First, take a long deep breath. Then stab your finger and pour rubbing alcohol on it or bite the inside of your cheek or tongue while chewing food or run into the bed frame and bruise your shin and try not to cry. This is how you will feel after starting the College Application process. Might I suggest you have a full cocktail ready before starting?
If your kid does the whole process without your help, and doesn’t screw it up or have a bazillion questions for you, YAY! You need to have your child apply for the Mensa Society! And if you don’t have that kid, welcome to this new fresh hell of getting your kid into college.
You will need the following;
- Your tax returns.
- Your kids Sat and ACT scores and any other standardized test scores.
- Your kids High School transcripts.
- All the stellar activities, awards, groups, civic duties, pedigrees and exceptional inventions to save the world your child has done over his/her lifetime.
- Blood types on all family members and any blood connections to famous people, kings or queens, serial killers etc.
- All parent information going back to the day you were conceived.
Then you start filling out the Applications and FAFSA forms and you will repeat all the info on each form over and over and over again till your are out of cocktails and swearing at everyone and accusing your husband of making you even have these kids that you now have to send to college. (Just kidding, I love my husband and kids).
Prepare to shed lots of tears, yours and your kids. Then sit by the mailbox or inbox and wait to see if your child gets into any of the bazillion colleges you and your child applied too. Once you get an acceptance letter, don’t forget to take a picture of your smiling child holding the college letter and post on all social media so your friends and family will know. They can’t wait!
Then you see you only get a little bit or NO HELP from FAFSA and you can’t sell a kidney to pay for college. So you look for scholarships. There are apps and websites to help you. Your child applies to over 5,000 scholarships and maybe gets a few hundred dollars and cries over all the lost time for applying for all those scholarships.
No worries, let’s take out some parent loans to help our kids! That’s a fantastic idea! Then you can pay out of your retirement account and savings accounts to cover those loans. You will never retire and you will work till you die. Hooray!!!!
Oh wait, you say you have saved money to pay for your kid’s college? Good for you! I know lots have been able to save and half of them lost all that in the last stock market/housing crash. So cheers to you!!!!!!!!!! (holding up my third glass of mimosa).
So that is just a taste of what it’s like to get this college process going. I wish you well and hope your kids gets into the college of his dreams. Then he/she can move back in with you to pay off the loans and never ever leave again. The End.
PS….This isn’t how it will be for all parents. I was just frustrated with filling out all the forms with the same info over and over again. This is the second kid to go to college here so I am over filling out any forms. lol What has been your college app experience?
And Just for a little humor, Watch this video!
