My Road to Becoming a College
Student
In February 2012, I became not only a full time mother
and wife, but also for the very first time a college student. I hope to be able
to share with you the constraints I faced along the road and how I overcame
them. I will be the first to tell you it has been a long and difficult road,
but one that I do not for a second regret.
In October of 2008 I was a happy, energetic, and lively
normal 8th grader. Little did I know that it was all about to
change. You see, in September of 2008 I had been raped after a football game
but didn’t realize it was something I would have to overcome for not only
myself, but for the new live I was growing inside me. That’s right, in October,
I found out that I was going to be a mom, not only a mom, but a teen mom which
made the task seem all the more scary to me. After finding out that as a result
of my rape I would be a mom soon, I tried to continue life normally, however,
that would not be the case. Due to complications from being young and pregnant,
I faced a number of health complications that eventually led to my dropping out
of high school so that I could protect the tiny life growing within me.
My son Jessie was born on August 28th 2009 and
weighed in at 9 lbs. 13 oz. and was 21.5 inches long. That day my life turned
down a whole other road, and has led me to be the person I am today. After his
birth, I fully intended to return to school but unfortunately that wouldn’t
happen.
Little
did I know that 13 years later I would finally take the steps needed to gain my
G.E.D and continue down my academic path. When I finally returned to school, I
was a full time mother, and wife, which in itself is a fulltime job. In addition
to the tasks already put before me, I was working part time as a substitute
teacher at the school my children attended. When my youngest son began
preschool, I thought, “Here is my opportunity to go back to school” I had been
telling myself for years that when I found a babysitter I would go back, but
things would always come up. Bills would be piled to the ceiling and my
husband’s job just wasn’t cutting it. So, I took the step to working also.
Eventually, I was able to get into a spot where we were living comfortably due
to my husband’s new job and was able to cut back my hours working.
In
August of 2011 when my youngest son started preschool I finally acted on the
chance. I enrolled at the local Adult Education Center and began placement
testing to see where I stood academically, and what I needed to brush up on.
Luckily for me, I tested fairly well and only required a minimum amount of
classes. After approximately 8 classes, I was informed that the center felt
that I was ready to begin my pretesting phase. I sat down and in one afternoon
took all the required pretest (including the essay) and after 6 hours was
pleased to find out that I was ready to move on to the actual test!
In December of 2011, I sat down at 8 am
sweating bullets and worried about how I would test. You see, this was the
first day of the actual G.E.D test, and I was worried that even though I had
tested well on the pretest, I was totally going to mess this one up. After
completing the first day, I was unsure of myself and worried that I was going
to do poorly. However, I continued on to the second part, and was off to
eagerly await my results. Fortunately for me it was only 2 weeks, although it
felt like years to me at the time. Three days before Christmas I can proudly
say that I received my diploma in the mail, and this past May crossed the stage
in acceptance of it. It took me a long time to get here but I finally managed
to do it.
In conclusion, it has been a long hard road, but I have
managed to overcome the constraints of being a single teen mother and a wife,
to continue on to become a full time college student.
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