I was sitting at my desk in my third grade classroom daydreaming about “Dragon Ball Z,” when suddenly I started falling backwards.

The next thing I remember was feeling the weight of my desk, and all of its contents, raining down on me. A wrinkly, turkey-necked woman towered above me. Her name was Mrs. Pennfield, and she was the most terrifying teacher I ever had.

Her piercing brown eyes showed no hints of remorse for nearly cracking my head open.

“If you’re not going to pay attention in class, Zach,” she screamed, “the least you can do is keep your desk CLEAN!”

My classmates kept their noses in their books to avoid her wrath. This wasn’t the first time she’d disciplined a student in this manner.

I sat on the floor of the classroom dumbfounded, not sure whether I should cry or get angry.

I know what you may be thinking. This guy’s crazy teacher traumatized him for life and he’s probably still talking to his therapist about it today.

That couldn’t be any further from the truth.

I’m not sure why or how, but something was rewired in my brain that day. When I got home from school, I felt like a new person. It was as if a sledgehammer had knocked down a wall in my head and a new side of me was flowing out.

The best way to describe myself pre-“Pennfieldgate” was extremely introverted and weird. Instead of crawling on all fours like a normal toddler, I butt-crawled. I could draw you a diagram explaining how this works, but I’ll let you use your imagination. Until I was 3 years old, I had my own language and clung to a toy dinosaur that was originally a decoration on my two-year-old birthday cake. Its name was Tootieninitz.

When I was 2 and a half, my parents showed me “Jurassic Park.” For the next six months, my only form of communication was roaring exactly like the T-Rex in the movie (my roar was so identical to Spielberg’s T-Rex that my parents considered sending him a recording). My behavior, as you can imagine, was not conducive to making friends in preschool.

Concerned, my parents brought me to multiple child psychologists. When they tried to test me for the normal developmental disorders, I refused to cooperate. “There is something seriously wrong with your child,” the doctors told my parents.

I eventually learned how to speak English, but when I started school, I still fell dreadfully behind my classmates. I was last to do almost everything. Writing my name in kindergarten was a struggle, and learning to read and do basic math took even longer.

At the time, I knew there was a reason why I was pulled out of class for remedial math and reading, but frankly, I didn’t care. I had my action figures (or “men” as I called them) and my imagination to keep me busy. School meant nothing to me, and I had no interest in learning.

Even though I was far behind my peers, my parents resisted holding me back. They felt that eventually I would gain my academic footing and catch up with my peers — all that I needed was a “push.”

For the most part, my parents were right. By the time Mrs. Pennfield pushed me over, I was probably ready to break out of my introverted shell. All I needed was an external trigger to shock me into reality. By the end of the year, I had completely caught up to my peers and was pulled out of remedial classes.

Looking back, I may have snapped out of my reclusiveness without the help of Mrs. Pennfield. But if I could go back to third grade, I’d let her flip my desk all over again.

Zach Bergson is a Public Policy senior and a deputy magazine editor for The Michigan Daily.