As I turned my phone over, I felt the color drain from my face. I frantically typed in the password and opened TeacherEase. I clicked grades and saw two summative grade 0’s staring back at me. Ever since I was young, I came up with the negative notion that If I get a bad grade then I’ll fail everything else. Now, my parents were never like “You have to get all perfect grades,” or “If you don’t get perfect grades you’ll never succeed in life,” so those thoughts somehow made their way into my mind.

Although, as I’ve grown older, I’ve been able to control my emotions in regards to my grades with a huge help from my parents. But, sometimes a bad grade or comment on a test will catch me off guard and I’ll be sad for the rest of the day. And during those times, I try to remember that one bad grade doesn't mean the rest will be.

One cloudy day in December, I had caught a bad cold and had to stay home. This is already very difficult for me because missing school, to me, is the worst stress inducer. I miss work, I miss notes, I miss discussions. I had peacefully made my way through the first half of the morning when I got a notification from Google Classroom that I had Social Studies. assignment had been graded. Weird… I thought. I opened the Classroom app and clicked the assignment, then, I saw a 0/4 on a summative assignment. My jaw dropped, I had never gotten a zero on a summative, or even a formative! My hands started to get shaky as I got up to get my chromebook. I opened the screen to Gmail and went to Email my teacher.

“Good morning Mrs. Faith!

This morning I got a notification on my phone that I had gotten a 0/4 on a summative assessment that I was unable to do because I am sick. Thank you and have a great day!”

After that, I decided to read a book to calm down. I was very confused with myself because it was just a grade and it’s not the end of the world. Then, I remembered my old fears about receiving grades, and my reaction started to make sense., But I hadn't freaked out like this in a while so, what was happening? I got bored reading quickly, so I checked my phone and another message from Google Classroom. Oh god, I thought, Not again. I turned my phone over, expecting the worst. And that’s exactly what I got, another 0/4 on a health summative assessment. Great, now I have to send the same email, except to Mr. Charlie.

The next day I went back to school, and without a reply from either of the teachers I went on with my day, worrying about why they hadn't responded. But in my last period class, I couldn’t take my worries any more and decided to go to my counselor and talk to him. When I got to his office I had a normal conversation with him and then brought up how I was out of school yesterday and I had a mini freakout because I had gotten two 0/4’s on summative assignments.

“Oh so you’re a perfectionist?” He joked, laughing to himself.

“Wait… that actually makes sense,” I shockingly realized.

When I left his office what he said resonated with me. A perfectionist? Me? I had only ever heard of perfectionists being a terrible thing. I couldn’t be a perfectionist, that's bad. But as I got back to class, sat down, and finished my work, I was thinking it over and being a perfectionist doesn’t have to be bad. Maybe I was a perfectionist, and maybe that was okay.

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