It was approximately 6:30 a.m. as I struggled to get through the doors of my middle school’s cafeteria, where the eighth graders hung out before the bell rang. In my hands were multiple large shopping bags that held Tupperware containers filled to the brim with 350 plus cookies that I’d made myself. Why? I’d personally baked all of the cookies to give out so that everybody in the eighth grade class would be able to have one; it was an advertisement for my campaign to be the Vice President when we reached high school.
Like most people, my middle school experience was not fun. Hormones are rushing everywhere and people at that age are just mean to each other, usually for no good reason. I decided at the end of my middle school career to run for Vice President in an attempt to get people to notice me and to like me. Hindsight being 20/20, I obviously know now that being liked should come naturally, and if people are not nice to you, you do not need to make an effort to be overly generous to them.
Anyway, back to the cookies. I had my parents drop me off at school extra early, hoping that if people took one of my cookies, that maybe they’d consider voting for me. People who never acknowledged me a day in their lives walked by, took a cookie, and didn’t even look at me or thank me. I was obviously crushed considering the amount of time I’d put into making them, but I was still hopeful. Soon enough, the day of the speech came, and I was so excited to get up in front of my peers and talk about my future plans for the class. I’d taken so much time preparing the speech and nobody clapped for me. When other, more “popular” people went up who clearly didn’t have speeches prepared for their respective positions, people clapped. Not only did people clap, but these individuals won. I have nothing against them now, obviously, but it hurt that people could get up there without really saying anything and win when I’d prepared extensively. Again, I was crushed. After this, I was so terrified to present in front of any amount of people in fear that I’d be judged, and this lasted for quite a while.
Due to this event, I went into high school and decided to lay low since apparently my best efforts wouldn’t get me anywhere; this sentiment unfortunately lasted the entirety of my high school career because my efforts were never appreciated except by a select few. Bullying was something that I experienced throughout those four years, not constantly, but enough to make it hard to show up to school sometimes. I put academics first, since I really only had one friend, so I am glad that I was able to set a precedent for myself to be able to work hard in college.
This is the only habit that I took with me: academics should always be a priority over social activities. I tried to join clubs and sports but nobody was ever accepting or even the slightest bit nice so I ended up quitting. I joined Best Buddies and worked my way up to the officer level, but even then, I was ignored or was treated poorly by others. By this point in time, I wanted to make sure that my personality was the reason for people mistreating me, so I’d go out of my way to try to be nice and outgoing, but to no avail. At this point it wasn’t about having a million friends or doing a bunch of activities, it was about not being miserable.
I’d applied to a reach school when it came time for the college application process, and said reach school is a common one to apply to and get denied from in my area. It was my dream school, so I decided to take a shot. Well, I got in. I was ecstatic, and the same type of people who took my cookies in middle school without thanking me pretended to be my friend because I was accepted into this university. On the day of my graduation, I almost burst into tears, not because I was sad to leave, but because I was happy for it to finally come to an end.
During the graduation ceremony, an authoritative community figure stood up and talked about many things, one of which being the aforementioned club that I was a part of. I thought, “Wow, I went through all of these struggles, and I’ll finally be recognized in this moment at the very end.” I was apprehensive but excited to be recognized. When names were announced, three out of the four officers were mentioned by name, one of them not even being a graduating senior. I was not mentioned. I had spent so many hours of my time, so much money, and put so much of my energy into this club to make the members, the children we helped, and their families happy. I was never thanked, but it's OK because I was able to help people.
When it was time to head off to college, I remember seeing people post long paragraphs about how sad they were to be leaving such an “amazing” place and I felt nothing but resentment at the time. I know now that people have differing experiences, but it’s how the individual moves forward that matters in the end.
My point in writing this article is not to dwell on past events, but rather to explain how it is possible to move forward in a positive manner from such a negative experience. I can now proudly say that I am a tour guide for my university, I represent and work for multiple brands on campus, I am in a loving sisterhood where I have met some of my best friends for life, and I am happy. I am no longer afraid to get up in front of people, and instead I have completely embraced public speaking and I adore leading families and prospective students around my beautiful campus. The thing is, people would never be able to tell that I was a timid, bullied individual in high school. I can say with 110 percent honesty that I made more friends in college in two days than I did living in my town for ten years. I am now outgoing and well-liked. Just because high school may be horrible doesn’t mean that your future has to be that way as well. It’s important to be pragmatic and to really take life by the hands to achieve the results you want.
