My Experience In My Life

“Experience is not what happens to you; it is what you do with what happens to you”. That is what my dad was saying in the big screen in front of me, quoting Aldous Huxley, next to my mom, both smiling widely and a bit dewy-eyed. It was a video they recorded unbeknownst to me that was being shown at the Jenkins Foundation scholarship awards ceremony; a night that will last in my memory for the rest of my life. An acknowledgment that came almost as unexpected as the realization that I would study in one of the best universities in Mexico. And, at the same time, a recognition that seemed to be just an obvious next step, the natural consequence of all that I had done and worked for up to that moment.

As I'm writing this, we have just returned from a 5 day hospital stay. Life has become a series of doctors' appointments, tests, and hospital stays. This is life with a chronic illness. . . especially one of which not much is known. But life wasn't always this way.

In my life, I have been very fortunate. Intense struggle, emotional pain, and hardships never have seemed to come my way, as they do prematurely to some children. I have always taken this for granted, so I never thought about my life as being easy.

Every moment of accomplishment is success and there is one event in my life that stands out above the rest. I stood waiting in the psychiatric ward of the hospital, awaiting my father’s embrace. I was eager, but not ready to see him after months of waiting and wondering. Nevertheless, my palms were sweaty, arms crossed, unwelcoming to the unknown. This was the first hospital that allowed me to visit my father as a 12 year old because of safety regulations. My heart sunk as I walked into this unfamiliar place. I immediately noticed the eerie aura of the place. The walls were lifeless with no sign of photographs or memories--just a blank canvas of gray. It saddened me that this is where he was staying everyday without an escape. I saw people struggling with serious mental illness: bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and clinical depression. It was a shock to see my father amongst patients who were clearly mentally ill. Despite my unrest with this new reality, I have found an undeniable interest in medicine and health after seeing my dad be prescribed many combinations of medicine trying to find the one that would counteract his mental illness.

My life was perfect, I got along with my siblings, my mom and I were close… Well then there’s my dad. We were always really close, he and I would go out to the barn together at the old house and he would speak to me as if I were the audience. We always enjoyed each other's company until one day he started acting strange, and then stranger, and then even stranger until the point where my mom found him in the middle of the night standing in a parking lot in his pajamas. She eventually left him… I don’t blame her, I mean he wouldn’t get help.

Starting in my eleventh-grade year of high school, I never knew all the changes I would experience. I attended Chickasaw High School in Chickasaw, AL. It was a little school, which had about five hundred students in total. I did not live in Chickasaw like all the other kids. I lived about twenty minutes away in Mobile, AL with my dad and stepmom. I went to this school because my stepmom (LaRae) was a teacher there. Also, I was like most girls in high school, I had a high school sweetheart named Michael Matthews. I thought my eleventh-grade year of high school was going to be a great and memorable experience until I found out some horrible news.

It has been an eventful four years here at Christopher Dock. I went through a lot and I am proud of who I am becoming. I am not the shy, quiet and awkward kid that I was coming here but instead, I grew into a kind, confident and selfless individual ready to take on the world. Thanks to the adversity that I went through, I was rewarded with what I desire the most in this life: God, Friends and Family. The adversity that I had go through was letting go of my past, restoring my lost faith to God and stop being dependent onto my brother Tyler. Without doing those three things, I would not be where I am today. Now I would like to reflect on my growth throughout all of these four years.

It was the last weekend of my summer vacation before entering senior year. All my life I have been spending my summer vacations in my beach house on Contadora Island, a small paradise off the coast of Panama. Everything on the island is joy and serenity. It had almost become a tradition for all the island residents to go spend the last weekend there. I had a very close friend who also had a house in Contadora. He was the most caring and gentle person I have ever met. I would regard him as an example of how people should treat others. He was always so considerate and friendly with everyone, no matter what. These were qualities that I did not see in myself at the time. Whenever I had the opportunity, I would criticize someone for not being or looking a certain way. Or I would not treat people with the corresponded respect they deserved. These were all things that Walter would try to change in me, with his caring and humble personality, but my arrogance would keep persisting. When it came to the formation of his professional self in academics, he always strived for more. He was the most ambitious, while I was a conformist with mediocre results. Coming back to this particular weekend, Walter had opted to spend it camping at a reservoir with another group of friends. The weekend on the island was very fun, even though he had not come. I woke up early on Sunday, it was February 28, 2016. Little did I know that this day would mark the rest of my days. I woke up early to enjoy my

My college routine goes like this: Wake up, study, go to the gym, shower, go to classes, go to the library, practice the violin, go to meetings and activities, studying, and then back to my dorm for a restful sleep. I like to say that I can achieve my goals as a dual-degree student pursuing Music and Pharmaceutical Studies towards a PharmD. because I love the consistency in my routine. As a dual-degree student, I have 8-10 courses a semester that I need to take. Being organized and managing my time wisely motivates and allows me to do everything that the University of Connecticut offers for me.

