#tbt/ GTKY- what were you like in high school?

[TnT10]

I was going to ask this on the AMA today but thought  it would be fun to ask everyone!  What were you like in high school?  

[harlowjune1984]

I was pretty reserved in high school....kind of an odd ball. I felt awkward, and stuck mostly to my close friends, played tennis, took a lot of hands on classes (art, crafts, cooking, horticulture, etc), and wasn't that great when it came to grades just because of pure laziness. Now I look back and wonder why I didn't try harder when it came to my class assignments, so I could get into the class that I wanted to take (that you had to have a certain GPA to get into). The school I went to was pretty small (one stoplight town, graduating class of 107 students), so everyone knew everyone else's business...so I never got in trouble. I knew that if I got in trouble, it would get back to my parents by lunchtime.

[TnT10]

First of all, I want to say that I am WAY different than I was in HS. There's my disclaimer, because I was a little shit, not as bad as my friends though. I'm from a small town in Indiana, there's not a whole lot to do here! I tanned all of the time, highlighted my hair, and smoked. I drank on the weekend with friends and remember having so much fun in high school! By the time I could drink legally I was over it though. Most of the people that I was friends with in HS are all junkies now and few of them have died, so I am glad that I got away from that whole scene. It's funny how you think that those people will be your friends for life, not so much in my situation. I'm jelly of the people that did have lifelong friends from HS!

[TnT10]

Mar 3, 2016 12:43:08 GMT -5 harlowjune1984 said:

I was pretty reserved in high school....kind of an odd ball. I felt awkward, and stuck mostly to my close friends, played tennis, took a lot of hands on classes (art, crafts, cooking, horticulture, etc), and wasn't that great when it came to grades just because of pure laziness. Now I look back and wonder why I didn't try harder when it came to my class assignments, so I could get into the class that I wanted to take (that you had to have a certain GPA to get into). The school I went to was pretty small (one stoplight town, graduating class of 107 students), so everyone knew everyone else's business...so I never got in trouble. I knew that if I got in trouble, it would get back to my parents by lunchtime.

Dang, and I thought that I was from a small town!  I also wish I would have tried harder.  I mean, I had decent grades, but I missed a lot of school and could have learned so much more.  I wish my parents would have instilled in me more the importance of school work.  They cared that I had good grades and that was it, so I was able to scrape by with B's and C's and be fine. 

[tikoberry99]

I was very shy and only outgoing around family and friends. I played field hockey and lacrosse, but only because my parents bribed me to play with a car. I was not into the sports teams and didn't participate in their activities (wearing uniform to school on home game days, sleep overs, etc). I played the guitar and wrote songs in my room with a good friend and we got pretty damn good I stopped playing the guitar at 17, but kept my guitar and amp for my future kids...I'm hoping little man gets into music and plays it. I had a BFF from second grade and we were attached at the hip...she was super outgoing and helped me break out of my shell a bit. I loved high school and it was very hard for me to leave my comfort zone and friends to go to college.

[cavewmn]

I am an outsider looking in. In my hometown I bounced from group to group. I lasted one year back in my home town in high school. It sucks being an odd ball and having a cousin who was very popular but. In the big city I found a small group of friends. Of course I didn't have any classes with them and so the people I talked to went from the druggies to the football players. lol

It takes people getting to know me to like me. Around people I don't know I am very quiet. Which people find odd.
I think this is why I prefer to be a hermit.

[mcktymck]

I was a bit of an ugly ducking/late bloomer, so I wasn't the biggest fan of high school. It was hard being boy crazy and not having any boys reciprocate the feelings haha. I eventually figured out how to apply makeup, got my braces off and grew into my looks a little better, so the last two years of HS were better. I had 3 close friends that I always spent time with in and out of school but was friendly towards just about everyone (except for the really stuck up bitches). I was never into playing sports but enjoyed going to the games with my friends. For the most part I was a good kid who didn't get into trouble often and behaved myself. I was the quiet one which worked in my favor all the time, alcohol would go missing and my mom never suspected I was to blame, and she never found out about the boyfriends sneaking in the middle of the night until AFTER I was out of HS

[TnT10]

Mar 3, 2016 12:57:38 GMT -5 cavewmn said:

It takes people getting to know me to like me. Around people I don't know I am very quiet. Which people find odd.
I think this is why I prefer to be a hermit.

I'm very much like this too now that I'm older.  A lot of people tell me once they know me that they thought I was a bitch before they knew me.  Resting bitch face I guess?!  LOL  I'd much rather have a night in rather then be out socializing, I have to find balance with H because he is very much an extrovert.

