The Best And Worst Transformations Seen During School Reunions, As Shared By These 30 Internet Users
Who you are now and who you were back in school are two totally separate people… probably. But let’s be real here for a second: class reunions can be super stressful, no matter how successful you are right now. There’s always this low-key anxiety that you haven’t lived up to your potential and that others might see you as who you were way back then, not the adult you’ve become now. Or worse, that you somehow peaked back then and it’s all been downhill from there.
We’ve collected some of the most powerful real-life stories about the biggest transformations, good and bad, that people have seen during their school reunions, as shared on r/AskReddit. It just goes to show that nobody’s future is truly set in stone. And the trajectory you’re on in high school can change drastically. Upvote the stories that impressed you the most, and let us know how your recent reunions went in the comments, dear Pandas.
When you’re done reading through this list, you might want to consider checking out Bored Panda’s earlier article about the worst school reunion stories—it’s proof that a bit of awkwardness is really nothing to worry about in comparison.
Bored Panda reached out to Lisa McLendon, the William Allen White Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications and the Coordinator at the Bremner Editing Center at the University of Kansas, to get her perspective about staying in touch with former students, and supporting them whether they're still studying or when they've graduated. You'll find her thoughts as you scroll down, dear Pandas.
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Back in highschool we had a kid who has aspergers and was a little weird. He was, however, amazing at the yo-yo, having picked one up during middle school when we had that yo-yo trick assembly. After everyone else had stopped walking the dog in 8th grade, this guy was doing more and more elaborate tricks every day during lunch. He was bullied and teased but he continued doing what he loved.
So, at our ten year reunion, people from every strata of high school popularity was there, including this guy. He was his same old self, but more confident. I asked him if he still yo-yos, and he busted out his custom made titanium yo-yo that he said he made on a CNC lathe. He then starts to do some tricks and a large crowd gathered around. It was quite the show, he had gotten very good. When he finished, people clapped and cheered, and even the jockiest dudes from back in the day fist bumped him and told him how badass he was.
So I guess the biggest transformation was everyone else. Nobody teased him for being who he was anymore, they now admired him for being so passionate about something.
As you age, you gain wisdom and most stop being boneheads. Most but not all. Some stay boneheaded until they're gray and one foot in the grave.
One of my neighbors growing up was that super motivated Type A do everything types. Co-valedictorian, captain of the hockey team, gifted musician...just always working.
10 year reunion, went just how we all expected. Full ride to Yale, Harvard MBA, six figure Wall Street job, gorgeous fiance...and he seemed utterly miserable.
10 years later, 20th reunion. He got sick of it all, quit his job, sold his house, got divorced, and got out of town. He now owns a pig farm in Upstate New York, spends his days working the farm, brewing beer, and hiking in the forest...and I've never met a happier, more satisfied person in my life.
mega obese quiet kid (so huge everyone just exempted him from cruel remarks etc) - lost hundreds of pounds and also ended up being fabulously gay - showed up with his sassy little boyfriend -- i was so happy for him
"I stay in touch with some students—social media has made this a lot easier—and there are a few I meet with in person, either to touch base as a mentor or just to catch up," Professor McLendon, from the University of Kansas, shared with Bored Panda.
"A few have gone into teaching, either full-time or part-time, which is always nice to see," she told us that some of her students have followed in her footsteps.
My boyfriend went to his 10 year over the weekend. Saw this woman he didn't know. Turned out to be one of his old football buddies... So, I'd say that was a very big transformation.
Not 10 but 5.
This kid that everyone made a scapegoat in high school is LOADED.
He was the kid that certain groups would pretend to be friends with and then do something horrible to him as a "joke" like depantsing him in front of the whole lunch room or teasing him about his small d**k till he cried (not sure if he actually had one or not just high school a**holes being a**holes)
Turns out that he won some sort of contest/scholarship thing for this space engineering idea and ended up going to school in California for free. I guess he worked super hard and was able to graduate a year early and now is just like rich as f**k working for some sort of space engineering thing that works closely with NASA.
It was funny listening to all the people who use to make fun of him just listen to his life story with their mouths hanging wide open. He has no debt, owns a beautiful home in California and another "cabin" home in our home state (MN), drives beautiful cars, hangs out with beautiful people. All at the ripe age of 24. You could practically smell the jealousy. Plus he brought his smoking hot gf.
It made me so happy for him :)
The ones teasing him about his penis size were probably just projecting their shame at only having an angry inch themselves.
On the flip side I know someone who hasn't aged since high school. No extra fat, no wobbles, no gray hair, nothing. Even his voice is the same at thirty as it was at fourteen. I'm pretty sure he's a vampire.
Bored Panda wanted to get the professor's opinion on what educators can do to encourage their students to aim for the stars, and how to pick up their spirits if they haven't (yet) achieved what they set out to after graduation.
According to Professor McLendon, there are two parts to inspiring students to aim high. "One, give them a solid foundation to build their skills and knowledge on, so they’ll be able to succeed at whatever they choose to pursue," she said.
"Two, give them support and encouragement—and the benefit of your own network, if possible—to help them get where they want to be," she explained what educators can do.
Twin sisters. The good one straight A student and a perfect angel is now 90 pounds soaking wet and just finished her 4th stint in rehab for drugs. The one who was a trouble maker and constantly in trouble even arrested a few times for drugs and shop lifting while in high school, is a doctor with a family.
