Personal Experience Essay Sample: An Embarrassing Moment at School

A few years ago when I was in Elementary school, an incident occurred to me; one that I will always struggle to forget because of the humiliation that it brought to me, despite it being helpful to me even today. From my childhood, I used to have an intense phobia for Math as a subject although I was good at the practical application of numbers like the calculation of the change to expect from a shop attendant. I used to be at loggerheads with my parents who thought I was an embarrassment to the family. My father was a renowned engineer and my mother a medical professional, but me, I was completely the opposite!

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For a long time, I struggled to understand the tough concepts of Math and to solve arithmetic problems. My parents were supportive and stood with me all the way, but still it seemed impossible for me to improve in that subject. On many occasions I was sent home by the school Principal to bring my parents to school; the burden that I shouldered my parents was horrendous! My father had to hire a private tutor who came to our place to offer coaching sessions and at least help me to break the deadlock, but so little changed. My negative perception about Math was the root of all my miseries.

I vividly recall that day, the day that was darkened by an occurrence that befell me. The day that made my school peers to nickname me The loo guy, what a horrible name that was! My hatred for Math made me to always doze off and to miss classes when I could. In addition, the Math Tutor, Mr. Jeffreys, was a no-nonsense person who believed every student had to be a Math guru, just like he was. To add insult to an injury, he was fond of appointing me to answer questions and to solve Mathematical problems, which I always failed. He used to tell me the reason behind it was to help me improve, but I was so convinced he hated me and used that opportunity to victimize me; who knows? Besides, my class peers always made fun of me, and this worsened the situation even further. The mockery coupled with my unconvincing performance in class tormented me and made school lose meaning because it was like hell on earth.

The series of distress and contempt made me resolve to openly abscond Math classes. I used to hide in other unoccupied classes and only show up when Math classes were over. This happened for a while; little did I know my Math teacher was monitoring my actions. They liaised with the duty teacher and tracked my moves. One time just before the Math class, I left the class to hide in my usual place; but unfortunately the class was occupied and the teacher on duty saw me walking around the school during class timethis was forbidden! Realizing that I was spotted, I changed course and ran towards the lavatories but this was too late because he had seen the direction I took. I locked myself in one of the rooms, unluckily the lavatory was out of order and to make matters worse, someone had used it and did not flush. Outside the lavatory, the duty teacher was waiting, he even talked in a loud voice on the phone so as to send me a message that he was still there. Indeed, my days had been numbered!

Time passed and on the twentieth minute, I could no longer bear the awful and dreadful stench from the toilet; I gave up and had to present myself to the teacher. My Ferguson got hold of me and frog-matched me to the Principals office. They checked on the class schedule and found I was to be attending a Math lesson. I was convinced my offense could not go unpunished; the punishment I was awarded was a loss of playtimeI had to practice Math problems as others went for Physical Education classes. I was even paraded before fellow students to serve as an example to other students, and as usual I had to call my parents to school.

It took the intervention of the school Principal to look into the chief cause of my problem. Fortunately, they managed to find a lasting solution to it; Math became my best subject, even today at High School. That was indeed a terrible, appalling experience that I always longed to forget. Nevertheless, it was a turning point for a new chapter in my life, and it made me realize my untapped potential.