting a whole month to get my results back, I was left looming over this thought that everyone was right, school just isn't my thing and I just wasted everyone's time. I remember walking into my coach’s office and just saying that I needed to talk to someone, anyone, she took me into the conference room and we sat down and I told her everything. Everything I was feeling, how I felt absolutely helpless and I felt like the world was against me. She listened and she helped me understand that I wasn’t helpless, I wasn't alone, I had a whole line of teachers and teammates and classmates who were there for me. I finally had the support system I needed to succeed.
After I got my test results back, I sat down with my psychology teacher and we looked through the hefty packet together. She broke things down for me so I had a better understanding of what they meant. To top it off she helped me understand my best learning style. After those results came back I was diagnosed with ADD, Dyscalculia, Anxiety, and Depression. I spent the rest of my senior year trying to piece together how I actually learn. Because of that, transitioning to college with ADD, Dyscalculia, Anxiety, and Depression was made easier. Most of that has to with the fact that I built such a strong support system with my teachers and my friends during that time. Because I appreciate having that support system and I actively create to my own support system in college as well as throughout life.
