Things I wish I had known when I was 15

1.  Getting off with 18 year old boys, is not cool – it’s illegal. When you’re a 15 year old girl you think you’re the cat that got the cream if you are seeing an older lad. When I look back now, I realise these lads were in fact sad, losers who couldn’t get any girl their own age so took advantage of pig tail wearing school girls who still ate coco pops for breakfast. Pretty sick.

2.  Enjoy eating chips for lunch. Chips and gravy, sausage rolls, smiley faces, cake and custard all in one sitting. Weight 6 stone 3 pounds.  Repeat that 8 years later and we would be the size of  Heather Trott (after she ate Shirley).

3. Be glad you were frigid. The popular girl who was always sneaking off under the slide at the local park may have been the best thing since sliced bread at 15. Now, she’s still popular with the lads but also has 2 kids, a council house and chlamydia. Be grateful you were too scared to touch those cocktail sausages, be very grateful.

4. Appearing last on your best friends MSN name isn’t the end of the world. ‘KaTiE LvZ BoBbY 4LyF 2K7 ❤ BBF GaLs: AbI, ViCkY, LuCy, SaRaH, AnY, LeAh, SoPhIe n HoLlY.’….. NINE, NUMBER FUCKING NINE, why am I last on the list? She clearly hates me and thinks I’m fat. I’m going to block her. And she’s not coming to my super sweet 16th at Heaven and Hell in Stockport next week. Bitch.

5.  This is the only age that boys will be happy with a kiss. The moment you turn 16, lads will think they can put their hand up your skirt… and the rest. Make the most of being innocent, it’s all downhill from here.

6. The little shits in school will end up in prison or on the dole. The class clown may be funny to watch; throwing pens at the kid who sits at the front and launching tables across the room when they get a detention. In a few years you’ll see them in the street and laugh, because you’ll still think they’re a clown, difference is, you won’t want to be their mate.

7. Downing a bottle of White Lightening will never end well. If I could go back and tell 15 year old me that it is not clever to drink a bottle of 12% cider whilst spinning around in a dark alley on Friday night, I would. But she would call me a boring cow and ask me to go in the shop for 10 Richmond Superkings, handing me a bag of copper she nicked from her mums jar under her bed. Then she’d go home, be sick and get grounded all weekend.

8. Teachers are human beings. When you sit giggling at Mrs. Jones’s mole, she can actually hear you and wants to twat you all with a ruler. She will go home to her husband, drink a bottle of wine and rant about how horrid you all are and how she hopes her kids aren’t like that. On the other hand, you’ll go home and won’t even bat a pretty little eyelid, unaware you’ve actually ruined a poor woman’s day.

9. Your mum and dad love you. You have to be home by 9pm and ALL your mates get to stay out until 10. That must be because your mum is a total cow bag who wants to ruin your life and hopes you die from social suicide. No, babes, that’s because your mum doesn’t want you to get abducted by a strange man who will lure little naive you into his car when your walking home. Duh.

10. Step away from the hair dye. Wow. This is a biggie for me. Ginger kids never do well in school do they? So 15 year old me toddled off to Boots for an Ash Blonde ‘Nice and Easy’ hair dye. Turns out it goes yellow, with a hint of purple and a dash of grey for good measure. It’s taken 8 years to get that shit out, 8 god damn years. Don’t do it.

Holly O’Rourke