when you know you know

 Going back to the summer before my freshman year at Ole Miss I was extremely nervous. By nature I am a very shy person and with the help of high school friend drama it was terrifying going to a major university where I knew no one but my mom’s friend's son (but who are we kidding boys are never helpful in these situations). You might be wondering “then why did you pick to go to a school 6 hours away from the security of your family and home?” and that is a great question. Let me take us back… 

It all started with the movie The Blind Side. I hate to say it but it's true. One night I randomly asked my mom about it because it has a reputation of being a “party school” (which it is) and she told me that it was actually a good school (with lots of partying…but that's at every school). So after looking it up I really wanted to go visit. Lets just say that the Lord was definitely walking before me and carving my path to becoming an Ole Miss student. Over the years I have grown to be a very cautious person, big on safety and cleanliness of my environment. When I tell you I didn’t see any homeless people or pieces of trash I MEAN I DIDN’T SEE ANY in the city of Oxford, Mississippi. The campus was beautiful, the town was like a Hallmark movie and it felt very safe, the sorority houses were amazing, and the few boys we saw looked promising (can’t lie that that had an influence on me haha). And it didn’t hurt that we were upgraded to having the suite at The Graduate Hotel. I just knew it was the place for me. 

Even though I knew in my heart and gut that this was the place for me I was scared to tell anyone. In reality I think I was scared to admit it to myself. Because I knew that a lot of work was going to have to be done in order for me to be prepared to leave home. 

Once I finally got the courage to  confess to my family that I wanted to attend Ole Miss my mom pretty much gave me an ultimatum. Her stipulation was that if I was serious about going then I had to go to therapy to work through some of the high school trauma I was carrying, the growing anxiety, as well as a pathological fear of throwing up (which didn’t bode well with having to live with a random roommate, let alone community bathrooms. As much as I like to control things I can not control the vomiting of another person. DARN!) So I agreed to seeing a therapist (after much thought and anxiety attacks). 

Enter Ms Janna! Oh how I loved Ms Janna. She was the real life version of Miss Piggle Wiggle as my mom referred to her. She was a single woman who worked out of her house, which sounds sketchy but if you are from a small town then that is completely normal (fun fact: the majority of our medical offices are in old houses). It took awhile for me to open up and get to love and appreciate her because as I previously mentioned I hate emotions, especially my own. And on top of that I am a shy person so try telling a stranger the deepest thoughts and feelings of my heart? (yeah, no thanks). Ms Janna helped me throughout the summer of 2022. During this time one of the biggest stressors was finding a roommate and how on earth I was going to make it through sorority rush with my social anxiety. And boy oh boy were those going to be big mountains to climb. But God never left my side through any of the challenges that I faced. My worries of not knowing anyone in the state of Mississippi and being alone were taken away by the daily presence of the Lord that I experienced.