Overcoming my fear for Numbers

I had always hated the mathematics subject as a child, I discovered earlier on in life that I didn’t do well with numbers, and it got worse especially if the numbers had equations in them or were bulky and I had to simplify them, I would fidget like a 2year old who was terrified of thunder or horror movies, automatically I would develop sweaty palms and go blank immediately.

My fear became like an invisible barrier, preventing me from venturing deeper into finding solvable solutions towards those very straight forward equations which seemed to me like torture at the time.

When I got to class 2(Ss2) I had a teacher who took an interest in me seeing that I was quite intelligent and had no issues with every other subject except mathematics, I even loved further mathematics or engineering mathematics as its now called but I just could not overcome my hatred for simple mathematics and this affected my results greatly

However Deep down in me I knew I wanted to do better, I wanted to love math’s, I knew that I was going to write a major exams at ss3 class level and I could not afford to fail that exam else it would mean an extra year for me

Back to my Class teacher who desperately wanted to see me become better at math’s, he offered taking me private classes which I declined if only I knew that was my ticket to becoming better I would have jumped at the offer but naïve me rejected it and I still regret it till date

I barely passed my waec(West African Examination Council) exams with an average of C and I knew how many nights I had to stay awake solving and resolving problems

I got to the university and guess what, mathematics was my one of my core courses and carried the highest unit loads in the whole semester, trust me you would not want to know what a disaster my results were in my first and second year, it was so bad my lecturer who was a female had to specifically call for me to ask what was wrong, why was I having issues passing her course? She also did her best to explain to me as best as she could, only then did my scores improve a bit

As I would later realize that I just had issues understanding the process of solving this equations

One would think that after all I went through I would conquer my fear for mathematics but I am glad to announce to you all that I still have a phobia for math problems, even though its not as bad as it used to I still do not like mathematics.

Giving my very sour experiences with mathematics all through my secondary and tertiary institution, it made me become very self aware such that whenever i saw anyone with the fear of something no matter how insignificant it was i always did my best to help whoever it was overcome that fear, no matter how long it takes me i ensure that fear is replaced with boldness and confidence

I only hope that none of my kids picks my phobia for numbers but now I know better and I’ll make sure to see that they overcome the fear I didn't.

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