The Expectation of Success


“You’re such a disappointment!” That four worded phrase one’s parent might reiterate to their children over a hundred times after seeing their report card. That guilty feeling you obtain when you glance up and see that pure look of dissatisfaction in your parents eyes while they talk on the phone to your teacher. Your stomach feels achy, and all your six year old mind wants to do is lock yourself in your room and pretend to live in another reality. A reality where you can get away from taking responsibility for your own actions and imagine that life does not feel like a pile of rocks enclosing around you. Everyone can describe a circumstance where an obstacle or failure has compounded their life and leaves them with a feeling of overwhelmed discouragement. However, one has to know that failure does not actually brand you as a failure, it simply means your “failing” your way to success.

My first years of schooling started out a little rocky, in that they were the most difficult years I have gone through in my seventeen years on this planet. Laziness and my natural ineptitude to take the initiative on anything, greatly corrupted my mind. It was a constant struggle for me to focus on the material and make good grades. It was also a struggle for my parents to motivate me to strive for excellence. My parents decided to have me tested for ADD and ADHD on the recommendation of my first grade teacher, Mrs. Fink. Sadly, her intuition turned out to be correct. The results came back diagnosing me with moderate ADHD. I know my ADHD influenced the decisions I made and the way I went about things in school. At my young age, I did not really care about the outcome that my ADHD was causing or the fact that success was the least of my concerns. Fortuitously, there was someone on my side, teaching me how to do the right thing, the right way, at the right time, every time, even when no one was watching me.

My father, even though I was diagnosed with ADHD, immensely enlightened me on the understandings of his strong expectations, and completely destroyed any idea of this condition being used as a crutch or an excuse for failure. So for three hard, miserable, tearful years, my father sat at our round kitchen table teaching and reteaching me my school lessons. Even though countless binders and flash cards were made and many tear-stained papers were thrown in the trash, my father never gave up on me. He taught and “pounded” into my head to always remember my school work, and that every time the teacher talks it is important. So, after listening to that man say, and I quote “You have to build up your weaknesses until they become your strong points,” I finally have the self-motivation and determination to grasp concepts in class on my own and have the foreknowledge to catch myself when my mind starts to wander.

Everything moves in the same straight line unless acted upon by a force, and without my father and my determined mind set, I would have never been pushed onto the path of success. I still sometimes fall back into my ADHD ways, but I always know how to get myself out by remembering my father’s voice and everything he has taught me. All obstacles can be overcome and can change the person you are on the inside, especially when you know that someone believes in you. So, one day when I finally graduate I will walk across that stage and I will look at my father and know that I overcame and did my best; because one’s best is never too much to ask, never too much to give, or ever a source of shame.