I've seen this quite often. I see parents leaving the sibling doing well to do their thing without much support and focus on the problematic child. As a result, these kids lose steam and motivation. Why bother if mom and dad isn't acknowledging it? Some spiral out of control for some attention. It's pretty sad really, but it's pretty common. The question is whether these parents catch it in time.
I used to pass notes to a guy in Algebra class... mostly song lyrics. I'd write a line pass it to him, he'd write a line, back and forth. He was a quiet kid and friends with some other friends of mine who were big into BMX bikes and skateboards. I took a bunch of photos of these guys for my photography class. At graduation, he said he was heading to California to ride BMX. He never came to a reunion... he was too busy playing rhythm guitar in Guns N Roses as Izzy Stradlin.
A lot of rock stars seem to have been the quiet, nerdy, skater/BMX types when they were kids. I remember hearing how excited Corey Taylor was to provide his roars for Doctor Who, I read an interview with Robb Flynn who apparently had blueprints for the Death Star and vehicles from Star Wars, and obviously The Offspring and blink-182 were two of many skater punk groups to become hugely successful bands.
One girl who sat next to me in English class in junior and senior year. Thick coke bottle glasses, a bird's nest of thick curly hair. She was always very nice and very smart, but super quiet and introverted.
I was an extroverted, outgoing jacka** so I used to ask her to read parts when we studied Shakespeare, invited her into my group for group projects and made her take speaking roles, that kind of thing. She was never really comfortable talking about herself and we never hung out outside of class, so I left school not knowing much about her except that she was smart, quick to grin at a joke, and had strong feelings about "The Crucible".
Ten years later, this gorgeous woman shows up at our reunion. Smoking hot redhead, sparkling blue eyes, stacked hourglass figure. That goofy teenage grin had turned into a confident, knowing smile. She knew how to dress and make herself up to emphasize her assets and minimize her flaws. She was jaw-droppingly stunning.
We talked for a good hour. She was just a late bloomer. I apologized for always volunteering her for public speaking and she said it was one of the things that made her start to confront her shyness. She ended up going to an ivy league school and became a journalist, of all things.
We still chat from time to time.
Edit: no, we didn't bang. I was happily engaged by my 10 year reunion and well settled into my career. She lived in Africa on assignment from a wire service. We were in very different places in our lives and I was and am happy to count her as a friend.
As happy as I am for her becoming more confident, it's a pity that the majority of this post focuses on her physical attractiveness. Could have left all of that information out and it would still have been a great example of how she'd transformed.
Meanwhile, if someone feels like they still haven't lived up to their potential after graduating, the support and encouragement they get from their former professors or teachers can really help.
"Lots of people don’t get there right away, or end up somewhere else completely, and if students see how others have navigated their career paths, it helps instill some patience and also an openness to other possible pathways," the professor told us.
Whether we like it or not, we’re social animals. We need other people and their approval to feel good. We’re hardwired for communication and cooperation. That, at least in part, explains why some individuals might feel apprehensive about going to their high school reunions. They might think that who they are now won’t leave a positive enough impression on their former classmates.
You might not be where you imagined yourself when you were back in school. Or you might feel embarrassed about how you look, the choices you’ve made. Some people might even feel that they haven’t changed at all over the years. Or that they’re not as ‘cool’ as they were when they were a teenager. In short, we think it’s fair to say that nearly everyone wants to leave a positive impression. Bold, beautiful, successful, witty, and charming—that’s what we want to be seen as.
My husband and I went to the same high school but met years later. He was the football player all the girls wanted in bed and all the guys wanted to be with. I was the one people threw against lockers and treated like trash. When my reunion came around, one of the girls I had kept in contact with asked me to help with the website, so I said what the hell. When we showed up, quite a few people asked why he was there. He had graduated 2 years earlier. He said he was with his wife and just and took his seat. I walked in and took a seat as they were thanking those who helped with the reunion. When they announced my name, people looked around slightly confused. I stood, like the others and you could hear a pin drop. Apparently I changed quite a bit in that ten years. My husband raised his glass and smiled again. It was awesome.
One kid was fairly small, quiet and goofy. Nice kid, but nothing too special about him. We hung out a few times at speech/drama tournaments.
I had wondered what happened to him. Turns out he grew quite a lot and became quite popular. His acting career took him far. He's been in several huge films, including X-Men.
We knew him as Jimmy. Today he goes by a more mature name of James - James Marsden.
I hope he's still a cool, goofy guy deep down that I remember from the few times we hung out.
This guy was poor. Nice kid, but really poor. Only owned 2 shirts and 1 pair of pants. People always donated clothes to school to give to family. Dirty, needed groomed, overall looked homeless. You know how most kids are, mean about it, but he was cool.
Millionaire. Has started and sold quite a few businesses and is overall very successful. Invests in lots of real estate now.
Yeah it was pretty much poverty that drove me to do better. It's not that I'm incapable of the "cockroach" lifestyle, I grew up like that. I simple refuse to live like that anymore.
The irony, of course, is that everyone’s so worried about their own self-image that they don’t really notice the things that we’re worried about. (Though, on the flip side, people really do gossip over the smallest flaws, too. But there’s no way that you can eradicate gossip without taking away what makes our species ‘human’ in the first place. And... gossip can actually have some benefits, too, like encouraging cooperation and helping 'reform' mean individuals.)