[mcktymck]

Mar 3, 2016 13:06:42 GMT -5 TnT10 said:

Mar 3, 2016 12:57:38 GMT -5 cavewmn said:

It takes people getting to know me to like me. Around people I don't know I am very quiet. Which people find odd.
I think this is why I prefer to be a hermit.

I'm very much like this too now that I'm older.  A lot of people tell me once they know me that they thought I was a bitch before they knew me.  Resting bitch face I guess?!  LOL  I'd much rather have a night in rather then be out socializing, I have to find balance with H because he is very much an extrovert.

I'm the same way ladies! It's like night and day when I'm around strangers vs close friends. Everyone at my last job found me intimidating for the longest time because I was very quiet and had resting bitch face, but my office mates that turned into BFFs saw the other side of me that involved random dancing and singing at my desk, bouncing off the walls, and just general weirdness haha

[roccobabyk]

I grew up in a very small town and went to a very small school (graduating class of 49). I played every sport I could (volleyball, basketball and softball/track) because there was literally nothing else to do. I made good grades mainly because all of my friends made good grades and I didn't want to fall behind. I was also in band and participated in a lot of different clubs but really only hung out with a small group of friends. I did get into some trouble my senior year when I decided to rebel a bit and argue with our rival school but besides that I was boring. The real intereating stuff happened when I went to college and learned what the real world was.

[tikoberry99]

Mar 3, 2016 12:57:38 GMT -5 cavewmn said:

I am an outsider looking in. In my hometown I bounced from group to group. I lasted one year back in my home town in high school. It sucks being an odd ball and having a cousin who was very popular but. In the big city I found a small group of friends. Of course I didn't have any classes with them and so the people I talked to went from the druggies to the football players. lol

It takes people getting to know me to like me. Around people I don't know I am very quiet. Which people find odd.
I think this is why I prefer to be a hermit.

I'm the same way! It takes a while to get to know me and when people first meet me they think I'm a bitch, but I'm just REALLY shy. It also doesn't help that I have resting bitch face. I prefer to be alone or with a VERY small group of friends. DH is super social and just doesn't get why I prefer to be a homebody then out and about all the time. 

[tikoberry99]

Mar 3, 2016 13:06:42 GMT -5 TnT10 said:

Mar 3, 2016 12:57:38 GMT -5 cavewmn said:

It takes people getting to know me to like me. Around people I don't know I am very quiet. Which people find odd.
I think this is why I prefer to be a hermit.

I'm very much like this too now that I'm older.  A lot of people tell me once they know me that they thought I was a bitch before they knew me.  Resting bitch face I guess?!  LOL  I'd much rather have a night in rather then be out socializing, I have to find balance with H because he is very much an extrovert.

Resting bitch face here too! I want to punch people when they say "you should smile more" my yearbook literally has 10 comments about how I have such a pretty smile...I should smile more.  Grrrrrr

[cavewmn]

I am so glad my husband is introvert also! And I also have resting bitch face!!!!

[cabbagecabbage]

In one word: awkward. I was young for my grade and late to bloom, bright, nerdy, artsy. I had surgery and used crutches on and off for the first half of high school. The surgery made me gain weight so I was chubby sophomore year. I was poor compared to most kids at my school, lower middle class. Pretty much everything that could make a kid uncool, I had. I drifted between the nerds (too preppy) and the artsy/wild kids (too wild for me) but had a few great friends. I couldn't wait to leave and never come back, which I did. Now I like my hometown and through social media I like lots of my old classmates.

[mcktymck]

Resting bitch faces unite!

[TnT10]

Mar 3, 2016 13:33:18 GMT -5 cabbagecabbage said:

In one word: awkward. I was young for my grade and late to bloom, bright, nerdy, artsy. I had surgery and used crutches on and off for the first half of high school. The surgery made me gain weight so I was chubby sophomore year. I was poor compared to most kids at my school, lower middle class. Pretty much everything that could make a kid uncool, I had. I drifted between the nerds (too preppy) and the artsy/wild kids (too wild for me) but had a few great friends. I couldn't wait to leave and never come back, which I did. Now I like my hometown and through social media I like lots of my old classmates.

I'm glad that you are somewhere you like now and were able to connect with old classmates!  

[roccobabyk]

Resting bitch face is a perfect deterrent for bump touchers, unless they really lack social awareness.

[cabbagecabbage]

Mar 3, 2016 13:37:40 GMT -5 TnT10 said:

Mar 3, 2016 13:33:18 GMT -5 cabbagecabbage said:

In one word: awkward. I was young for my grade and late to bloom, bright, nerdy, artsy. I had surgery and used crutches on and off for the first half of high school. The surgery made me gain weight so I was chubby sophomore year. I was poor compared to most kids at my school, lower middle class. Pretty much everything that could make a kid uncool, I had. I drifted between the nerds (too preppy) and the artsy/wild kids (too wild for me) but had a few great friends. I couldn't wait to leave and never come back, which I did. Now I like my hometown and through social media I like lots of my old classmates.