Despite how average my life has been thus far, especially compared to others, I have learned so much. Whether I was faced with minor complications or major decisions, I had much knowledge to gain. Regardless of the outcome of my actions, I simply reflected on what I had to learn and carried on. Because, regardless of whether I like it or not, time will continue forward, even if I’m not. If not my age, then it’s my experiences that define who I’ve grown to become.

Aurora, Illinois, a suburb near Chicago with many hills, big and small, and many lakes, rivers, and ponds. The townhouse I lived in was quite noisy at times, thanks to mom and dad. Aside from all the parental chaos, home was home, purple chicken noodle soup and bike rides were what I looked forward to. I loved the landscape and how much of it there was, the sky was always so colorful, the fireflies lit up the city parks making the city seem magical in a way. Aurora was a city that was all about unity, everyone came together for events, clubs, and during tragedies. You would always see a group of people running the hills in matching shirts or a whole neighborhood celebrating someone's birthday.

It was the beginning of summer after my seventh grade year. The sun was blazing, the birds were chirping, and I felt an overwhelming sense of freedom. Life seemed great, until the next day when I was bored out of my mind and had nothing to do. During middle school, I followed my brother, Isaac, around like a mime. Whatever he did I would aspire to do the same. This was no different when, bored out of my mind, I found out my brother was going to go disc golfing with the neighbor friends. When Isaac asked me if I wanted to come with, I jumped up, ran to my bike, and told him I was ready whenever he was. I had never heard of what “disc golf” was, but I knew that since my brother was doing it, it was cool! So I followed Isaac and the neighbor friends all the way to Northside Park, sweating immensely from the summer heat and from how quickly I was biking. On the first hole, Isaac gave me my own disc to borrow for the round. This sport was completely foreign to me, so I threw my disc as hard as I possibly could, in an attempt to impress Isaac and his friends. Not only did the disc go absolutely nowhere, but I threw it so high that the wind actually pushed it backwards. I felt humiliated as everybody laughed at me. Isaac, however, came up to me and explained to me how discs fly and the proper way to throw. Each hole, I could visibly see my disc traveling further than the previous hole. Every time Isaac saw me doing something improperly, he would correct me and tell me how to fix

On June 10, 2006, I woke up like any other Saturday, expecting it to be a good day of baseball. Little did I know, how much my life was about to be turned upside down. Getting the news that my father had passed away from a heart attack, at the age of 30, really took a toll on my family and I. I couldn’t let that stop me from having a successful life because he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. That meant it was time for me to step up to the plate and be a man, be a role model for my little brother, and also be the shoulder that my mom could lean on. Even though I was only 10 years old and in the fifth grade, I really grew up and matured since that day.

I started this experience in this class with my luggage which was empty of experience, but now, when this journey is almost close to an end, I am thankful for having had the chance of being part of such amazing class and course. I considered every single class as a “stop” where I had the chance to visit something new and get something which could remain in my memories and could be useful for my personal life. From the very first class I realized that this could have been a different experience. I agree when Lily, in the first class told us that using slides and books cannot be considered an experience from which you can take something to grow as a person. Therefore, from the beginning of this journey I took the opportunity to challenge myself and to especially defeat my fears. In fact, throughout my entire life I have been very emotional and rarely I was taking an initiative when I have to speak in public. When first I candidate for the CFO role, I was afraid of talking in front of everyone, but then I took this occasion to give a turnaround to this experience and in the end, I managed also to be elected. During my speech, I used a particular sentence “life is no made of grades, but of experiences” and I guess this class reflected perfectly what I was expecting. I was not expecting a grade from it, but rather to get something which possibly could help me throughout all my experience here in San Diego, but also for my life and working career. Working in the board was an

My life is full of adventures here in El Paso, where I was born and raised. A city like this is unique and different from many other cities because our city is right next to the border to Juarez Mexico, meaning the culture here can differ greatly. The city is unique and special, mainly because of the very Hispanic culture here that has taught me to love my family. The environment here that I have been raised in is based on a great deal of religion, family, and challenging work. I believe the environment I was raised in has matured me to be a hard-working brother and a student.