When I was a little kid, I was a big nerd. You may be saying, “But, Steph, you are still a big nerd.” Well, you’re right, but I was an even bigger nerd as a kid.
I was also an Army brat and when I was in the third grade we were stationed in Virginia.
Now, I was smart and I knew I was smart cause I’d been in special classes for smart kids. When we moved to Virginia my parents upped the ante and sent me to a special school for smart kids.
I. Was. Pissed. Number one because my brother and all my friends and neighbors got to go to the regular school, number two because my bus ride was really long, but most importantly because I WASN’T THE SMARTEST KID ANYMORE. It was ridiculous.
I was used to getting the highest grades without even trying. Now you’ve got me here reading my Christopher Pike and these kids are devouring The Hobbit. I was out-nerded! I couldn’t stand it.
We switched classes, just like in high school. I hated that. The teachers all wore high heels. I really hated that. I had to do actual work. I really, really hated that.
I would like to tell you that I learned a lesson in how important hard work is and how I struggled to the top of my class and even became class president and made the teachers stop wearing such offensive footwear, but that would be a lie.
Instead I became depressed and cried everyday until my parents finally took pity on me and sent me back to public school where my academic excellence and lackadaisical study habits were received warmly with many ribbons and A+’s.
Don’t judge me. I was nine.*
*I’d do the same thing today.
Were you a nerdy kid? Did you ever feel like you got thrown into the deep end and couldn’t swim? For that matter, did anyone actually throw you in the deep end when you couldn’t swim? I’ve heard that’s a thing.
We Don't Chew Glass 
October 21st, 2014 at 10:35 am
I think we all love to be the big fish in a small pond. I know I did too.
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October 21st, 2014 at 10:37 am
I knew there was something about a pond! It was teasing me the entire time I wrote this but I just couldn’t think of it. That’s it exactly.
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October 21st, 2014 at 10:40 am
I got put in special schools starting in second grade. Nerds rock.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:52 am
Nerds do rock. Did you like it?
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October 21st, 2014 at 11:19 am
I was a nerdy kid, but I always felt like the dumbest one in the class. Turns out when you have ADD, it’s hard to focus and get your work done. Who knew? Because we didn’t have ADD–we had “kids who don’t apply themselves” or “kids who won’t concentrate.” Guess what I heard for the elventy-billion years it took me to get the hell out of school?
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:53 am
That SUCKS. My niece has ADD and when they finally diagnosed her she said the medicine made her brain quieter so she could think. She’s 8.
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October 21st, 2014 at 11:30 am
My mom was told when i was in Gifted and Talented that the teacher wished i could draw my assignments. It wasnt a compliment. :I
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:54 am
I guess that means you’re a good artist though, right?
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October 21st, 2014 at 11:33 am
My baby boy was a big fish in a little pond until we moved here and he was also no longer the smartest kid in school…that chafed him for a while, but he got over it.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:55 am
I was just lazy. Still am. I’m glad he got over it.
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October 21st, 2014 at 11:33 am
I wish I was smart!! I was just considered a nerd because I wore glasses. A shame! and I literaly got thrown into the deep end (of the pool) and almost drowned when I was 7. But now I am the best swimmer ever! 🙂
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:56 am
So funny! Thanks for sharing, and I’m glad you didn’t drown.
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October 21st, 2014 at 11:57 am
I doubt I was ever the smartest kid in class, but I was up there. Sadly, though, I couldn’t be bothered to do the work and didn’t care.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:57 am
Me neither. I’ve never been very ambitious. I think my goal when I was in high school was to get to stay home and color all day, and look at me now!
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:59 am
Me, too! I played hookey as often as I could fool my dad. School sucks.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:16 am
I once skipped school for two weeks straight. I got caught, but for some reason they thought I’d only skipped four days, so that’s what I got punished for.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:16 am
I didn’t skip that often, but when I did I got caught. I was never as sly as I thought I was.
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October 21st, 2014 at 12:13 pm
Oh, yes. Yesssss. I was a straight A public school nerd myself, though I also did great at a private school for a few years, too, even with that super-strict missionary/teacher who could not FATHOM how I could sit there in the front row with Bourdeaux Cherry nail polish on my fingers. Shameless.
I was convinced at that age that, yes, I WAS in fact the smartest kid ever in the history of kids. Also possibly the fastest. And the strongest.
Ahhh…to be 9 again.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 9:59 am
You harlot, lol.
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October 21st, 2014 at 12:14 pm
No we weren’t thrown in but the swimming pool was open air on the shore. April in Scotland is NOT warm. I used to turn blue and be fished back out 😨
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:00 am
Oh my gosh! Did you learn to swim though?
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:55 am
NO! 😨
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October 21st, 2014 at 12:16 pm
My school offered to skip me a grade but my mother thought I should be with kids my own age. That was fine with me because I would’ve been bullied either way but at least this way I still got to feel superior about something.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:01 am
Bullies suck! That would be a hard decision to make as a mom and a kid.
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October 21st, 2014 at 2:01 pm
I was the worst student ever. Starting in about 5th grade, I realized I could just never do homework, ace the tests, and still pass. I got C’s in everything. But I had a lot more free time than the kids who did their homework. Haaaa
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:02 am
You sneaky devil! I used to rewrite the questions as the answers on my homework and half the time it passed inspection.