I'm glad that you are somewhere you like now and were able to connect with old classmates!  

Me too. I was so angsty but I don't think I was as uncool as I felt. People often say they remember I was really funny or smart but I felt so inferior and judged back then. Being a teenager is so hard.

[ellebelle]

I went to a large high school. There were over 600 people in my graduating class so I can't even imagine what it was like graduating with 100 or less people. I was pretty quiet unless you knew me and then I was more outgoing. I was a good student, studied hard, played soccer and tennis. I also participated in concert band and pit orchestra for the school plays. I pretty much got along with everyone and just floated along, for lack of a better word.

[katelou]

I went to a large public school with 550 kids per class, after graduating from a Catholic school where I'd been with the same 44 kids since kindergarten. It was a rough start because I knew almost no one.

I finally found a great group of friends, we were in marching band and theater. Most of my friends never drank and we spent a lot of Friday nights at each others' houses binge eating junk food and trying to kill each other at Sorry! (yes the board game).

I was diagnosed with Crohn's mid-junior year and high school had a rough ending, too. I spent a lot of time feeling awful, looking awful on high-dose prednisone, and in the hospital. I had a lot of people who either didn't believe me or didn't know how to react.

I had some fun times but don't miss it

[rungirlrun]

I went to a huge high school (~800 kids in a class so it was competitive in all regards). It was nice because while there were cliques, there wasn't one group who ran the school nor were there many kids who were bullied. Most people were able to find their group. I wasn't popular, but I had a large group of good friends and many acquaintances. I ran cross country and track and was one of the smart kids so I'd say I was generally well liked or people didn't know who I was (very common at graduation to see kids you had never seen before in your life!). I certainly was a bit shy (still am but became much more outgoing in college). I went to dances but never had a boyfriend and was definitely a good kid who didn't drink or really do anything rebellious. Therefore, I went a little too wild in college - nothing extreme but I could have laid off the alcohol a bit to avoid making dumb decisions :-)

Overall, I enjoyed high school but have zero desire to go back. I have a few friends who I still chat with over email from high school, but I really made my lifelong friends in college and beyond.

[rungirlrun]

katelou, I hope you're doing ok with Crohn's now. I have a friend who has it, and I've seen him suffer so much. Not an easy disease but also not one that's well understood by others which is a double whammy.

[lostinfaith225]

Let's see, I think I would have been labeled one of the smart kids.

I was a goody goody, shy, hung out with the band kids. (I was not in band). Most of my friends were a year younger. My high school sweetheart was a year younger. We dated off and on my sophomore year and solidly my junior and senior year. I wasnt n the popular crowd because I didn't party.

My bff was in the popular crowd. She was a cheerleader, but we stayed friends!

[harlowjune1984]

Mar 3, 2016 12:47:01 GMT -5 TnT10 said:

Mar 3, 2016 12:43:08 GMT -5 harlowjune1984 said:

I was pretty reserved in high school....kind of an odd ball. I felt awkward, and stuck mostly to my close friends, played tennis, took a lot of hands on classes (art, crafts, cooking, horticulture, etc), and wasn't that great when it came to grades just because of pure laziness. Now I look back and wonder why I didn't try harder when it came to my class assignments, so I could get into the class that I wanted to take (that you had to have a certain GPA to get into). The school I went to was pretty small (one stoplight town, graduating class of 107 students), so everyone knew everyone else's business...so I never got in trouble. I knew that if I got in trouble, it would get back to my parents by lunchtime.

Dang, and I thought that I was from a small town!  I also wish I would have tried harder.  I mean, I had decent grades, but I missed a lot of school and could have learned so much more.  I wish my parents would have instilled in me more the importance of school work.  They cared that I had good grades and that was it, so I was able to scrape by with B's and C's and be fine. 

MH and I both learned our lesson, of course years after we should have been getting our shit together. We decided when we got together, that we would offer his niece and nephew an all expense backpacking trip to Europe on four conditions: They got good grades in high school (no D's or F's, and hardly any C's....we wanted at least a B average), they had to send us their grades each quarter (we weren't going to hunt them down and ask for them), they didn't end up pregnant (or get someone pregnant), and they graduated. Well, my niece didn't graduate (she did end up getting her GED later)....so that kicked her out of the running. When it came to his nephew, he got bad grades and first two years, never sent us his grades (although SIL tried to do it for him, but I put my foot down with MH on that one), and he just barely graduated. So he didn't get the trip either. 

