Every time a report card came home, my mom hung mine up on the fridge like a trophy. There was no one else’s next to it; just my name, my grades, and my expectations. Growing up, I never had siblings. My mom was morally too young to nurture any more children. Moreover, my parents split right before having me, so it was not quite ideal to progress any further with a family. The relatives on my mother’s side were very close-knit to us; this meant I had some variation of company around me besides my mom, but none of them were close to my age.

Being an only child came with mixed expectations; I wasn’t just the baby, but I was also the blueprint. I was the first daughter, granddaughter, and niece, and since I was the only kid at the time, more often than not, I was getting all of the attention. This was especially prominent around Christmas time. My family had an unofficial motto where ‘adults don’t need gifts as much as the kids do,’ and being the only kid, you can only guess how far they went out of their way to spoil me. But that is all that it really was—gifts. They just helped conceal the way I felt on the inside: isolated. While I was always appreciative of these gifts, they never had an emotional connection to me, subsequently leaving me longing for something more. I would turn to other hobbies in times like this, but they would often get shunned. “You’re too young for that,” I’d get scolded. In moments like those, I felt as though I were embedded in quicksand—stuck, helpless, and unable to do anything.

Although being babied most of the time was quite common for me, there were also moments where it was the complete opposite. The other side of that expectation was raised to such a high bar—I was expected to be mature, make the right decisions, maintain all A’s, and never fail. I felt as though I was constantly switching between being treated like a child and being expected to think like an adult, all depending on which was needed most in that moment. Oftentimes, it was especially confusing to know which version of me my family wanted. Did they want the authentic me, or the malleable idea of me? While it was a rather confusing concept to fathom, it was also very comical to consider that I was constantly scolded for not rushing my development, yet they did all of the same to me.

So as I continued to stand in front of the cold fridge, analyzing my report card, I realized that my grade was not just a number, but rather the numerical weight of my expectations. Still, with all of this, I am not, and never have been, resentful of anyone; in fact, I am very appreciative of it all. This is because I realized that while being an only child in my family came with much pressure and attention, it was about the journey more than anything—the journey of my mind—and this is something that little girl had to realize as well. As much as I wished to be able to switch the life I had, I have come to realize that both parts, whether good or bad, whether lonely or loving, all led me to who I am today. I have learned how to be empathetic, how to be self-reliant, and most importantly, how to be independent from others. There is a different kind of joy in knowing that my life is not subject to what others expect me to be, but instead, I have the will and right to decide who I want to become. Being both the “baby” and the "blueprint," while they are two very contrasting personalities, helped me to eventually find a balance between them within myself.

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