We think that it’s best to… just be yourself. If you’re happy, if you feel that you’re successful based on what’s most important to you, then that’s wonderful. But don’t skip out on your school reunion just because you think someone might not like your haircut or suit. You never know, it might be a lot of fun catching up with the people who used to be your friends. And it’s the perfect opportunity to act goofy and childlike for an evening.
One pet peeve of ours is that no matter how successful we are, the moment we walk into that reunion, someone is bound to start reminiscing about the good old days and sharing a ton of embarrassing stories that you’d rather forget. You know, Pandas, the kind of stuff you suddenly remember when you’re showering or when you go get a glass of water at 5 o’clock in the morning. Thanks, Chad, thanks for reminding everyone of the time Jim puked after eating a bad taco. You too, Stacy, you’re just wonderful for bringing up the story about how Alice got spooked on the stage and started stuttering. Brilliant…
Me, actually.
I was this weird punk-ish nerd that none of the boys would even look at, let alone ask on a date. I had a girlstache and no boobs. And besides that, I was the only poor kid in an expensive school (yay scholarships).
10 years later, I'm hot. Pardon my lack of modesty, but I look really good, and I bought the boobs I wanted. I dress well, I speak 3 languages, and I'm one of the few who has a college degree and a steady job in my area. I'm living by myself and paying all my bills while most still live with their parents and use their money at almost 30.
Suck it, you bunch of bullies.
Don't apologise for being confident and finding yourself hot. You deserve to be happy with yourself. And well done!
This girl, let's call her Jane, was always very quiet. She was never picked on, but that's because she was mostly ignored. She wrote lots of poetry and read lots of books and I never heard her talk in school outside of English class. She started smoking cigarettes and drinking when she was a teen, but she didn't like parties with lots of people. The few times I talked to her it was always about how terrible parents were or how terrible God is or how terrible the government is. She was thin and pretty too, and my friend dated her briefly, but he said he couldn't deal with her anger.
Flash forward I see her again. She put on a ton of weight. Like a ton. I thought "oh great now she has body issues on top of her other issues. Poor girl." But I talked to her and she was so happy.
She got a job writing for a travel blog and she gets to go all over the country. She came out as a lesbian and I saw pictures of her and her partner's travels. She quit drinking and she's been sober for a few years now. She's very open about her struggles with her identity, alcohol, and depression that date all the way back to high school.
So physical and mental state she had a huge transformation. And I'm glad she found a happy ending.
Tough, bada** football player with shaved head, nicknamed "Iceman". Came to the reunion a skinny, long-haired hippy/yogi and sporting one of the happiest smiles I've ever seen. I like to think he finally figured out who he really was.
It’s probably a question of ‘when,’ not ‘if’ someone’s going to bring up your past. And even though our instincts might yell at us to cringe and shy away, it’s best to do the opposite. Lean into the embarrassment. Embrace it. Laugh it off. Show everyone you’re having fun. Ironically, this is what’s going to make people love you more: accepting your flaws, not trying to pretend you never had any.
Vanessa Bohns, an Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior at Cornell University, explained to Bored Panda during an interview for a previous article that not hiding our embarrassment helps us connect with people better.
“Displaying signs of mild embarrassment can actually be socially constructive and make people feel more sympathetic towards you in the face of your faux pas. I don’t necessarily think you need to take pains to hide it,” she told us that others value honesty and being genuine.
Nobody changed at all.
I left Ireland three days after my leaving cert, and happened to move back a month before the reunion party. I hadn't seen a single person in the 10 intervening years, and everyone was basically *the exact same person* as they had been in school. Better-dressed, more confident, less awkward - but essentially the exact same people.
I had been dreading it, because I was never a popular kid in school - but it actually felt wonderful to be among those people again. After high school, you never really get to know anyone that well again. Add that to me having spent 10 years being an immigrant in various places, and that made re-connecting with these people extra sweet. All of the people with massive chips on their shoulders - they didn't show up. So the only people who were there were the ones who were as excited as I was.
There was one kid who changed massively, but he didn't come to the reunion. In school, he was the most dyslexic kid, worst at math, bottom of every class. His only love was making home-made bombs on his farm and blowing s**t up with them. He went to a college in Cornwall or Wales or something, that specialised in mining - because he figured that way he could work with explosives.
So fast-forward almost ten years, and I am finally getting my bachelor's degree. I took a bit longer than most people do, but I had just got the results from my last few exams and I had finally passed. I was basking in that elation when my phone rang and it's this guy. He just got his PhD for building a f*****g robot that goes into mines and fires f*****g lasers everywhere to make a 3D scan of the mine without endangering any humans. He built a robot with lasers on it. And had a PhD.
Way to take the wind out of my sails, James.
There was a guy in my class that was a big meathead and was known to be a huge bully and womanizer. He is now an easy-going artist that hugs everyone and has a very zen demeanor. At our 10 year reunion, he told me how excited he was to atone and let everyone know that he has changed. I thought it was incredibly touching and my respect for him is fully restored.
I saw me go from being a daily smoked-out stoner who breezed through each year of high school with average grades to a middle school science teacher who last year received teacher of the year honors. I bet they never saw that coming. B***hes.
🥰🥰🥰 this person sounds a LOT like me. but i teach college, my grades were a bit better than average, and i got my Teacher of the Year a few years ago. but goth chick to math prof HAHAHAHA
By accepting our feelings of embarrassment and awkwardness, we also put a stop to them morphing into feelings of shame.