MH's cousin's daughters are being raised by his aunt and uncle. The oldest was extremely smart (well, book smart), but she dropped out of school, ran away, and got pregnant. The youngest just started high school this year, and jokingly said "Hey...what about my trip to Europe? Will you do that for me?" I told her that since we have yet to pay for a trip to Europe, she was more than welcome to work towards one. So far, her grades are up, and she has been sending us her grades each time she gets them....so we shall see if she gets a trip! Hopefully it is enough incentive for her, to work hard and graduate. 

[melody330]

I think my view of what I was like and others view is way different. I get a lot of "I thought you hated me in HS!" When I reconnect with people. ::shrug:: I guess put me in the RBF club.

I was kind of a little bit of everything. Our class alone was 500 kids. We have four high schools in our town. So...it's a big town lol.

I played varsity soccer all four years, but I was in no way a typical jock. I hung out with the skater kids, I didn't drink, smoke or do drugs. Mostly a mall rat on Friday/sat nights. In the summer we cut school to surf, and I never got in trouble for it. I took AP classes and skipped a lot of them. Still managed good grades.

I knew everyone, but had a close group of friends we stuck with. I'm still friends with a few of them today. DH was in that group of friends, so we are all still in touch.

HS was easy for me, I seemed to fit in wherever and i don't remember feeling like an outsider. I do remember trying to include everyone in school stuff though. Dances, gym class, ski club. I would say I enjoyed HS. I hope DS has a similar experience!

[housecarder]

I moved around a lot when I was in elementary school (at least once a year) and then finally stayed in one place for middle school. I started to come out of my shell only to up and move to a new place for high school. H actually moved to the same small Indiana town as me the same year so we were friends being the new kids.

I was bright and never studied but kept up good grades. I didn't go out much except for church stuff, I was content spending time at home reading or playing with my siblings. I started to build a decent group of friends but hardly ever did the sleep overs or hang outs outside of school. I got along with pretty much everyone.

[mcktymck]

harlowjune1984 that's really awesome that you offered that incentive to your nieces and nephews!

[sarcaztic10]

Pre-senior year: I was very shy and quiet. I hung out with the nerds and band geeks even though I wasn't one. I was smart in a few subjects but others I just didn't like or care about but still managed to get decent grades. I had a really good GPA despite all that and was being pursued by some good colleges.

Senior year is when everything changed... I started my first job, bought a car, started smoking, dating a much older guy, and ended up dropping out of high school early in my Sr year and running away from home. I got into drugs and drinking and was basically ruining my life. Then one day it's like I just woke up and realized what I had done and that I still really wanted to go to college and become something.

I ended up enrolling in an alternative school and moving back home. I finished high school a few months early because the school I was at her me set my own pace for learning. I stopped dating the older guy and stopped partying and got my life back in order.

I really hope that DS and this LO don't put me through the crap I put my parents through.

[jewelsofthenile]

I was a pretty good kid. Most of my teachers always commented on how quiet I was. My high school was small 108 kids in my graduating class. I played volleyball all through high school. Since our school was small and the district composed of mostly corn and soybean fields. A lot of the kids in the school would drink on weekends since there was not a lot of things to do/barn parties/house parties usually happened every weekend. I drove my friends to these parties a lot after I was able to drive. I drank some but I was pretty tame. Driving my friends gave me a good excuse not to drink I got decent grades not the best but pretty good. I am still in contact with several of my friends. Overall, I liked high school. I liked college a lot more, although i don't keep in contact with many college friends, and I am glad I don't have to do it all again.

[TnT10]

Mar 3, 2016 18:49:59 GMT -5 sarcaztic10 said:

Pre-senior year: I was very shy and quiet. I hung out with the nerds and band geeks even though I wasn't one. I was smart in a few subjects but others I just didn't like or care about but still managed to get decent grades. I had a really good GPA despite all that and was being pursued by some good colleges.

Senior year is when everything changed... I started my first job, bought a car, started smoking, dating a much older guy, and ended up dropping out of high school early in my Sr year and running away from home. I got into drugs and drinking and was basically ruining my life. Then one day it's like I just woke up and realized what I had done and that I still really wanted to go to college and become something.

I ended up enrolling in an alternative school and moving back home. I finished high school a few months early because the school I was at her me set my own pace for learning. I stopped dating the older guy and stopped partying and got my life back in order.

I really hope that DS and this LO don't put me through the crap I put my parents through.

That is good that you were able to realize that you were able to recognize that you needed a change and made it.  I'm with you that I hope my kids don't put me through what I put my parents through.