I know that this is not something that is uncommon because many individuals shared their experiences with me. So, where should I start? Could it be at the beginning where I absolutely hated high school? Or the part where I was failing English (to my standard), the subject that I excelled in every other year besides Grade 9? Imagine, Grade 9.

In Grade 7, teachers are always preparing us for the academic side of high school, never the social side – spoiler alert! you may encounter some really terrible people along the way. I found the transition from primary school to high school fairly easy considering most of my friends from Grade 7 were with me. Academic wise, high school was fine until higher grades started expressing their seniority by throwing unnecessary insults to many of the eighth graders. Collectively, I thought we’d all be okay until I became a target.

I started hating high school. I would hate getting up in the morning because seeing these ‘trolls’ would ruin my entire day. Just when I thought things could not get any worse, I was being penalised during Grade 9 English. And I don’t mean a few marks for missing punctuation or spelling errors, I was getting 50s! Something was far from okay and I could never understand what I did to this particular teacher who would rarely read through my essays and just give me a D for them. I never bothered to question it because I really thought I was missing the essence of what was needed to produce a stellar essay. As the year progressed, the teacher became intolerable by being unnecessarily rude and never providing feedback or constructive criticism.

So, as you can see, my Grade 9 year was a mess but things changed a bit when I began Grade 10. I had a new teacher for English and that change really did wonders for me. I did really, really well for English in Grade 10 to the point that I couldn’t wait for that period. The teacher was supportive and you can really tell when someone is passionate about something, you will also begin to enjoy what they’re saying or teaching.

When I began Grade 11, the only thing that got me through the year was that it would be the last year that I will see the bullies that were now in Grade 12 who still laughed or threw insults as I walked by. But the funny thing is, the same bullies from high school are now wanting to be my friend on Facebook, following me on Instagram and are trying to ‘make amends’. This always makes me laugh out loud.

I hated high school and by writing this post (which has not revealed everything I went through but just a summary of it) makes me realise that I still hate it. It was the worst 5 years of my life and if I had the chance to go back and stand up to my bullies, I wouldn’t. As for the friend and follow requests – blocked!