I remember my first day at the University of Tampa so vividly. The beautiful campus with the enchanting Plant Hall at its center with minarets reaching for the sky. This was my chance to start fresh. To start a new life. No, I wasn't in trouble or anything juicy like that. I had just overcome so much bullying and torment for seven years that I was ready to leave all the negativity behind.

I wasn't a social outcast or an introvert. I was the girl who suffered from not only ADHD, but also an anxiety disorder, social disorder and a learning disability.

People in high school tend to make fun of rather than try to understand. I posted lots of statuses explaining my personality and what I went through on a daily basis. Sadly, the torment never really ended.

College was scary for me. Would the same thing that happened in high school happen again? Would people accept me? After four years, I can tell you the definitive answer. No. But that doesn't mean I didn't struggle at times with some people tending to stay away from me or just stop all contact with me. But those people who loved me and wanted to help me a better person fair out numbered the negative people who I had to learn were never going to understand or care and I had to stop trying.

Dealing with a social disorder is not a social sentence to weekends alone. It means you're different but that's okay! College is the perfect place to find that group of people that will love every quirky thing about you.

My anxiety disorder was completely different from my social disorder experience. I couldn't completely control it. Some days I would be curled up in the fetal position in bed in the midst of an anxiety attack unable to function. But most days I was my bright and bubbly self enjoying life.

However, my anxiety disorder did keep me home some nights paralyzed, unable to move. I learned that anxiety is such a common thing on college campus'. It was no longer something that made me an outcast. And as much as college is basically filled with anxiety, the experiences you have will always outweigh those bad days.

I'll tie my two most frustrating let's call them 'quirks', together. While ADHD is a super common thing, when it is combined with a learning disability you have a big challenge ahead of you. You may be sitting on your laptop taking notes in class when all of the sudden an iMessage pops up in the corner and your mind is in lala land for the rest of the class.

While I am very lucky to be naturally intelligent, some concepts went right over my head. Math and chemistry for the most part were just concepts that I would never understand ever and I just needed to pass those prerequisites that colleges require. I worked harder in those classes than I did in my major classes. I am so thankful for all the understanding my professors gave me and how patient they were when I asked the same question fifty times over. And for the university for making me never once feel like an outcast.

Four years taught me more than I ever learned in my first 18. I learned how to live on my own, how to learn from others, how to be a friend and how a friend should treat you, and how success is measured in a million different ways. (I also learned how much it sucks to be broke).

Now, I'm twenty two years-old. I graduated college and completed my dream degree. Something I never anticipated being able to do. While some think of talking about things like this as taboo, I think it's so important to keep an open dialogue. Never feel like you won't achieve something because of a certain aspect of your personality or something that makes you mentally different. I'm an example of how much you CAN achieve.

And every single person out there deserves to know they are worth the world and that success is defined by no one else but you.