First semester freshman year is a struggle when you’re a girl. Yes, you get free drinks, but you also you get a reputation. Freshman year is the time when you get to decide who you are as an adult, it’s truly a time period of self-discovery and experimentation. You dread your hair, you see if you like screamo, and you explore different types of ideologies that create the foundation for your own. For me, I didn’t have that choice.

People started calling me Mimzy for this, that, and the other reason. At first I hated it, it was something that defined me as drinking party girl, with little expectation of greatness. It was a nickname that trapped me into something I very much wasn’t, no matter what you heard about me, you automatically thought you knew everything. I didn’t have the opportunity to grow as the individual I wanted to, I was locked into an identity that others thought of me as.

Then it got worse. I wasn’t Melissa anymore. I had lost the self-confidence and sense of identity that people had for me. I simply smiled and laughed when people shouted out, “YO TRAP MIMZ!” I played along and just accepted the fact that these people that I thought were my friends were only really friends with the girl they called, “Mimz.” I felt lost, not even allowed to clutch onto the thing that we don’t appreciate the most, ourselves.

Upon leaving my hometown, which is literally one street, I had some pretty big plans. I was going to write poetry, finally, be able to wear glasses I was embarrassed about, and be able to voice the opinions that I had fostered for many years. I was going to enjoy going out with friends to things that weren’t just a drunk party basement or the bar down the street. This might sound a little lame to you, but this is coming from the girl who fondly remembers reading Macbeth alone on a friday night in high school.

Instead of all these amazing plans, I was sent into some pretty deep depressed thoughts in college, with no credibility as a human because of a nickname that tore me apart. At first calling me Mimzy was a joke, then I became the joke.

I look back at college and I wish that I could do some parts over again. But, I don’t look back and pity myself.

I look back and pity the f**kers that started calling me Mimzy. Because here’s the deal everyone. You can call people whatever you want to bring down their confidence, but today a name can no longer define me. With words and writing, and speaking what I actually want to say, you can call me Mimz all you want.