“What you want to be careful not to do is to let embarrassment morph into the more destructive self-conscious emotion of shame, where you feel so badly about a minor mistake that you start to think there is something wrong with you and feel the need to completely disappear and hide away yourself,” Vanessa said.
The kid who was stealing motorcycles and selling them for parts is now a police officer. He was never accused or convicted of course but I knew that for a fact.
Let's hope people sometimes *do* change.
Probably my wife (although we just had our 20 year reunion a couple years ago). We both went to middle and high school together, knew each other in a friendly way, you know, say hi when you pass in the hallway, but nothing more than that. Fast forward about 12 years, and I went on a blind date after coming off a glorious summer of bachelorhood. I saw her standing outside the bar, waiting for me, and I can still see it like it was yesterday. I kept on thinking, nah, this can't be her, I had seen a couple pictures but I was like this girl is drop dead gorgeous.
We hit it off that night, and within a couple weeks we were dating. About a month after that first date, we were talking about where we went to school, and she mentioned that she went to the same high school I had. So I asked her what year she graduated and lo and behold, it was the same year as me. "What middle school did you go to?" I asked. Once again, same as mine. She had our high school yearbook from our senior year in her closet, so she brought it out and we looked up our pictures. "Wait a second, you're <so and so>?". I was in shock, in high school she was someone that was bullied on a lot because of her looks. But here I was looking at this gorgeous blonde, who was just stunning. We brought out her middle school year book, and that is when it pretty much hit us that fate had brought us together. There, in faded yellow marker, she had highlighted my name. The only boy in our entire class that she highlighted was mine. We still don't really know why, but she did, and it was the like the God of Fates opened up the clouds and sent a beam of light upon us.
The best part was, my nickname starts with "Crazy". I was a party animal, but I was getting near 30, and I had been dating/hanging/whatever many a crazy chick over the last 10 years. All of them were pretty big into the party life themselves. She however, was grounded. She had a good job, dressed way above my pay grade at the time, and just was a good person that had a good family. She turned my life around, and while it hasn't all been roses, we have now been married for close to 10 years and have two wonderful kids. And most importantly, I still look at her almost every day and think how lucky I am to have such a beautiful woman, both inside and out.
P.S. When she first joined Facebook way back in the day, I was already on it and had a lot of friends from high school. I made a post linking to her Facebook and just said, hey, if you remember <so and so>, we got married a few years ago so she needs some friends on here. My post was inundated with posts from high school friends, "that is <so and so>!!", "wow <so and so> you look so different", "No way that is <so and so>", including some of the very people that bullied her when she was younger. I am extremely proud of my wife for the woman that she is, both to myself and our kids. And I'm even more proud to know that this girl that grew up getting bullied because of her looks got the last laugh.
After college when myspace got big I changed my location to my home town. I got a msg from a guy says damn where were girls like u when I lived there. I responded 3 seats behind u on the bus.
There was a girl in my class who was not comfortable in her body. She acted like a boy, talked like a boy, and always wanted to do boy things. She got made fun of. A lot. Meanly. Kids are a**holes.
I went to elementary through 12th with her, so I knew her for a long time. I'd call her my friend, mostly because we were always nice to each other, but we never saw each other out of school.
10-year comes and now he's living life as a man. Not everyone from my podunk little school saw this as a good thing (mostly the ones who still live in our home town), but most of us were happy for him.
He's on Facebook now (my 10-year was just as Facebook was spilling into the masses) and is confident and is a regular person, comfortable in his skin. Just living life.
Definitely the smelly kid. He wasn't actually smelly, but the routine beatings and teasing definitely took the toll on this guy. He was just...non-functionally weird.
He apparently blossomed in college and ended up in law school. He became a lawyer for abused women, doing orders of protection and whatnot. He said his motivation was to stand up to bullies, so that no one had to endure what he did.
The next year I got laid off due to budget cuts and opened up my own law firm, which failed. My life's back to being in the s**tter, but the reunion stands out as my high water mark.
A dude that I saw drop acid in class on multiple occasions had become a youth preacher. The girl voted best looking had become a chain-smoking drunk who had somehow aged 30 years in a decade. The goth girl that I would sometimes smoke weed and talk about John Waters movies with had become some kind of Stepford wife.
A lot of people seemed genuinely shocked that I hadn't been stabbed to death in a back alley somewhere. Never realized I had such a reputation in high school :S
Two [passed away], one became disabled after a car accident, a couple of them came out as gay, one became a super successful entrepreneur and HEAPS got really fat.
Meanwhile, I got a haircut.
I don't know any that became an entrepreneur but one was a police officer killed in a car accident going home from work on new year's eve and another was stabbed at the airport they worked at. I feel sad about that a lot as they were both lovely people.
I knew guy who failed all his math courses and had me tutor him in math then he became a mathematician guess I was a great teacher
A lot of people give up on math because, frankly, most HS math teachers suck.
It's only been 5 years since I graduated and one of the girls in my class is a freaking rocket engineer. Working for nasa.
Like what. She used to cry about that douchebag she was dating. We did yoga in PE and talked about stupid highschool girl things.
And to think if I'd actually seriously applied myself It would have been possible for me too. good on her.
It's never too late to start applying yourself. Van Gogh was thirty when he began to paint.
