Andrea Gonzales - Girl Code

I stared at the pages in front of me: an outline of the presentation I had to give to my eleventh-grade English class in twelve hours. I knew I needed to practice, but I couldnt. I tried to open my mouth to begin, but I couldnt. I couldnt even do the presentation for my empty bedroom. Just the thought of having to open up in public and share these ideasmy ideasparalyzed me.

I got up from my desk and walked unsteadily to the dining room, where my mom was working on her computer. My stream of tears immediately got her attention. I cant do it, I told her. I cant.

I felt beyond angry and frustrated with myself. All I had to do was talk to a roomful of my classmates for seven minutes about Oedipus Rex. I had loved the play and had a lot to say about it. I loved my classmates too. How could I be so shaken by a presentation?

But I shouldnt have been surprised. Id always had trouble openly expressing myself in school; Id always been the quiet one in class. My report cards from over the years say it all:

Class: Tudor England (History)

Spring 2011, 8th grade

A great report despite your reluctance to present it aloud. (Why do you always do that?)

Course: American Literature II

Winter 2012, 9th grade

Excellent work this year. Youve excelled in all aspects of the course (although at the risk of sounding like a broken record Im going to repeat that it would have been good to hear you speak up more often in class).

Course: Economic History of Globalization

Fall 2013, 10th grade

An excellent writer with a firm grasp of the subject. Too bad we heard so little from her in class.

Course: Intro to Biology

Fall 2013, 11th grade

You are off to a good start this semester. One point that needs improvement is class participation.

It wasnt that I hadnt wanted to participate. Id just held myself back because I felt what I had to say was meaningless. I believed my thoughts were stupid and anyone who heard them would think I was stupid. I often spent my hour-long morning subway commute mulling over past conversations where I had said something strange, past situations where I had acted weird. And then, late at night, when my parents were both sleeping, our large, dark apartment would envelop me and I would get lost again in feeling inadequate and idiotic. During those nights, Id wonder whether I would grow out of the feeling or whether I would be stuck being insecure for the rest of my life. How would I have a job and be a functional adult if I spent all my time questioning myself?

Looking back on that night in eleventh grade when I got so worked up about a minor presentation, I feel like laughing and giving Past Sophie a piece of chocolate and a big hug. I wish the old me could know that when I tell people I used to be terrified to speak up, to raise my hand and say something in classthey dont believe me. Thats because now Im all about speaking up and speaking out, ever since I co-created an 8-bit video game about menstruation that went viral and completely changed my life.

Before Tampon Run, I was a shy, quiet girl from the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Since I was born Id lived in the same apartment with my parents and two older brothers. I went to Bard High School Early College and I loved to ride the subway, bike around the city, take photos with my moms old Minolta, and play tennis. I was a normal kid. A normal kid who, for the first seventeen years of her life, felt this mental and physical terror over sharing her ideas with anyone other than close friends and family. With public speaking, I felt vulnerable because I had to get the words exactly right as they came out of my mouth. There were no second chances. You opened your mouth, and the world judged. I also felt uncomfortable sharing my ideas in papers or essays or any school assignment because I considered anything graded a measure of my self-worth. I saw grades as an opportunity to A) prove my belief that I was dumb, or B) disprove my belief that I was dumb. No pressure or anything...

The only way I felt comfortable expressing myself was through journaling. Personal writing had long been a cathartic act for me, beginning with keeping a journal when I was young. It was a way to process my thoughts and express and understand myself better. Unlike graded exercises or public speaking, no one read or judged what I put in my journal. It was the only place I could be the person I aspired to be. The only place I could dream and muse and not have to censor or edit myselfthe only place I felt confident that, one day, I had a future as someone who could share her voice.

During eleventh grade, I finally found a way outside of journaling to loosen up and to stop obsessing over whether my ideas were smart or dumb. I befriended a group of girls at school who showed me it was fun to be myself and do it outwardly. They told me over and over, through their words and their actions, that my ideas were funny, good, and important to share. I discovered what a joy it was to be heard. I thought about Future Sophie, ninety-something years old and lying on her deathbed, and how disappointed old-lady me would be if I kept my ideas to myself forever. Speaking up and speaking out was the only way to affect people in this world. And what would my life be worth if nothing I did ever affected anyone?