FLORENCE B.

AJERO BEED 1-4

‘Academic Validation’ that is what most students seek these days. Honors, high
honors, straight A’s being the top of the class or just getting in the rank is the goal of every student so far.
Family and friends being proud of them once they achieve those accomplishments the problem is what
they went through to earn that kind of accomplishment. I, for one has always been pushing myself hard to
earn an academic validation from my family. I got through many breakdowns to earn that rank or honor.
There are days that I forgot to eat or sleep just to finish an activity. I tried to make time for myself, my
hobbies and just to have fun but in the end I just burned myself to finish the activities. I started aiming to
be in a rank when I was in 9th Grade as I was compared to my cousin for having an honor while I don’t
have, that was the first time I’ve heard my mother comparing me to others, since when it comes to school
she doesn’t care as long as I passed and hearing her comparing me to my younger cousin break my heart.
So I started to grind and it worked I got into the honor roll in 9th grade then I continued in 10th grade, until
the pandemic hit. During my senior high school years was the most challenging days of my life, as I
balanced school with household chores that I don’t even have time for myself. These were the days that I
forgot to eat and sleep just to finish my activities. The days of having so many breakdowns that I can’t
even count. I lost so much weight and I became ill all the time. I remember crying over and over again
because I couldn’t understand a simple instruction. My head was overloaded then in 2021 people in my
family kept dying. Every week for 6 months we always went to a burial. Then my only rest, my grandma
died, it really took a toll on me and my studies as I didn’t go online for a week so my activities that needed
to be passed had been stacking up, but my teachers had been considerate which I’ve been grateful for.
These were the days I’ve also been struggling with my mental health, which worried my mother as she
would always ask me to go out whereas I refused to come and reasoned with her that I still to finish some
things. In the end I graduated with high honors, after I graduated I ask myself if all my sufferings are worth
it, I can’t tell if I’m proud of myself or not since I really don’t feel anything I just wanted academic validation
from everyone around me. I saw this Tiktok that said “papel lang yan” to those who received an academic
award, well this is what I thought those who agreed with that don’t know how it feels like or how much we
have suffered just to get those papers. How many nights we haven’t slept, times we didn’t eat and how
many breakdowns we’ve been through. Those are not only papers but those are the results of our blood,
sweat and tears that we clearly deserved. Once you start aiming the rank every year you want to achieve
better for you to not disappoint everyone around. The academic award is not just a paper it’s a proof of
how much suffering we’ve been through to achieve it.