The most popular and best-looking girl (biggest b***h, really) in my class weighed about 220 and was pregnant with kid #5. From head cheerleader on her way to UW, to college dropout stay-at-home mom. I probably *could* have enjoyed seeing that more, but I'm not sure how off the top of my head.
Being a stay at home mom isn't necessarily a mark of failure. Maybe she was very happy with a lovely family and a supportive man.
One girl I went to high school with is now a guy I went to high school with. It's an all girls school.
So... that didn't cure them/s (are you reading this, people who keep thinking it's a disease?!)
Skinny nerdy guy got busted for selling a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of adobe software in college and spent 15 months in prison. He came out super buff.
"Couple thousand dollars worth of adobe software" in other words - three quarter of just one adobe product.
Matthew. He was so small and... pasty. Made white bread look like toast and weighed ~100 pounds when I had last seen him. Barely stood 5'6". He had joined the army, and somebody gave him the Captain America Serum, and taught him how to sing/dance/play the guitar. When the 6'2" 230lb muscled model walked in, all the soccer moms gasped for air. When he picked up the guitar and started singing Garth Brooks songs (yes, my 10 year happened when Garth Brooks happened), their panties hit the floor. I still wonder if a country music star, killed, ate, and stole the identity of my little pasty friend.
The class loser got a construction job the summer out of high school, hated his boss so after the summer he got a loan and started his own concrete pouring company. He's super successful and loaded now.
It was actually good to hear how he was doing because the way he was going I thought he'd be dead before 21.
The people I wonder about the most were my angry classmates, the kind you can tell are hurting and may be even a little dangerous. Maybe they ended up in prison or dead? Maybe they came into their own and are happy now?
I ran a highschool reunion function at a restaurant I worked at. Kind of an interesting one. This would have been 25-30 years. The one guy had become a billionaire and paid for the whole event, and one of the guys who was listed as passed away actually showed up so that was awkward.
Everyone had a kid or two and almost everyone had at least one failed marriage.
They all looked fat and sad and their faces lacked color. It was really depressing. Most were just angry with life and bitter. I left rather quickly and went to hang out with my current group of friends.
This one guy used to be kind a of a bully, seemed not to give a f**k about school, had bad grades, skipped class and did some drugs in school. I wasn't bothered by him and didn't interact with the guy that much as i wasn't a target of his antics.
If you asked me how I thought he turned out, I would've guess and was now doing some kind of manual work and had no education.
Turns out he co-created one of the most recognizable clothing brand in my country and has multiple brick and mortar locations. His brand is worn by some big names. He's a successful businessman and he's probably worth millions.
I think it's pretty f*****g cool he turned out that way!
He was selling weed in high school. Now he's one of the best damn lawyers in the city
Because he understands the other side—-the side his clients are on. Not to mention that his high school “business” may have bankrolled his law school tuition.
I went to my 25th last year - the absolute most amazing thing was how many people 'found Jesus' or some s**t... People that used to party their balls off completely transformed into carbon-copies of their parents; going to church every week, becoming 'conservative' both socially and politically. It was unnerving.
Popular cheerleader that was super girly and always had a boyfriend, she showed up at the 10 year reunion as a soft butch lesbian. Short hair, pantsuit, not a drop of makeup, slender but toned, and a wife on her arm. No one saw that coming.
The girl with a promising theatre career ahead had an intense struggle with mental illness (I believe it was schizophrenia) and eventually a cocaine addiction as well. By the time the reunion came along she was clean, but unemployeed and had ruined her looks and voice. Really sad.
Oh, and the devoutly religious girl who was proudly celibate ended up becoming a sexologist. Huh.
EDIT: As for me, I'm not an unbelievable change, but I still surprised people. I was a decent student in high school, but not extraordinary. I barely got into my biology program. I was actually waitlisted, and it was common knowledge that I barely passed first year. Fast forward to the high school reunion: I'm now doing my med school residency in a very competitive speciality. Life is great. All the kids who did better than me in high school that didn't get into med school were scratching their heads.
Saw a classmate smoke crack publicly many times @ 14 years old from rolled up aluminum foil. I heard he and a friend robbed a liquor store @ 17. He now has a PHD in mechanical engineering.
Can I say me or does that make me arrogant?
I was expelled and got a GED from an alternative high school.
I've since seen combat, have a bachelor's degree and am raising a son who became his student council president
People can change.
Your not arrogant! You've changed and that's what was required for this
I graduated in 2004. Facebook was widely available (to all schools/the public) by 2005.
I didn't notice any transformation because nothing seemed punctuated. A few things:
- I realized that one of the biggest class idiots (i.e. had about 30 minutes' notice before he learned he passed his exams in 8th grade so he could walk during "graduation", similar story senior year) - he just passed his CPA exams and now he's an accountant for a good firm.
- Another total doofus who managed to somehow get into AP Calc, and fail the class (AP calc carried no graduation credits) and then got a lackluster 1 out of 5 on the exam - he's earned a doctorate in Pharmacology
- Baldness. Lots of baldness.
- The hardcore kid who used razor blades to put HUGE gauges in his ears, got kicked out of his house, and secretly spent a few nights in the school is not much different, but he showers now, doesn't use drugs, is a huge conspiracy theorist, but is an incredibly loving father. It's kind of neat to see someone who has a snake tongue, mega tattoos, huge gauges, and is kind of nutty work so hard to keep a strong family.
