Undergraduate / 'the second oldest of three children' - PERSONAL STATEMENT [4]

I am new to this forum and reeeaaaalllyyy need some help! I need to submit my application but I really need to edit my personal statement. Any advice is more than welcome!!! Thank you!

--It is a bit personal, but I think that makes it unique and honest.

Here are the requirements for the personal statement:
REQUIRED:Academic History, Major/Career Goals, Cultural Understanding
OPTIONAL: Educational Challenges/Personal Hardships,Community/Volunteer Service, Experiental Learning (Describe your involvement in research, artistic endeavors, and work (paid or volunteer), as they have contributed to your academic, career, or personal goals.

Other Comments
750-1000 words but can be more if you feel like you have more to add.

Well here it goes! Thanks for all of your help!

Growing up as the second oldest of three children to a single mother, I learned to be an independent child whom also strived to discover how and why the things in my environment operated the way they did. Not only was I constantly badgering my mother with never ending "but why?" questions, but I also tried to gather information on my own at any chance I had. Fortunately for my mother, when I started going to school my questions began to decrease and I became more sophisticated in my means of gathering information. As I continued to grow and mature, school became an increasing priority of mine, not only to answer my unbounded questions but also to distract me from my tremulous home life.

As a young child, my father and I had a strong relationship which was built on the foundation of him teaching me the ways in which he understood and respected the natural world. He taught me how to have passion and empathy for everything and everybody around me-no matter what its shape or size or color or physical form may be. Occasionally, I would notice that Daddy acted a little funny after he drank his special water that smelt funny but I never truly understood the depth of the situation. Eventually, I became knowledgeable enough to understand that Daddy's special water was actually vodka and that my father had a drinking problem. During the weekends when I visited my father, I tried to ignore his frequently slurred speech and incoherent sentences initially. However, it became increasingly apparent to me that over the years that my father's drinking habit had severely escalated and it became his routine to drunkenly berate me during my entire stay with him. Because he was my father, I took his cutting words to heart and at the age of eight I decided to end my relationship with him. Around the same time that the relationship between me and my father was becoming ever more unstable, my mother's fiancé began to abuse me sexually, mentally, and emotionally during the evenings when my mother was working. Because I was a young child and unequipped with any coping mechanisms, my feelings of guilt, fear, anxiety, and depression started to physically manifest into frequent panic attacks and I began to withdraw further into myself. I held my secret from my mother for three years before I gathered enough courage to tell her what her fiancé had been doing to me. The truth ripped my family apart and for the next several years my life consisted of chaos and court dates.

As my school work began to increase in intensity, so did my drive to succeed scholastically. Forcing myself to always give the best work I was capable of and constantly striving for improvement gave me outlet to focus my energy and escape the turmoil of my home life. I discovered that excelling in my education gave me a renewed self-confidence and self-worth that I had thought I would never regain. In high school I elected to take as many honors classes that were available to me, in my junior year I participated in Advanced Placement classes, and my senior year I decided to participate in the Running Start program because of the superior educational options that the program allowed.

My relationship with my father remained strained and tenuous as I continued to grow and mature, but I began to understand that his alcoholism was a disease that, try as I might, I could not force him to overcome. While on vacation in Las Vegas, I received a phone call from my estranged grandmother notifying me that my father had passed away in an unfortunate accident where he fell down a flight of stairs and received detrimental brain damage. Although my father and I had grown apart, I was still devastated by his death and struggled to cope with knowing that I could never heal our relationship. In seeing my father struggle through life and fight battles in which I could not aid him in, I developed a great need and desire to help people. As a first step in satisfying this desire, at the age of sixteen I acquired a job as a Nursing Assistant Registered (NAR) taking care of mentally and physically disabled people in an Adult Family Home; a job in which over four years later, I am still happily employed. I also began volunteering in the Special Care Nursery every week at my local hospital; my duty as a "cuddler" consists of me assisting the nurses by the means of stocking supplies, as well as feeding, dressing, cuddling and overall nurturing the underdeveloped, sick, or drug addicted infants before they begin their journey home. Both my job as an NAR and my duty as a volunteer have helped me understand the vast differences in the cultures of individuals and how I need to shape the way I care for people in order to respect the individuals believes and also perform to the best of my ability.

After becoming employed as an NAR, I applied for the Heath Care Services course that was offered through the local hospital in my home town. The class was intended for students who had a desire for a career in medicine and was designed to jump start their path towards that direction. During this class I had the opportunity to learn medical terminology, human anatomy and physiology, job shadow several Registered Nurses in various specialties, and perform multiple dissections of fetal and adult swine. I discovered my intense passion for medicine and the human body as I decided that a medical career would fulfill my desire to help others and sooth my burning need to understand the natural world. Following the opportunity I had to physically watch a cesarean section being performed while I was doing a job shadow in the Child Birth Center at my local hospital, I further discovered that surgery intrigued me with such intensity that any other aspirations of having a career in any other field besides surgery were immediately demolished.

Following the realization the becoming a surgeon was the only career that would allow me to be proud and content, I dove head first into the schooling that would lead me to the path of medical school. I enrolled at Whatcom Community College as a Running Start student and I began taking classes to fulfill the requirements to achieve an Associate's Degree in Biology. After I graduated from high school and my college courses were not being paid for by the Running Start Program, I began to pay for my classes myself from the money I had saved working as a NAR. My mother and step father had decided that I needed to provide my own funds for my education and because they are wealthy business owners, I did not qualify for financial aid.

Having the ability to support all of my needs financially and scholastically has given me a sense of pride and determination to succeed in every class I take. Since beginning my educational path towards a career in medicine, my drive to accomplish my goals has continued to increase in intensity and my dedication to achieve these goals while performing to the best of my ability has also remained unbroken. Since I was a child, I have always strived to give my all in every aspect in my life in order to be the best person I can possibly be. My past has not been the easiest road to travel, but neither has it been the hardest; it has shaped me to be the forgiving and loving person that I am today and has also given me the determination to continue to improve myself and my future. I believe that the University of XXXX can help feed my drive for success and give me a solid foundation for my future career in medicine by helping me continue my journey towards becoming a major in biology graduate. I am also determined to prove that as a hard working, passionate, and driven student I will aptly represent your school.