I Used to Think I Was Stupid

Adventures in Academia #1

Welcome to those who’ve found their way here by way of my essay published in The Unpublishable, about beauty, diet culture, and their connections to my mother’s death as well as my own recovery from an eating disorder. You’ll find a wide range of writing here at Assembling Remnants. Whether you’re new here or you’ve been here since the beginning (three years!), I am thrilled that my work resonates with you.

This is the first in a series, called “Adventures in Academia.” The series navigates the intersections of education, class, knowledge, memory, different types of intelligence, and exploitation. I also share how I keep things organized, how I prioritize my work, and how I am currently experiencing academia as a first-generation high-school and college graduate.

This series is also, in a secondhand way, about writing nonfiction.

I have decided to not to paywall this series because I think that many folks who haven’t had access to certain kinds of education can benefit from what’s here. That said: it’s personal, intimate, and I’ve worked hard on it. Please consider upholding the reciprocal nature of art and commerce by becoming a paying subscriber.

Leisure Time in an Elegant Setting // Pieter de Hooch (Dutch, Rotterdam 1629–1684 Amsterdam)

I never learned how to live a life that wasn’t chaotic.

No— that’s the wrong way to say that.

I grew up in a chaotic environment.

For most of my life I believed myself to be incapable of routine, structure, and academic discipline. For most of my life I thought I was stupid.

Maybe this began when I had to repeat kindergarten. What my mother and teacher said didn’t make sense to my kid-brain. How was I supposed to understand that an August birthday meant I was “younger” than everyone else even though I was the same age? I remember passing my former classmates in the hallways or seeing them on the playground. They were first-graders now, but I wasn’t, and they always let me know that I’d been held back because I was dumb. A baby. I couldn’t help but believe them.

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In the past few months I’ve been parsing through my life as a student, trying to trace my way back to the moments I lost faith in my intelligence and the moments and events that helped me regain a sense of intellectual confidence. Sometimes I feel like the act of self-understanding is a willingness to look beyond the obvious.

There is a clearly marked line in my memory. Maybe this is a neurological ditch I’ve created— an assumed origin. The line, inky and easily followed, leads me back to high-school, when I dropped out at sixteen. I could stop there, but I know that’s not where it started. Nor was it in seventh grade, when I was expelled from my middle school for subordination after several infractions. Nor sixth, when I started skipping classes and ran away for the first time. I used to think of those moments as inciting incidents. Now I recognize them as predictable outcomes of an unstable childhood and educational environment. I knew I needed to look for the chicken-scratch lines; the ones I’d tried to erase, if I wanted to deconstruct and examine the beliefs I’d internalized.

Why hadn’t I done it before? Why weren’t these paths and memories clearly marked? Because our psyches protect us from what’s painful. Sometimes I let it go— if a blank spot within my memories resists filling in, I can let it go. Sometimes my psyche is telling me: leave it alone. But other times I can intuit outlines and hear faint whispers summoned by a scents, sounds, or visions. Traces of memories. With patience and attention everything eventually fills out. I remember.

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Memories of my childhood are not continuous, because my childhood wasn’t continous. They often involve different school; different teachers; a different dwelling, and sometimes different guardians. I moved in the middle of sixth grade; at the beginning of seventh grade; in the middle of my sophomore year. In one crystalline memory my mother drops me off at my new school. I must have been seven or eight. Walking through the front doors, I’m carrying several papers documenting my previously attended schools. There’s a secretary behind the administrative desk to whom I introduce myself, handing over the papers.

“How many schools have you attended this year?” She asks. I hold up three fingers. It’s January. Her expression becomes concerned before she quickly switches back to neutral. I look down at my shoes, ashamed, and my shoes, their floppy soles gaping, elicit more shame. The memory ends.

Before my mom remarried when I was thirteen we’d moved at least nine times and I’d attended at least nine schools. For two of those years I lived with my grandparents— this would be my longest residence anywhere until my thirties, when I moved to Syracuse for college.

At one school I placed third-place in the spelling bee. At another I was tested for ADD because I had so much trouble focusing. Like many women and femmes, I wasn’t diagnosed because the common belief was that ADD only involved hyperactivity. (Please note that I am nonbinary, and use they/them pronouns).

Five year-old me, very excited about a painting.

I was one of those kids. The kid you saw at your school for a few months, who maybe smelled like cigarette smoke and kept to themselves before they disappeared again. Maybe you were kind to me once, or maybe you were one of the many kids who refused to engage with me, or made fun of me. I remember all of those kids, but I am pretty sure they’ve forgotten me.

