Are you ready for it?

Hey, y’all! My name is Meredith Hoofnagle. I was born on February 18, 1989 at 11:49pm in Winter Park, Florida. I grew up dancing competitively from age 3 to 15.

I switched to cheerleading in high school. I cheered competitively for one year and football all four years. I also was heavily involved on campus. I was Junior Class Representative. Senior year I was elected Senior Class Vice President. I was also the philanthropy chairwoman for the whole school’s Homecoming Week. My team and I helped provide gift cards for dinners for exceptional students and athletes we felt deserved them so they could go to the Homecoming Dance with a little less stress.

I hope you’re sitting down. I took Spanish all four years of high school. I was even Vice President of the Spanish Club my senior year.

In college, I bought the SAT II Spanish test prep book. I studied it at home for about a week. I passed the exam and earned my foreign language requirement for my journalism degree without having to step foot into one of the classes.

At WPHS, I was in National Honor Society, Beta Club, all honors and multiple AP courses. I graduated with a weighted GPA over 4.5.

I had my sights set on the University of Florida. If I didn’t get into UF, I was going out of state. Thankfully, UF made the right decision and let me in.

My time at UF was anything but easy. I dealt with four deaths in my family, grief, loneliness, jealousy from people around me. Some semesters I made straight A’s. I worked out every single day. I went out. A lot.

Some semesters my sorority sisters couldn’t even drag me out of my room. I gained weight. I cried. A lot.

But that is the disease of depression. It will be a roller coaster. You don’t know what each day will bring. But fighters, we keep living. We keep moving forward… even if I stay in bed with the lights off until 3 PM.

Back to how that affected my social experience at UF. When I was down, I felt ignored. When I was on top of the world, I felt hated. But you know what? I didn’t care. I have been through more loss and traumatic life experiences that any of these people can ever imagine.

So, I kept grinding. I got my degree in Telecommunications-Management with an outside concentration in Business Administration in August 2012.

I was also six months pregnant. My dream of being a sideline reporter on ESPN was derailed.

My calling was being a mom first.

But now, my dreams are even bigger than that. I love America. I love people. I love our world.

My dream job is to make this a better place for us all to enjoy together.

I am truly honored you are on this journey with me. I cannot wait to share my life with you. But more importantly, I can’t wait to see everything I can learn from you all. 🇺🇸🙏🌎