Determined to make a home life for his kids that is the polar opposite of the home life his parents made for him. There’s a reason some kids are so troubled, and that reason is usually behind the closed doors of their own home.
I don't wanna toot my own horn, but I had a hell of a transformation. In school I was fat, nerdy, awkward weirdo that was too oblivious to pick up on social cues. Since school I lost a lot of weight, grew into myself more and gained a lot of confidence. At the 10 year reunion, nearly everyone else gained a lot of weight so I definitely stood out. It was interesting because my frame of reference of myself was yesterday while their's was 10 years ago, if that makes sense. It was surreal, honestly. It really made me reflect on every mile I ran, every weight I lifted and every cookie I put down.
I ended up getting stoned in the kitchen of the bar with former goth weirdo, former star basketball player and some former burnout/hippie. I didn't really know any of them before. It was a really fun time.
What we found out is that each one of us is a brain, and an athlete, and a basket case, a princess, and a criminal.
I saw a guy who was picked on relentlessly and who was horribly awkward in social situations transform himself completely. In high school we thought he'd shoot up the school one day. He's a registered dietitian now, in his second or third year of med school, in great shape and generally an all around great guy.
Super quiet nerdy girl I graduated with went off to college, met a guy that was a model she began to date, dropped out and is now a lingerie model herself. Always thought that was pretty cool..
Probably myself. Sometime during my early twenties, social interaction just "clicked" and I somehow managed to change myself from nerdy, socially 'mis-calibrated', unintentionally funny guy to a person that people actually want to befriend / invite / cowork with / f**k.
Sounds a bit preposterous, I know; it's a strange mixture of practice (!), self-evaluation and somewhat holistic self-improvement, and finally acquiring some social *'credit'* or *'value'* I could build upon.
Edit: Reason behind this post is: If I could do this, you can do this too.
The class fatty dropped it all and now looks like Rob Lowe.
The fact that they called him class fatty tells me everything I need to know about how they treat people in their life.
An intelligent, obese girl from my Kansas class of 48, lost all her weight became a TV anchor for a Southern California news broadcast.
this one girl made it from stripper to mayor's wife. it was a small town, so to her that was a big deal
My 10 year was sad. I played football in High School, marginally popular. The rest of the guys I looked up to that I played football with in High School just kind of... Stayed in that moment. Most of them still lived in the same town, grew pot bellies, and never let the football part of their lives go. They spend every night at the same dive bar by the lake, and they all wore their letterman jackets to the reunion. Now, I've put on some weight (losing it faithfully as of late), but their just... Stuck in their old lives. Most are working construction, aren't working, on assistance, etc. It was depressing.
The saddest part was that up until I graduated from college, I longed to be like them still. To still be buddies, go out all the time and party. Then I got married, had my daughter, got divorced, found the love of my life and moved onto a career.
They're just still stuck in that perpetual spiral, trying to relive the best days of their lives. Some of them gave up scholarships or dropped out because they didn't get the same validation they did in High School.
They peaked by 18, but didn’t have the same wherewithal or the motivation to continue to peak again and again as their less popular classmates. Pretty sad to see all that potential go to waste.
Everyone was the same for the most part. None of the cheerleaders got fat. The nerdy kids were still nerdy. I guess I was probably the biggest change since the dress code for dinner was to wear a suit and I was literally the only one there in a suit, despite my rather gangster roots in high school. One of the hotter cheerleaders' husband was wearing shorts and flip flops. I don't know what the f**k is wrong with people. You just f*****g Google "semi-formal" and it says wear a goddamn suit. Jeans, shorts, polos... No, every site says wear a suit. F**k.
Girl was an average-looking person with no boobs - huge boobs, covered in tattoos, alternative model, and is on covers of tabloid magazines in the UK.
PSA - You only get to live once. You should all go to your high school reunions. You don't get another chance, and you'll regret missing it.
No big surprises at my 10 year, but found out that a few of my former bullies are pretty nice guys now. People change. :)
No regrets missing any of mine so far, spent high school years counting down the days until I never had to see any of them again...
There was this one guy who never really talked much, but he wasn't weird other than that. Nobody knew what happened to his mom, but he just lived with his dad in a lighthouse outside of town. When he was a sophomore, I think, he got in a fight with a senior and literally knocked him out. But that was the only time he was ever violent, and the other kid started it.
Senior year (I'm not proud of this), I keyed his car because he beat me in some contest.
So at the 10 year reunion, nobody knew he would show. Most of us hadn't talked to him since graduation. Well he comes, and he has a super hot wife. Plus, turns out, he's in the Justice League! I apologized for keying his car, and he said it was ok because a sacred day of Atlantean amnesty.
Good old Art.
There was the definite cases of "who is that fat person who ate my friend" but the most unreal thing at mine was the girl no one knew or remembered. Holy s**t.
So we were a pretty close graduating class, everyone at least knew or remembered everyone else. Except this one girl, absolutely hammered, and no one knew her. She was so outrageous, that everyone came up to me asking if I hired an escort to be funny (which I had strongly considered doing, but couldnt find one that was 'cool' enough, and would recommend anyone else doing it if they can).
