Do not compare

Part 4        

Both my sisters were far better students than I had been. They would win prizes for coming first or second in academics, I could not. I was nevertheless impressive with my grades.

 School teachers often asked me, "What is the matter with you? It seems you are not working hard enough. Why cannot you be as good as your sisters? Both are much better than you. Maybe, you are not as intelligent as them. Try harder. Do you not want the applause your sisters get?"

 I developed a severe inferiority complex. I studied very hard at home but teachers thought that my sisters put in more hours of study. This stress led me to develop hypertension as early as 8 years of age. I started getting panic attacks during exams and would repeatedly be hospitalized and put on oxygen. The same teachers who had broken my spirit by comparing me to my bright sisters were quick to ridicule me for my hospitalizations.

Many of my home tutors would say the same. I had a Math teacher as a nine-year-old who’d teach me the subject for five hours without breaks at my residence. His methods were most unfriendly to teaching a primary school child. He’d continue to snap at me and complain to my mother. One day, my elder sister who was going to sixth grade came to him with a sum. She was brilliant at the subject and her students love her as a Math teacher. He told mum, “Your elder daughter is very bright, the daughter I teach is dull in comparison. I want to teach your intelligent child instead and opt out of teaching the one I’m tutoring now.”

Later another tutor said, “I’ve heard that your eldest daughter is hyper-intelligent but your middle daughter isn’t that good,” Mother tapped her forehead gesturing and added, “Correct! This daughter has cow dung in her brain and a low IQ. The rest of my daughters are very brainy.” Teachers who had taught both me and my younger sister would say, “The youngest daughter has sparkling wit, the middle daughter is the least intelligent.”

If any teacher said that my intelligence wasn’t alarmingly lower than that of my sisters, she’d refuse to believe it. My grandmother supported her wholeheartedly.

#shatteringconfidence, #cruelteachers, #stopchasinggrades, #marksarenoteverything, #IQ, #schoolgrades, #gradingsystem, #schoolgradesdontdefineyou, #donotcompare

https://pixabay.com/illustrations/doll-little-girl-teacher-2680904/: Image by Kate Stejskal from Pixabay 

 

 

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