Life of a highschool student

Shaniah Bates

             My name is Shaniah Bates and I was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota and raised in kankakee, Illinois. Growing up with a single mom and seeing her work as hard as she did to put clothes on my back and keeping a roof over my head I always seen myself as a reflection of her: smart, ambitious, determined and hard working. In 5th grade I was above average in math, reading and geography. Taking middle school pre Ap classes earning the B honor roll every semester throughout my 3 years as a middle schooler and once I came to highschool things changed.

Freshman year was a really great year for me I played volleyball, softball, stayed for basketball games. I made B honor roll that year and finished off final semester with a 3.2 GPA.

During my sophomore year my mom had a second child and a lot of things changed for me because my brother’s dad wasn’t helping out and my mom had to work in order for the bills to be paid. I had to step up and play the official big sister role. I got my first job at little caesars, We moved into a house for the first time, and switched to Patrick Henry High School. When my brother was born I started to notice that my mother was becoming more dependent on me.I started to feel like I wasn't able to be a teenager anymore. It felt that it was too much stress for me and I  became unhappy with my home and parents. Then transferring to a school was a big step for me because I have been going to school in Columbia heights since the 5th grade, and not really excited about moving to the “hood” (north minneapolis ) and going to Patrick Henry High School I was around a lot of bad influence still not letting it affect me, Then I met a boy and he was a troubled kid , he was involved in a lot of gang violence and soon became my boyfriend and it led me too following after his footsteps I got in trouble with my mom a lot, stopped caring for school and ran away from home and the summer got even crazier.

Junior year was a lot tougher just with the amount of work from school, home issues, and mental issues that I all dealt with alone.I managed to realize that there was a bigger picture to what I was going through and that I felt that I was more than what I was allowing myself to be.