It was quite the process getting my parents to let me live in the college dorm. A dorm that was only about 25-30min away from home. What would happen if you got hurt? Who would take you to the hospital? Does the school know what they're doing? Who is going to help you when you have a cast on? Everything is already accessible at home - why do you want to make it harder for yourself by moving out? These and other questions was the uphill battle I fought during my senior year of high school, all the way up to the day I moved into my dorm. As an 18 year-old I was furious with my parents for wanting to keep me at home. In my opinion they should be proud that I wanted to leave the house, that I wanted to seek my own independence, that I felt ready to try living on my own. Didn't they realize that the reason I felt ready was because of the way they had raised me? Shouldn't they be flattered? But no, they wanted to keep me home. To keep me safe. To keep me secure. To keep, for the SHORT term, life easy for me. It was during this period of my life that I began to realize that it isn't ALWAYS that teenagers make decisions in our lives for the short term; I decided I had to be the parent to my parents and show them that it was time for me to go, no matter how difficult and challenging "The World Out There" may seem.