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October 21st, 2014 at 3:09 pm
This is my daughter. 6th grade—straight A’s. Received awards for being at the top of her class, special honors, teachers pet, all of that. Moved into Gifted And Talented in 7th grade, suddenly, there are kids there doing as well as she is. Some…even better! Then it became “homework? What homework. I don’t have any homework”. and D’s and F’s. I have offered to take her out of the gifted and talented and put her back into general population (that’s what my husband calls it) but she doesn’t want to. she wants to be a smart kid. she just doesn’t want to have to do anything anymore.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:04 am
Oh, jeez, I’ve been there. I hope she sticks it out and shows more oomph than I did. I sometimes think about what I could have done with my smarts before I killed all my brain cells, but I guess I am where I am supposed to be.
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October 21st, 2014 at 5:48 pm
Oh how happy I am that my parents decided not to have me skip a grade.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:04 am
Right? Too much like work.
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October 21st, 2014 at 6:24 pm
I was a nerdy kid, wore glasses at a young age, Asian to boot but I have always sucked at math…..go figure?!
I didn’t get good grades in school until college and graduate school. Paying for the classes did wonder to my motivation.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:05 am
I suck at math too and wore glasses. I bet paying for the classes was a great motivator!
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October 21st, 2014 at 6:38 pm
I was a devote non-achiever in my grade school/high school days. When I started college, I was astonished to discover that I could actually do quite well. So there I was, feeling all genius at the community college, graduating on the dean’s list and all that, and I decided that I should totally go to an actual big-kid 4 year college, since I was way smarter than I thought. Five minutes into my first class as an English major at a 4 year school, I realized I was a total moron. I damn near ran screaming from that classroom. Luckily, I stuck around and figured out the trick to sounding like a know-it-all English major and ended up doing fairly well. I was rather devastated that my GPA went from 3.95 to 3.59, but I still ended up graduating some kind of laude or whatever, so yay and all that. Aaaaaand now I work retail….but that’s a whole ‘nother story…
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:06 am
How interesting. I love hearing y’alls stories. And of course you know that’s still a crazy good GPA.
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October 21st, 2014 at 7:57 pm
My daughter had this same experience – she went from a regular, rather crappy school to a magnet school where everyone was brilliant. She stuck with it and, while she wasn’t the smartest person in school, she was smart enough to get a full ride college scholarship and then later made it into Harvard for law school. Me, on the other hand, NEVER had this type of problem – I was firmly in the 3.0-3.5 GPA throughout high school.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:10 am
I’m glad she stuck with it. Good for her! I bet you are a proud momma. 🙂
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October 21st, 2014 at 10:00 pm
In high school I was top of my class, straight As, even valedictorian. The day I got to college and realized I wasn’t the smartest girl in the room, and worse, that grades aren’t the only thing that matters… Dude, it sucked. But I’m glad I stopped thinking I was Steve Jobs because I was probably rubbing some people the wrong way…
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:11 am
That’s one way to do it, lol. By the time I got to high school, I was skating by, definitely not the smartest and definitely not the best grades. I’m picturing my little know-it-all self now and wondering how I didn’t get beat up.
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October 22nd, 2014 at 5:43 am
I loved Christopher Pike!!!!!!!!!!
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:12 am
Lol! Me too! And R.L. Stine was okay, but not as good.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 11:59 am
Yeah, he kinda sucked. lol
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October 22nd, 2014 at 12:06 pm
When I was 4 I learned how to swim at little-kid camp. As we were all going down the steps in the SHALLOW END of the pool, some hyperactive brat managed to shove me off the bottom step. My head barely stayed above water. I was choking and almost drowned. Yes, I was standing UP.
I also wound up in some Advanced Placement programming class in my Junior year of HS. That was baffling since I am SO not a math-nerd. I tapped out after managing to write one whole if/then program.
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:13 am
BAHAHAHA! A person after my own heart.
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October 22nd, 2014 at 10:06 pm
I’ve never felt like the smartest person anywhere, ever. I’m a middle-of-the-road gal. I don’t fail, but I don’t win either. It’s comfy here. I like it. 🙂
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October 23rd, 2014 at 10:15 am
That must be nice. I went from feeling super smart to feeling super dumb. Now I half the time can’t remember my own name, CANNOT help with 6th grade homework, and barely leave the house with my shoes on. Ohhh, the good ole days.
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October 26th, 2014 at 11:11 am
I was the smart kid in the class in elementary school and would have loved to go somewhere where they would have challenged me. I spent a lot of time being bored in school and not doing homework because I could pass the test without it. However, schools like busy work like homework and my grades didn’t just reflect my amazing test taking ability. Thank god for Graduate School! I would go for my PhD and more if my kids didn’t need to eat….
I’m sorry your experience wasn’t so great. I think you’re super smart!
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October 27th, 2014 at 6:47 am
I’d like to go back to school too, but it’s not in the cards for me either. And thank you!
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October 28th, 2014 at 11:54 am
I was one of those smart kids in elementary school. I caught on quickly and rarely had to study. Then, when I started taking advanced classes in junior high and high school, I realized that I had to actually study and do honest to goodness work to maintain good grades. I HATED IT SO MUCH.
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October 30th, 2014 at 6:56 am
Right?! That’s exactly what I’m talking about.
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