Anyways, this chick is all over every single guy there, hanging on 'em trying to dance (when there was no music and it was the cocktail hour), grinding on them in front of their wives (still no music, that was later). But she also knew everyones names and stories, like stories a best friend would know. But not a single person knew who she was. She was average looking not hot but not ugly. But when she slammed back about 10 tequila shots in a as many minutes and then proceeded to grope, manhandle, smoosh-smoosh every guy, it went to a whole new level of weird. Someone had brought an old yearbook, and sure enough the name she gave was in it, but no clubs/activities, she looked somewhat similar to the 10 year old pic to where it probably wasnt a party crasher or someones spouse just havin a laugh, and still not a single person who knew her.
She was amazing to watch, just the shear amount of IDGAF she exuded was hilarious. Then she threw up. on the dance floor. Stood up, kicked the vomit with her shoes and started dancing some more then ran to the bar for more beer. Last I saw, the old class pres was trying to get her to drink water as she was passed out in a chair with more puke in her hair, while mumbling about how happy she was she voted for the class pres ten years ago.
I can only imagine her thought process leading up to the reunion. She definitely made sure people knew her, except if you asked anyone there I guarantee you they still couldnt tell you her name. I left before she got cattle carted away. But if your looking for an example of who to be at our reunion, DEFINITELY BE HER. I guarantee you will have a blast and look back on it and giggle with the total amount of WTF you create.
Really? Just imagine this was a man harassing all the females, everyone would be up in arms. And rightly so! No matter the gender, this sort of behaviour is not okay for anyone and certainly nothing to giggle about!
Three fave memories from my tenth:
1) the super smart, but unmotivated class clown - sitting at the bar telling everyone that he worked for a NASA subcontractor as a human space waste engineer and everyone believing him. "S**t freezes instantly in space." Completely hilarious. Her actually worked in a lumber yard.
2) the most beautiful, popular girl in our class sitting on a bench with literally - I kid you not - a line of guys waiting to talk to her and tell her how well they were each doing. She was still as gorgeous and perfect as ever.
3) The fact that educational and occupational attainment really didn't matter at all. It was high school cliques all over again. That changed at the 20th, but the 10th was still very much high school-ish. (If you are trying to finish a degree or get a promotion before you go to your 10th reunion, relax. No-one cares. But if it's your 20th and you care about such things - hurry.)
# 1 is a brilliant anecdote. I could base a whole screenplay on that one scene.
Life is f*****g hard. The most insane transformations came from the people who experienced unfortunate realities after graduation.
My HS ex went to an Ivy League school on full scholarship off the bat but then right after graduating she fell in love with the wrong guy and pretty much ended up living at home with her mother and her two kids while on social security while her husband was in jail for drug charges.
Indeed, life is hard. Can't get to heaven on roller skates, can't take a taxicab to Timbuktu.
I was friendly with this guy K freshman/sophomore year, I think. He was super quiet, shy, incredibly studious, chubby kid. Even some teachers would be like 'lighten up, relax.' He came out of his shell senior year and we kind of stopped being friends because he was hanging out with the 'cool' kids and having parties where people could drink, etc, and I was super square and uninterested.
So at my reunion, he was this x20. He is now a 'hotshot' kind of guy in DC working for a 'strategies' company. (Just googled it, no idea what they do). Anyway, at the reunion he was mostly okay UNTIL he chugged a s**t-ton of beers. Some folks had left, but the rest of left at the reunion had gathered around while he picked up a yearbook. He proceeded to s**t on EVERY PERSON in our year whether they were there to defend themselves or not. This was a super uncool kid freshman year (who nobody really disliked or made fun of, actually) just bashing everyone for weight, being weird, being uncool, being too cool, etc. My boyfriend was with me (he did not go to HS with me) and was so uncomfortable the entire time.
How NOT to get back at your former bullies at the reunion: become just like them, only even worse.
When I went to my 10 year I noticed a few changes. The popular jocks were fat and bald. People hung out in the cliques like they did in high school. And this one dude who constantly combed his feathered hair while in class was completely bald. That poor bastard.
One dude got alopecia. I thought he was someone's boyfriend until we talked. Eyebrows sure help you recognize people.
It's surprising how many of the ridiculously smart girls (we had a lot of them!) got pregnant not 2 years out of high school, dropped out of university, and now have 2+ kids, no higher education and are totally stuck in their boring a*s lives.
Some of the "slow learners" actually made it through uni or vocational school and have bright careers, only because they got their s**t together.
From the guys, beer bellies and bald spots everywhere! Shocking how many went totally out of shape.
That's rather judgy. Those women might enjoy their 'boring a*s lives'.
There was a girl in my high school class who was near the top for GPA, was going to a prestigious 4-year for pre-med, and was the ASB class president.
10 years later I found out she was an overweight hairdresser and had a kid out of wedlock in the s**tty city nearest our hometown. Talk about a "transformation"
One girl went from hot to super hot. Another girl went from cute to obese with 3 kids. Many, many people went from "single" to "divorced," and some of them also made it to "in court fighting over custody of the children."
So mine was last year. Saw a lot of people who got really fat, a few people who look the same, some who got really good looking.
Met my fiance there, I'm glad I went.
One of the ugliest girls in our class (looked like a mom in high school, a little on the chunky side with a short afro [she was a white Puerto Rican I think]). Anyway, she came to the reunion as a body double for Monica Lewinsky. Not a single person recognized her without looking at her name tag. The transformation as to how pretty she was compared to how ugly she was in high school was mind-blowing.
