Rejection sucks, it really does. No matter how strong you think you are, this is one of those moments where your strength is insufficient, and the feeling of not being enough starts hitting you. I don’t think there’s anything I could’ve done to protect myself from feeling so heartbroken over my first ever college rejection letter.

March 8th was something that I was looking forward to. Confidence loomed in me. I thought I did it all, good grades, amazing extracurriculars, and essays that truly portrayed the kind of person that I am. “I have this particular school in the bag,” I thought to myself, so much so that I already envisioned myself there.

I was at Target when the words “UC DAVIS” was trending on Twitter. My friend, Ryan Armstrong, then texted me to check my Davis portal. I was in line at self-checkout, when my heart started racing. I was pretty confident, but suddenly I got an awful feeling of nervousness. This was the first UC that released decisions from the list of schools that I applied to. It was setting the tone in my opinion about how all of the other UC’s would play out, which didn’t make me feel better at all. I managed to get out of Target, I raced to my car and prayed the whole time I was on the road.

When I finally got home, I gave a quick prayer and took out my laptop immediately. I logged into my portal after watching everyone on social media post about their acceptances. The email read, “Dear Annett. After careful review of your application, I regret that we are unable to offer you admission to the University of California, Davis for the fall of 2019.”

After reading that, I literally cried so hard for 30 minutes. I, Annett, was drenched in tears over a school that wasn’t even at the top of my list. It felt so awful to get denied. It really did. All I could think about was the fact that I worked SO hard on everything. I spent hours studying, years of taking challenging classes and aiming for a 4.0.

It suddenly all felt like it was all for nothing.