Dear Shrutee

No this isn't a story about the turquoise mermaids in the sea or the flying unicorns- for this isn't a fairytale. It's a real life story- my story in my words.

If there was something that my 13 year old self didn't know, it was failure. 13 year old Shrutee topped in her school for 3 consecutive years and always had those A grades in her bag. She never scored below 90 and was many teachers' favorite. That Shrutee was a freaking ideal child of every Indian parent.

14 year old Shrutee stepped into 8th grade with excitement. She had recently topped her 7th grade, which means she guaranteed her place in the 'prestigious' A section of the school. Before you run into any confusion let me explain this. There are usually 3 sections in our school- A, B, C. The A section is for the brilliant performers, B is for average kids and C is still deemed as the section for kids who have no good future in the academic world. Since she hadn't experienced any sort of failure in her life before 8th grade, Shrutee had developed a stupid superiority complex. She looked down on her buddies who were in B and C grade.

In that same year, a new system was devised by the school. Eighth graders of section A had to follow the ICSE syllabus, B section were to be taught the 'easy' parts of the ICSE curriculum while C section were required to follow the CBSE syllabus.

And this is where all the problems started.

This huge jump from CBSE to ICSE without any proper bridge posed a huge problem for me. It seemed as if a few months ago I was learning the table of 9 and today I have to solve a few algebraic problems. Maybe I could have caught up with the curriculum if I had some good teachers with me, but it seemed like the whole universe was against me that time. There was our Maths teacher who used to spend whole 40 minutes solving a problem, but without any prior explanation of the concepts behind it. A physics teacher who used to come to our class 20 minutes late. Don't ask me if any action was taken against her, she was and is still the school's supervisor. An English teacher who hated me and my doubts for reasons unknown. Since the English vocabulary of ICSE books was difficult plus the internet left me more confused on those things, so I used to ask a lot of questions to her......and most likely she hated it. That was something new for me since I had never met a teacher before her who didn't take my doubts with open arms.

All in all, I knew that my situation was really bad. I simply couldn't cope up with it. The pre mid terms came and it was a disaster. I had scored 29 in Science out a total of 40. At first glance, this may not seem that bad. But if you remember the beginning of the video where I stated that I had never scored any 80s, you could understand that this was a big failure for me.

I was devastated. And so were my parents. They sent me to an expensive tuition to get better in Science. Did it solve the problem? Well that's for the later half of the story.

So where was I? Ah my exams with nightmarish results. My scores weren't the only problem. Well I was hitting puberty at that time which simply worsened my problem. I started getting a bit body conscious and for the first time 'tried' to think seriously about my weight. Well 'tried' because I am still overweight but oh well, that time it was such a big concern for me. To the extent where I felt that it's better to jump off the roof and get born either as an elephant or a skinny human rather than live this life. Oh and I shouldn't forget about my pimples. Honestly those didn't bother me but when you have got a plenty people of people pointing those out, you have no choice but to worry about them too.

Mid term was a disaster again, especially English and Maths, scoring below 90 again. As for Science I managed to score an exact 90 thanks to my tuition teacher. God really bless him or else I would have been doomed.

The same story followed up for post mid and final terms until I was finally out of that dreadful class. By then my ego and self confidence was almost non existent.

Somehow I managed to stay in the same section since I scored a full in Social Science, my strongest subject till now. But 15 year old Shrutee didn't want to be at the edge of the cliff anymore. She was tired of staying at the bottom of the pit. Therefore she promised to herself to bounce back stronger.

It seemed as if God had liked my determination at that time since in 9th grade CBSE curriculum was brought back to us. That sort of solved half of the problems. I looked for a good mathematics teacher outside the school, and the person I found was my knight in shining armor. I am serious about this , he is the best teacher I have ever come across. I did wonderful in the pre mids, scored near full in all the subjects and was 2nd in class. Since then I have never been off the charts, it was always above 90. In 10th grade, I scored a total of 97.4% .

About my body consciousness, I started appreciating my body rather than criticizing it every single minute. I found my small chubby fingers as cute. I stopped bothering about my pimples. I started exercising rigorously but found it difficult to do it daily due to everyday obligations. But exercising kept me happy and energized. I really loved it.

My 8th grade English teacher left the school when I was in 10th. You should have seen the smile on my face when I heard the news. Not to be mean, but oh well the hate was mutual and besides she started it.

Looking back at those days, I really admire my 14 year self's grit. Even though there were a lot of setbacks and taunting, she didn't give up on herself. She believed in herself and worked diligently. She strived to be a better version of herself. Dear Shrutee, I am absolutely proud of you.