âit doesnât matter how people see you!â
but it does, doesnât it. in high school i was âsmart but distractedâ and âa dropoutâ and ânever in class.â i was seen as flighty, as incapable, as a certified mess. it was true, of course. i never did my homework. i didnât show up for the test. i had teachers who sighed when i approached their desks: of course you suck was the constant message.
it took me 6 years to graduate college, at which point i was magna cum laude. everyone knew me as the âoverachieverâ the âgroup leaderâ the âof course you did the extra work.â it was odd to me. everyone saw me as organized, efficient, self-sustaining. i was the same person, wasnât i. just as tired. certainly still mentally ill, even if i was better at handling it.Â
in one of my education classes, weâd learn that perception is everything. if youâre a girl, you see yourself as doing worse, even when youâre doing better. it plays into race, too: a phenomenon known as stereotype threat. students frequently rate themselves harder than the professor does. and of course, the ultimate of perceptionâs abilities: if you tell someone âi expect youâre going to do well,â they do. the same is true of the reverse.
i see a lot of people asking me why representation is such a good thing. or why we need to be careful about our intrinsic feelings. why does it matter, after all, that girls donât think they belong in STEM. who cares about that one man who came out and said theyâre biologically incompatible with it?
thereâs a girl i babysat when i was younger. mostly i was there for her little brother. i heard her, late at night, whispering to herself: youâre so stupid, youâre stupid, why canât you just understand this. itâs not unfamiliar. i remember staring at homework my mental illness wouldnât let me finish and thinking youâre so stupid, youâre a failure, the world would be better without your burden.
i went from being the person that copied homework to being the person people copied off of. i didnât suddenly gain an IQ boost. yes, i got a few coping mechanisms that have certainly helped me through. but the fact is: now that people expect me to do good, i do. and itâs still never enough. when i see â100%â on a paper i donât feel excited. i wonder why i didnât get a 101. in my heart, iâm faking this.
in my heart, iâm still flighty, still struggling with mental illness, still the girl who canât sit still. iâm still disorganized, still prone to wanting to run from conflict or the test or the homework i didnât finish. but my teachers all see me as a gem, a symbol of perfection. hereâs where the sad thing comes in: i miss just as much school for my mental illness. but because teachers like me, they let it slip. âyouâre a good student,â i hear a lot, âdonât worry about it.â iâve had teachers wave off entire finals based on my âgood girlâ category.
i wonder if thereâs a girl like me who never got a chance to change her label, and if sheâs sitting in class, turning out the same amount of homework. if she misses just as much, if sheâs also late on the assignment, if sheâs struggling to understand the problems. but sheâs still âunorganized,â sheâs still âa messâ. and nobody decides sheâs worth it to just say âhey, i believe in you. and you can make it out of this.â if, because of the way people see her, sheâs certain sheâs worthless.
youâre a good person. youâre more than your grades. you can do this. i know you can. iâm proud of you either way.Â
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