Thing is, she was never ugly. She just grew into herself, found her own style, and became more comfortable in her own skin. It is amazing how that can transform someone. When you’re happy with yourself on the inside, it shows on the outside—-by adding confidence and a sparkle to you that you never had before. People respond to that because it makes you beautiful, even though you might not be conventionally pretty. Then again, f**k conventionally pretty. Who is it that decides what that is? Besides, true beauty is not at all perfect, but it’s those imperfections that make it irresistibly interesting.
Not 10 but 20 a couple of years back.
Lots of bald or gray haired guys. Some of the women got big and some still acted like they were still in high school and thought they were still hot. Nope, not even.
One dude that changed the most was some kid who was skinny in HS. When he showed up, he was muscular huge but had a thick head and neck. You could tell he juiced up.
Knew a kid who was kind of an a*****e in high school, bullied kids, treated girls like s**t, thought he was hilarious and pissed off the teachers in class. Basically your average teenage shithead. I knew him well enough to know that there was a decent guy underneath the crappy attitude, but that side didn't come out very often. At our 10 year he was not just entirely gray-haired and more than a few pounds heavier, but he was also a devout Christian and as soft-spoken and sweet as a person could be. I can think of a couple of things in his life that may have precipitated the change, but didn't bring up the guy he had been in high school. I wonder if maybe he didn't want to be reminded of that kid anymore. I know I don't want to be reminded of who *I* was in high school, either.
My ten year was a year ago, the organizers were these four girls who just happened to have all gotten married in the last year which I personally thought was funny.
However, the person who had the biggest change? One person who was a girl in my grade had a sex change over the last ten years. "He" was on the lookout to avoid an ex boyfriend, because it would be awkward.
Another big change was one of the women in my year who was almost a ball in terms of body size when I was in school slimmed down a lot.
Other than that, the people that showed up were pretty what I expected. I was on the lookout to avoid an ex of mine that I had gotten back together with after college but broken up with a few years earlier. Luckily she didn't show up.
Why is He in quotation marks? Trans men are definitely men and we should use everyone’s appropriate pronouns without question.
In my specific case... Almost everyone is married with kids, or is about to be married and have an stable job... And I'm just in my 2nd year of University, no kids, no job... And still looking like I was 20 while the others have aged notably
I have friends from school who are grandparents, while my wife and I are still sniggering at childish k**b gags while drinking cocktails in the hot-tub on a Wednesday lunchtime.
The fat gay guy became really fit, ripped, and successful. God damnit, Fat Tim, why you be so brilliant?
The biggest non transformation was 95% of the people who thought they were the cool kids never made it out of my small south florida town and are stuck working at McDonalds and the like.
Biggest transformation was the overbearing amount of girls turned lesbians.
Truestory.
A girl who I was friends with but could never do anything with because she was dating my friend went from being smoking hot to morbidly obese.
Meanwhile here best friend who was short, slightly overweight and had a butch lesbian haircut is now smoking hot, super in shape (she's a distance runner now) and has a much more flattering style.
I really liked both of them as friends, and deep down I knew I had a good shot with the second girl, but I never asked her out because I wasn't attracted to her.
I'm sorry, why's a b***h lesbian haircut considered non-flattering here? Short hair on women isn't ugly, stop the stigmata.
Not 10 year but 25 year.
Large people EVERYWHERE. It's like everybody suddenly ballooned. Also, major alcohol abuse.
Thanks goodness for /r/keto, at least I don't have any excess weight hanging over me and look 10 years younger than most of my classmates. I've got that going for me at least.
I was a super skinny skateboarder kid who got his a*s kicked a lot. So I joined the military. And started lifting weights. Hard. And when I would get the weight up I kept thinking "wait till they see you at your reunion." It was my motivation. I got there and people were floored. I was 6' 2" 230 lbs and solid. The jocks were like trying to feel my muscles. The girls were on me. And my fiance was pissed. She didn't know. But It felt awesome. F**k that. No regrets. I had my 20 year and those same bullys all are dead of drug overdoses or suicide. 5 of them are dead. All 5.
"The jocks were trying to feel my muscles" ??? "The girls were on me" ?? "Everyone was floored" this seems kinda fake to me
I would NEVER ever even consider going to a school reunion. Not even sure if it's really a thing in Australia. Anyway, that part of my life is in my past and it can stay that way. School was a horrible experience for me and I certainly don't want to waste my time on reliving it.
Same Foxxy. I'm in America and passed my 10th and 20th because I knew it would just be a competition of how successful everyone became or didn't become. No thanks- I don't need to have anyone validate my life or my journey.
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It is sad that almost all of these post have comments about the girls got fat and mostly comments on appearance
I was about to say the same thing. Apparently the e mean girls are fat and the shy girls are hot and everyone is just as shallow as they were when they were teens
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You sound like someone who didn't suffer at hands of others at school.
Load More Replies... I would NEVER ever even consider going to a school reunion. Not even sure if it's really a thing in Australia. Anyway, that part of my life is in my past and it can stay that way. School was a horrible experience for me and I certainly don't want to waste my time on reliving it.
Same Foxxy. I'm in America and passed my 10th and 20th because I knew it would just be a competition of how successful everyone became or didn't become. No thanks- I don't need to have anyone validate my life or my journey.
Load More Replies... It is sad that almost all of these post have comments about the girls got fat and mostly comments on appearance
I was about to say the same thing. Apparently the e mean girls are fat and the shy girls are hot and everyone is just as shallow as they were when they were teens
Load More Replies... You sound like someone who didn't suffer at hands of others at school.
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