Ami Marrero

The one thing about me that truly has defined my life is having a built in best friend. I have a twin sister named Mia who attends Augusta University. This is the first time we have ever been so far away from each other, so adjusting to the absence is kind of hard.

A fun fact about my twin and I is that my Dad originally created my name from his older sister's name, Ima. When my dad found out he was going to have twin girls, my mom and himself decided to name the other one Mia in order to keep the same letters and to still dedicate her name to my aunt. The craziest part of the story though is that we are named after my aunt, and were coincidentally born on her birthday! One of the ways this was celebrated was that when I was younger, my Titi Ima would bring us three girls to the Georgia Aquarium on our birthday because we could get in for free! I always looked forward to my birthday because of this.

Although I say my twin is my built in best friend, I have to admit some struggles I've been through due to being a twin. There's a certain social stigmatism in which twins are not only similar in looks, but in personalities. This could not be further from the truth and growing up always being looked at as the same person was hard.

I truly love being a twin, but sometimes it's exhausting. We constantly had to fight to assert our own identities with family, friends, and school environments. An example of this was receiving gifts at our birthday or Christmas that were exactly the same but in different colors. Not only was this disappointing, but also embarrassing because Mia would open her gift, be excited about what she got, and then I'd open the exact same thing which ruined the surprise. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for everything I've received, it's just disappointing to know that your friends and family don't really perceive you as your own person. This promoted me to become very independent and hardworking in order to make myself stand out and make my own name for myself.

Being on my own at the University of Georgia has truly allowed myself to find myself and identify with what makes me, well, me. I can't wait to discover more about myself and embrace my identity.