I am that spark that you’re looking for. I am that bubbly presence that makes the room come alive. I am full of energy, essence, and enthusiasm. My trials and tribulations created my spark and gave me drive, determination and focus.
I’ve had many opportunities to be overcome my situations and become less than I am right now, but I chose the high road in every instance. I overcame my obstacles through sheer will, and sometimes, back-breaking work. From an early age, I overcame and disproved a chauvinistic father. I was constantly led to believe that there was no way I could ever be good enough, no matter how good the grade was, or how well the game went. My father had never gone to college, so his attitude seemed hypocritical to me. His hypocrisy set a drive within me on full-tilt. I decided that not only was I going to graduate from college, but I would become a professional.
My parents divorce had both negative and positive contributions to my journey through higher education. For example, it taught me to deal with certain kinds of oppression. I understand that being a white female from a middle-class family gave me certain privileges. However, given the total population of doctors, only a small percentage of them are surgeons, and of them an even smaller percentage are female. I believe that having had to deal with a constant bombardment of unfounded blatant male chauvinism from my father will help me persist in the medical world. I’ve developed a tough shell. Furthermore, my father’s attitude gave me a skewed perception of men, and perhaps instilled in me the cockiness with which he carried himself. Cockiness and misperception, will do you only a small amount of good in this world. So it has been to my advantage, despite the hypocrisy and oppression to see and strive for the lighter side of things.
I have also overcome physical obstacles. Since I was eleven, I’ve had asthma. I have not let it stop me from competing in challenging sports. In high school I ran track and competed in varsity soccer from my freshman year on. During the seasons, I always trained harder than the other girls to overcome the effects that asthma had on my lungs. Then, leading up to college, I began competing in club soccer. Club soccer is elite; I tried out and beat other girls make my team. I played for four years in St. Louis, Mo which was physically taxing. This is where I was recruited to play Division II college soccer. In college I was known as the girl who worked hard. I may not have been the best technical player but I ran further, faster, and harder than anyone else. I started every single game, save one due to injury, all four years. My asthma was never a burden on me, and I have never used it as an excuse. I treated my asthma the same way I treated my father’s chauvinism, as an accelerant to drive me forward. I believe that the physical strength I accumulated through overcoming my problems with asthma gives me an indelible presence in a room or in a crowd. For that, I am proud.
My aforementioned weaknesses had just as much influence in creating my spark as my strengths, but, I tend to favor my strengths. My strengths developed through the actions of my mother and my grandmother. They were my foundations. Both took such pride in my achievements that it was worth it to me to go that extra mile, if only just for them. My mother has sacrificed a lot in her life to give me what I need. As I said, I was a rather athletically talented teen, and I developed a passion for soccer. However, there was no soccer program in the small town where I grew up in Missouri, so my mother signed me up to play competitively in St. Louis. She spent countless hours on the road driving me to practices, and spent hundreds of dollars in new uniforms, cleats, gas, and food. My playing was a financial burden on the family. I knew she was fighting my father’s wishes to keep me in the league but she did all of this because she thought it might help me pay my way through college. As it turns out, I was recruited to play soccer at Newberry College. During my stay in South Carolina, my grandmother, who still supported me by writing me one letter a week with a little money inside, was diagnosed with ALS. Over the course of the next three years, her penmanship worsened, and her voice became so breathless that I could not hear her over the phone, but she absolutely insisted that I stay in class. Not only did I have to stay in school; I must also turn in every single homework assignment, and pass every quiz or test. She would not let of me leave classes to come see her, she also would not let me feel sorry for her. I was to do my duty in college and get that degree. My grandmother used to tell me that it would be a waste of good brain for me to not become a doctor. She didn’t know it, but she was teaching me how to perform under heavy emotional stress. I was torn between school and home and the only place I wanted to be was back there with her. In the end, I took one Friday off from class to attend her funeral up in Missouri. This was one month before I graduated with two degrees in Biology and Chemistry. With these unselfish actions, my grandma taught me to separate emotion and work. I miss her encouragement and her loving reinforcement of my finer qualities; mostly I just miss her. It is therefore easy to see that not only was I birthed and raised by these wonderful women, but I owe them my education and my will power, and therefore my spark. The day I walk across the medical school graduation stage, and see my mother’s smile, will be a grand day indeed.
My perseverance has already been challenged, here in the application process. I have not been accepted a couple of years now, and it is getting mentally, emotionally and financially exhausting. For any one of a number of reasons, acts of God, man, and naivety got in the way of me being the best potential candidate that I could be. But, I have made up my mind that enough is enough and I am no longer shooting for just ‘getting in.’ I am competitive. I am the person that you want in your school. I am the student that you will enjoy teaching in class. My determination to be accepted has brought me back time and time again. I have spent thousands of dollars teaching myself the correct way to master MCATS. I have sacrificed countless job offers from various companies because I don’t want to work at a job that will not help me become a doctor. Anything less than what I know is my best will not do for me. I know that everything else that came before this application round is not fruitless, because it is merely one more obstacle that, like the others, I will overcome. I believe that I can and will push through anything with vigor, pressure and perseverance.
Upon graduating cum laude from college, I received a rather prestigious award. The W.L. Laval award is presented to one graduating female and male a year. Its winners are senior student athletes who are judged to be outstanding in athletics, scholarship, character, and leadership. This was the cherry on top of the proverbial ice cream for me. It let me know that all of my efforts were worth something; that all of my mother’s and grandmother’s encouragement finally paid off. The award was merely a reminder of how much work it takes to win something so prestigious.
Medical school will be the springboard to my professional career as a surgeon. I believe that my strong upbringing that led to my awesome education has prepared me for the trials that could keep me from achieving my career goal of become a successful surgeon. I want my peers to respect my thoroughness and professionalism; and I want my patients to have confidence in my procedures and my quality of work. One day, with much hard work, I will be the model female surgeon in a largely male-dominated profession. Hopefully my persevering, bright personality will push me to achieve that goal.
I will push on past this current obstacle, like those before it and get into medical school. So I ask you, will you let me work hard for you? Will you give me the chance to shine; to use my vigor for good? Could this incoming class use an extra catalyst? I am that spark, that catalyst, and I will not disappoint. Thank you for your time.
----so now I have to edit about 1,000 characters without losing steam. wish me luck, artsy farts...:D
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