"Fat" is the F - word in a girl's dictionary. I cannot bear that word as it makes me feel so self conscious. When I see my friends called fat I can see their self esteem becoming lower. The kids in my school who are overweight on the other hand are impacted the most when they are teased about the way they look. Once I was so hurt for my friend (who was on the chubby side) so affected by the taunts that she could no longer take it and changed schools. Yet even now in the other school she is teased constantly much to her despair.

Running away is never the answer to a problem. I learnt this the evening that my friend who had left school had come over to my house and cried for hours about how she hated the fact that everyone teased her for her…

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There is a constant battle in my house about whether I should be allowed to be on Facebook or not.

"Everyone in my school is on Facebook except me! I miss out on so much that happens!" I tell my father who smirks in turn and retorts, "well then that is what makes you so unique."

I did not understand why it would hurt so much for me to be on a social network, one that everyone I saw in school was in, anyway. That changed a few days later when my parents showed me a numb er of articles. Those were the articles written by families of victims of social media scams. Sons being kidnapped and murdered, naive daughters being bullied and tortured all because of a social networking site.

I can name over a hundred reasons why social networks are not good for high school students. For starters,…

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Everyday when we read the newspaper we see the names of overachievers in our society. Even when you read a regular teen novel you hear how amazing high school is. Well guess what? It is called 'fiction' for a reason. Simply because it is unreal!

High school can be the most difficult period of a student's life. It is when most boys and girls go through adolescence, their hormones start acting up and they simply start acting mean.

This is something I have always failed to understand. How do girls become so mean? No, not mean - cruel, cunning and manipulative. Luckily others have wondered about the same thing.

I have had many run ins with mean girls. One specific girl tormented me and called me names so horrible that I cried myself to sleep every night. My…

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Parents always compare their children's accomplishments with other children. I know my mom does! It is funny how she seems to always say, "look how your friend studies! She gets A+ in everything and you are sitting in front of me with what is equal to a fail mark? Why can't you be more like her?"

My usual reply is, "she is my friend, not yours so I know how much she gets!"

"I have spoken to her parents! I know she does very well. At least much better than you!"

"Ma, you stretch the truth about how well I do in school. So why is it so hard for other parents to do so?"

Parental pressure is the worst in the world. We ourselves feel inadequate because of our parents remarks and we try to be…

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