Once I was accustomed to my outsider status (first grade? second grade?) I learned to answer to the name “New Kid” and begged teachers to let me stay inside during recess so I wasn’t left to the wolves on the playground. I was without herd; without protection. Each new classroom was its own microclimate, its weather the teacher’s moods. There were the ones who rained exasperated sighs when I hummed to myself or couldn’t sit still, and the ones who asked me why I was squinting at the board because we couldn’t afford glasses.

At one school a teacher gave up on teaching me math, so I never learned. Another teacher accused me of lying about having finished a Little House on the Prairie book overnight. I was in second grade. She made me write a summary of the book in order to prove I’d read it before reluctantly letting me join the small group of advanced readers. Many teachers didn’t seem to want to believe I was smart, and assumed otherwise. I trace this line back to myself now, and my need to prove myself intellectually.

There are glowing suns scattered throughout my memories: teachers who encouraged me and showed me kindness. Who gave me books and inquired about my hopes and dreams. Their faces are so clear to me its as if I can touch them; frozen in time.

Maybe that’s why I never gave up completely.

My single mom was a high-school dropout and worked a lot. In her spare moments she sometimes tried to help me with homework, but her efforts often ended in frustration. Either she didn’t know what I also didn’t know, or she didn’t know something that I already knew. Neither situation was good for her so she gave up helping after a while.

This was always a point of contention with my teachers, who expressed their disappointment and frustration in various ways when I said my homework was lost, or that I’d forgotten it. When I did turn in assignments they were usually half-finished. Only one or two teachers took the time to hold me in during recess and go over the homework with me, so I understood it.

(side note: this is why it’s so important that homework isn’t beyond a child’s capability. all homework should be doable without help from an adult. additionally, I understand that many of my teachers were doing their best. I attended underfunded public schools and many were overwhelmed)

We’d moved again in the middle of the school year, and I went from a sixth grader in elementary school to a sixth grader at a middle school. I remember one of my teachers coming to my house once, looking for me. My mom was gone often; sometimes overnight, leaving me without anyone to hold me accountable for attending school.

I gave up. That’s what happened. In sixth grade I gave up. That’s also when I ran away from home for the first time, when I was twelve. After that, excepting my time at an alternative school in eighth grade, I stopped trying completely. School was stupid, is what I told myself. But what I really believed was: I’m stupid.

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How did that lead to this?

Since returning to college as a 32 year-old undergraduate (more on that in upcoming essays) I’ve often been asked how do you do it? How do you do so many things at once? How do you organize your life?

When I was an undergrad my secret was that I was a workaholic. A full course load plus thirty hours a week nannying, bartending, and serving food. This made it impossible for anything to slip through the cracks because I was “on” all the time, but it was totally unsustainable. After three years of undergrad and two as at an MFA program, I spent my third thesis year battling intense burnout, nearly unable to complete my thesis.

I didn’t call it burnout, I called it laziness.

That was in 2017/2018, before I’d been diagnosed with ADHD, autism, and an autoimmune disorder. Before I’d read the books Laziness Does Not Exist and Time Management for Mortals and Digital Minimalism. Before I sold my book on proposal and traveled to Europe for a Fulbright. Before I quit the Fulbright because I had asked way too much of myself and didn’t know my limitations. Before Covid. Before I took another full-time nanny job and then, after a year, quit to write full-time. Before I started my PhD.

Over time, I’ve learned specific strategies to manage my time. It’s a constant rebalancing act, but I’m excited to share these with you. I prioritize my mental and physical health— doing so has never been intuitive, but it’s becoming moreso as I reframe my ideas of success.

While I still sometimes struggle with moments of embarrassment, self-doubt, and imposter syndrome, I’ve learned to believe in myself and my own unique perspective.

We all have an individual way of seeing and understanding the world. In the next segment of this series I’ll explore my time as a non-traditional undergraduate student— how I started out as one person and left transformed completely. And how that experience has informed my beliefs regarding toxic cultural narratives many middle-class, college educated people have about knowledge and intelligence.

I’m excited to share this with you, and I’d love to hear your thoughts! Not only do I want to hear about how my work affects you, but also about your experiences in school, whatever they’ve been (or are). Leave a comment below!

Lastly, please feel free to share this widely. Although it’s paywalled you’re welcome to screenshot it, forward the email, and share text anywhere you’d like (with credit, of course). Help the right people find my work!