Every single person that I get close with in life tells me that I don’t ever display any emotions. It is kind of funny because I never noticed that about myself until I got older and my friends would joke around with me about how I never show emotions. I am sort of monotone and I guess I do not show emotion in my speech either. I wondered to myself why I was so robotic.

After I hit 21, I started to figure out myself more. I was in such an awkward stage most of college. I was an awkward and shy person all of high school. I wasn’t really confident in myself but I never let it get to me. I just went with it and lived life. What kept me going was my day dreaming. I always planned out my future and all of the things I wanted one day. I would zone out into my dreams and plans during every class in highschool. Before I went to sleep, I would then again go into daydreaming mode. In a way, my daydreams were all just factors of determination and motivation. I am impulsive when it comes to wanting something. If I want something, I try every way possible of making it happen until I fail or succeed. This is why I kept daydreaming because I would come up with plans in my head to make things happen. I know this sound crazy, but it is just the way I am. I would just zone out into dreamland to escape my reality. My life wasn’t too exciting, but I was still having fun. I had about two very close friends who I would try to hang out with the most, and we would have fun. My grades were always average, and I wasn’t involved in anything exciting. I didn’t talk to any guys in highschool, I always kept to myself and had a very small circle. At times only having a few friends was boring, but I made the most of it and had fun. My life was just average, so I that’s why I just got lost in my dreams.

College came around and I was starting to have more excitement in my life. My look started to change for the better. I also started to have more of a social life. I was still in daydream mode because all the positive changes were motivating me. When it came to my major, I was truly confused. I was in dream world most of the time, and didn’t focus on my reality. I did not know what I wanted to do with my education. In my daydreaming I was someone influential and known. I wanted to be an influence in the beauty world. I loved makeup. I am a very creative and artistic person, and makeup is a form of art for me. However, my dreams were too big that I couldn’t achieve it in reality. I stopped caring about what was actually happening in real life. I went through a rough stage of figuring out my future. It was certain that I had to go to college and not beauty school. My parents did not accept anything less that college. I was stuck with the fact that I had to pick career path in the medical field. At the time, one of my cousins was in graduate school to be a speech pathologist. My parents tried to convince me to go into speech pathology. As much as I wanted beauty school, I couldn’t have it. I ended up deciding to go to Illinois State for Speech Pathology for junior year. I went to community college and got my associates degree, then transferred.

My junior year of college was the most confusing, reckless, and dramatic year of my life. I found out I was not accepted into my major, but I was accepted into the University. This put a huge weight of pure stress on my shoulders. I had to work extremely hard to raise keep a very high GPA. I realized how hard speech pathology was. I am not the best when it comes to science and math. Anything having to do with the medical field was not a strong suit for me. I went to a meeting for National Student Speech Language Hearing Association. I started to realize I was in the wrong spot. One of the leaders said one thing that made me realize this was not going to work out. “I have some good news guys, IT IS OKAY IF YOU HAVE A B. You don’t have to worry if you have a B in any class”. After I heard the leader say this, I saw every single girl in the room sigh of relief. This is when I was really sure I was in the wrong spot. These girls were stressed because they had one B. Meanwhile, I was sitting here barely passing the speech language classes. I had a math class that was extremely difficult and I worked extremely hard to raise my F to a B. I had never been so stressed in my life. I decided I had no choice but to change my major. The GPA requirement for Speech Pathology was a 3.7 and I had no way of reaching that. I then changed my major to Special Ed and found out that I still had to get accepted into that major. Again, I went through a great stress period. Not only did I have issues with my education, but in my personal life. I went through a hard time of being betrayed by someone I was very close to. Adding to that, I also had family drama. The only reason I stayed sane was because of three new friends I made while being there. I retook the ACT three times in the period of four months. I still did not reach the requirement for Special Ed. By this time, it was summer. I had no idea what to do because I couldn’t go back to Illinois State unless I changed my major again. I was seeing my boyfriend, which my parents found out about. They started to track my every move and watch the cameras in the house. I was trapped and confused. My parents were disappointed in me for my education and my personal matters. One day I had a breakdown, and called my friend Steffi for help. She is one of the only friends I have stuck around with since childhood. We went to different colleges which made us drift a little, but we still remained close. She helped me figure out my education by telling me about social work. I started to research more about social work, and found it very interesting.

In July, I applied to the Social Work program at Loyola University of Chicago. I was worrying I wouldn’t get accepted since it was very late to apply to a college for fall. I was only one month away from the start of the fall semester. At the end of July, I found out I actually got accepted. I was mind blown but I wasn’t going to question it at all. I went straight for it.

Now, I finally feel like I have my life figured out. I feel like I can accomplish anything I put my mind to. I just realized it all gets better. I started to really figure out myself as well. I understand why I act the way I act, and I have a better understanding of everything. So how does all of this relate to the fact that I hide my emotions?

I realized I do not show emotion because I don’t want anyone to see that I am weak in any sort of way. I went through many different problems in just one year, but I kept my emotions to myself. I replace my emotions with daydreams. Instead of dwelling on the worst parts of life, I think about how to achieve all of my goals more realistically. Even though my dreams were too big, I still haven’t put a halt into achieving them. I hide my emotions because I feel like it can burden me from working on my goals. This may not sound healthy, but I do let out my emotions to one person only. In a way, it helps me climb the top of the ladder. I learned to just forgive and forget about situations instead of making it into an obstacle. I learned how important it is that I just mind my business. I could keep having drama in my life, but I choose to stay peaceful to everyone. I take care of my personal issues on my own and get over it on my own time. This is why I do not display my emotions completely. I am accepting of how I am now, and I actually like this quality about me because it keeps me strong. At first I saw it as a bad quality, but now I realize it keeps my mind focused and strong.