Writing About My Father’s Suicide Put Me Through College

I became a man at the moment the medics proclaimed my father dead

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I graduated from Morehouse College in 2019 — part of the class that had its student loans paid off by the wealthiest Black man in the country, billionaire Robert Smith. However, I was also financially supported by several scholarships that in sum exceeded $70,000 throughout my time at the institution. And I would not have had that support without this essay, which I wrote as a high school student.

Orange

“Frank, you do too much!”

I can still hear my classmates. I can still hear the discomfort and distaste that they express when they hear my voice. Even when I’m not at school, their constant remarks resonate in my head.

Every day, it never fails:

“Frank, you do too much!”

“You think you know everything!”

“It’s really not even that serious!”

Mocking me for my perseverance, my peers are unaware of the struggles that I face. Judging me for trying harder than the average student, my friends do not see my efforts in class or in practice as a means of bettering myself. They see me as an annoying boy who thinks he knows and can do everything…