Throughout my life I have always been asked what I want to do when I grow up. When we are young it’s simple. We dream of being astronauts, footballers, princesses, pop stars and I was no different. I wanted to be a ballerina. I loved how graceful those beautiful girls were, with their baby-pink tutus and pointe shoes. I wanted to be exactly like them.

When I was three years old I had my very first ballet lesson at Heather’s Totally Dance Studio. I was ecstatic. I still have the picture my mum took of me in my leotard, hair in a bun, and a huge grin from ear to ear.  As soon as the music started I was infatuated. I learned everything from plies to ‘good toes’ and ‘bad toes’. I didn’t stop dancing when the class finished; I twirled and leapt all around the house. It quickly became my whole life and I now couldn’t imagine a world in which I didn’t dance.

I continued practising and eventually participated in my first showcase. I was nervous, but so excited. I loved being backstage with my mum doing my makeup and running around with my friends. All of the year groups were there, even the big sixteen-year-old girls, who all of us younger kids watched in awe. I’ll never forget what it was like the first time I went on stage; I had so many butterflies in my stomach I thought I was going to fly away. As soon as the lights went up and I heard the applause and energy from the audience, I burst into a smile. Learning how to dance had unlocked a new, wild and creative part of myself I never knew existed, from that moment on I knew I wanted to be a professional dancer.

I continued dancing. I took extra classes and learned different styles: modern, jazz and tap – but ballet was always my favourite. I realised I had an aptitude for dance that I hadn’t been fully aware of before, and soon I was the best at the studio. I knew I needed something more to improve. So, when I was nine I attended a musical theatre summer school. It was amazing. It was much more extreme; they taught me new dance moves and lifts where I was tossed into the air. And it wasn’t just dancing: they taught me acting techniques, which came very naturally to me since I was a dramatic child, and singing, which was the hardest for me but they helped me improve my technic.  From then on, if you asked me then what I wanted to be when I grow up I would’ve told you ‘a performer’ not simply a ballerina.

This second dance school was very intense: I had to sit annual exams for at least five different styles of dance as well as acting and singing. At 10 years old I was doing 15 hours of practice a week, not to mention taking all of December off school to do panto. It was consuming my life. I did other clubs like swimming, horse riding, tennis and even karate for a short while, but none of them stuck like dancing did. But I loved every single moment of it, even if I wasn’t the best one in this school and only got ensemble parts in the pantomimes and the role of a rat in the Nutcracker! But that changed when I sat my first set of exams and got really good grades: I started to move up the ranks in my class and got better parts. My shining moment was when I played Matilda in Matilda, even if it was only at a small, local theatre. I won an award and felt on top of the world. After winning the award, things started to look up for me: I got auditions for CBBC shows, performed for the Scottish Conservatoire and was picked from my class to perform in Disneyland Paris. I felt like the queen of the world and thought this would be the best time in my life. I was wrong.

People say there is always a lot of drama in Dance studios, and they are not wrong. The best representation I can think of is ‘Dance Moms’ which is a very clichéd and dramatic American, reality TV show. The trip to Paris was supposed to be an amazing experience and I was excited because I had a solo performance. I won’t get into the petty details of what happened but mums were banned on Facebook, a girl was asked to leave the studio, a teacher quit and three other people left, including me. All because rivalry about who was the best and who was the worst got blown out of proportion.

My mum thought that all this conflict and the hours I was pouring into the studio were too much for me. I disagreed but she wanted me to focus more on my school work. After I’d spent the majority of my life working towards this goal of being a performer and my mum helping me and paying for everything, she suddenly expected me to go to uni and become a doctor or a lawyer. I felt blindsided. She thought that dancing was just another hobby to buff out my UCAS application, but to me it was my life. She is a very logical and scientific woman so she didn’t understand why I wanted to waste my life on a career that is underpaid and very difficult to succeed in. I didn’t understand why she was forcing me down a career path I would be unhappy in. So, if you asked me at age 12 what I wanted to be when I grow up I would still have told you a performer, but my parents would’ve told me to stop being silly and think more seriously. They didn’t realise I was being serious.

For about six months I did absolutely no dancing. I was insufferable: I hated my parents for taking my dream away and begged them to let me go back. My mum eventually capitulated and let me join a new musical theatre school. It was more relaxed than my previous one: I did less hours and again, was the easily the best dancer, so within a few months I got one of the main roles in their end-of-year show. I liked going there: the people were friendly and all the classes were fun. I know this was a compromise: my mum was trying to find a school that fostered good attitudes and had allowed a balance between school and performing. Logically, I understood this but I still missed the intensity of the previous school; it pushed me to be a better dancer. As they say, it takes pressure to create a diamond.

For a long time, I had a very narrow mindset that I had to be a dancer or my life would be over, and obsessive dance teachers didn’t help much. While dance did give me more confidence, new friends and great skills, it was also tiring, stressful and when teachers were in a bad mood, scary. I can now see why my mum didn’t want me to go into a career that normalises grown adults screaming at little children, calling them fat or idiots. If I become a dance teacher I will treat everyone with respect, and remember that it’s not the end of the world if kids forget one move.

Dancing used to be my life, but now I realise I have other dreams. I want to experience uni life and travel the world. Although I don’t see myself as becoming a ballerina anymore, I could never quit, (despite going through some bad experiences). I know it’s unusual for grown women to do ballet as a hobby, but I don’t think it should be. I’m already going to an adult ballet class and all of the women there are so nice and enjoy doing a thing they love, even if it isn’t their whole life. So many young girls quit all their sports when they become teenagers and therefore become unfit. In my mind it’s crazy: dancing has given me good friends, social skills, confidence and crazy childhood anecdotes. I can’t wait to continue and get my children into it as-well. If you asked me today what I want to do when I grow up I would tell you a working woman (as well as a part time ballerina)!