I was the shy girl at school. While everyone else was out partying and enjoying the freedom of their college years, I was in the library. When I wasn’t studying in the library, I was alone in my dorm room while my roommate went on dates, made friends and made the most out of her college years.
My trouble was simple.
I wasn’t reclusive or introverted, I was overwhelmed. While other kids could get away with partying all night and studying a few hours a day, I had more trouble. It’s not that I was dumb. Studying and research were easy. It was the essays and papers that gave me trouble.
I had trouble figuring out what went where and what my professors wanted. Knowing that I had trouble gave me anxiety. So I ended up spending most of my time in front of my computer, taking weeks to hack through work that other students seemed to finish relatively quickly.
And that made me feel inferior and dumb. The little free time that I did have, I didn’t branch out to meet many new people. It felt like they knew more than me and had a better handle on college than I did. Times were tough. Thinking about them now makes them feel even tougher.
If I had known then what I do now, things could have been different. But my life didn’t turn around until I was in my senior year. By chance I happened to hear a girl in class saying that she had to hurry up and leave because she was late for her essay editing appointment. I was shocked to hear that she went to tutoring. She was almost as well-known in school for her 3.7 GPA as she was for never missing a party.
I’d never considered getting help on my essays before. I’d always been told that college was hard. That if I wanted to succeed, I would have to work hard. And I was lead to believe that my hard work would get me better grades than everyone else. But after hearing her talk, I started wondering if I was working hard instead of smart.
So I swallowed my pride and signed up. After all, I didn’t have anything to lose. And the sessions were cheaper than I’d thought they’d be: not much more than a cost for a meal out. Which I figured wasn’t much to pay if I could get some help and get out of the library. I signed up for an afternoon session after a class with just the outline of an essay I’d been working on.
In less than 45 minutes, we’d already made more progress than I could have accomplished with several hours’ work in the library. As it turns out, I was doing things the wrong way. I explained my writing process to her and she mapped out a much quicker one, one that I never would have thought of on my own.
The experience was eye-opening and sad at the same time. In less than an hour, she’d shaved close to a quarter of the labor I usually do on an essay. I was ecstatic about that. But I was also frustrated. I had wasted so much of my life struggling with papers when I didn’t have to. And I’d wasted months of my time that I could have spent hanging out with friends, partying and enjoying college life trapped in the stupid library and straining my eyes in front of the computer.
The next few sessions were just as eye opening.
Now that I had a professional writer and an Ivy League graduate helping me with the structure of my essays, writing a first draft was a piece of cake. It only took me a few hours out of the session instead of several sleepless nights.
And once I had it completed, she walked me through tips and tricks that I’d never even heard of. I now knew exactly what my professor wanted and how to deliver it in a timely fashion. Now, my essays weren’t just easy to write, they were stress free. Now I didn’t look at my syllabus with an aching feeling in the pit of my stomach. I had confidence. I could write about and research any topic well. And I had a professional writer who could help me along the way and answer any questions that I might have.
After just five essay editing sessions, my whole life turned around. I completed two research papers in a fraction of the time. I now had time to relax, enjoy myself and hang out with my friends. I thanked the girl in my class for the advice and she invited me out to a party the next night.
Now, instead of being the shy girl in school, I was the girl I’d always wanted to be. I had time to enjoy myself and I made the Dean’s List in my final year of school. My only regret was that I’d wasted so much time as a shy girl. I could have had an extra three years of partying and hanging under my belt if I’d just gotten help a little sooner.
About the author: Jane Collins writes for several sites about aspects of education and those never-forgotten memories of those fun school and college days.
Photo credit: Abitha Pallett