madisonraex
Sep 3, 2013
Undergraduate / When I was two and a half, my parents divorced; Story central to identity - Common App [2]
I'm really hoping for some substantial critique; We're required to submit the essays to our English teacher before we submit the app, but given the content of my essay I thought it would be more beneficial for me to take critique from a complete stranger as opposed to someone I see and interact with daily.
"Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story."
When I was two and a half, my parents divorced. In years since, I've witnessed the reasoning behind their split: my father was an abusive, binge alcoholic. A binge alcoholic is not the type of alcoholism known to most. Binge alcoholics involve themselves in family life, in society, in the workplace, for months at a time-and just when you believe that they are overcoming the disease, they disappear for days and return reeking of alcohol and shame.
I remember two years later, leaving my home, grandparents, and friends, to live in Massachusetts with my mom's boyfriend, which required a plane ride so long that "Barney's Greatest Hits, Volume 2" needed to be turned over and replayed four times. I remember, less than a year later, my excitement at the arrival of my grandma and being whisked away, back to Evansville, and leaving my pregnant mother behind. In the years following, looking back on my four-year-old self, that "version" of Madison was who I aspired to be. She was content; the dysfunction around her did not threaten to dim her light.
Upon my mother's return from Massachusetts, we moved into our current home. My parents soon got back together. My half-brother was born. My parents never married. They lived together for twelve more years in a cycle: Peace. Tension. Argument. The "Blow-Up." Dad's disappearance. Then Mom's frantic search for Dad, leaving me and my younger brother alone to worry until her return. This cycle took roughly two years to complete, segmented by domestic violence on account of my father and numerous, infrequent prison stays. From age five to seventeen, this cycle completed itself approximately six times. For five times, my mother allowed the cycle to continue. My freshman year of high school made Five.
We sat outside of school inside my mom's car, her looking at me with a mixture of concern and firmness, me crying and clinging to my US History poster decorated with fabricated World War I-era newspaper clippings, which my group was relying on me to bring for the day's presentation. I remember myself repeating something along the lines of "I can't," through tears. The previous night my father left after an argument.
There had been tension welling in the house for months and my father sat in our living room, uninvolved in our lives, staring blankly at the TV. I, the once-subordinate child, confronted him. He made a snide comment to which I responded by crying and, of course, my mother sprung to my defense. The evening ended with my mother expelling my father from the house, and I sobbing unceasingly about the man who betrayed my brother, mother, and I.
My father returned one last time during my sophomore year of high school. During my junior year he left voluntarily and by Christmas, my mother was in a happy, healthy relationship with a long-lost friend from her senior year of high school. Almost a year has passed and I've never seen her happier.
My world has changed immensely in the past two years; however, my mother's comment in the car that morning is the piece of advice that I can truly say will stick with me for the rest of my life. In trying to coax me into leaving the car for school, she echoed the motto I'd once adhered to and since forgotten amidst the emotional turmoil surrounding my home: "You can't let anyone determine your emotions, only you have that control; so why don't you choose happiness?"
Although my life has been forever altered, the change in me is not only the fact that I've gained resiliency, strength, and independence; I've committed myself to positivity. While today's world may consider a positive attitude a sign of naivety, my experience allows me to consider it instead a positive consequence of struggle-a sign of strength.
I'm really hoping for some substantial critique; We're required to submit the essays to our English teacher before we submit the app, but given the content of my essay I thought it would be more beneficial for me to take critique from a complete stranger as opposed to someone I see and interact with daily.
"Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story."
When I was two and a half, my parents divorced. In years since, I've witnessed the reasoning behind their split: my father was an abusive, binge alcoholic. A binge alcoholic is not the type of alcoholism known to most. Binge alcoholics involve themselves in family life, in society, in the workplace, for months at a time-and just when you believe that they are overcoming the disease, they disappear for days and return reeking of alcohol and shame.
I remember two years later, leaving my home, grandparents, and friends, to live in Massachusetts with my mom's boyfriend, which required a plane ride so long that "Barney's Greatest Hits, Volume 2" needed to be turned over and replayed four times. I remember, less than a year later, my excitement at the arrival of my grandma and being whisked away, back to Evansville, and leaving my pregnant mother behind. In the years following, looking back on my four-year-old self, that "version" of Madison was who I aspired to be. She was content; the dysfunction around her did not threaten to dim her light.
Upon my mother's return from Massachusetts, we moved into our current home. My parents soon got back together. My half-brother was born. My parents never married. They lived together for twelve more years in a cycle: Peace. Tension. Argument. The "Blow-Up." Dad's disappearance. Then Mom's frantic search for Dad, leaving me and my younger brother alone to worry until her return. This cycle took roughly two years to complete, segmented by domestic violence on account of my father and numerous, infrequent prison stays. From age five to seventeen, this cycle completed itself approximately six times. For five times, my mother allowed the cycle to continue. My freshman year of high school made Five.
We sat outside of school inside my mom's car, her looking at me with a mixture of concern and firmness, me crying and clinging to my US History poster decorated with fabricated World War I-era newspaper clippings, which my group was relying on me to bring for the day's presentation. I remember myself repeating something along the lines of "I can't," through tears. The previous night my father left after an argument.
There had been tension welling in the house for months and my father sat in our living room, uninvolved in our lives, staring blankly at the TV. I, the once-subordinate child, confronted him. He made a snide comment to which I responded by crying and, of course, my mother sprung to my defense. The evening ended with my mother expelling my father from the house, and I sobbing unceasingly about the man who betrayed my brother, mother, and I.
My father returned one last time during my sophomore year of high school. During my junior year he left voluntarily and by Christmas, my mother was in a happy, healthy relationship with a long-lost friend from her senior year of high school. Almost a year has passed and I've never seen her happier.
My world has changed immensely in the past two years; however, my mother's comment in the car that morning is the piece of advice that I can truly say will stick with me for the rest of my life. In trying to coax me into leaving the car for school, she echoed the motto I'd once adhered to and since forgotten amidst the emotional turmoil surrounding my home: "You can't let anyone determine your emotions, only you have that control; so why don't you choose happiness?"
Although my life has been forever altered, the change in me is not only the fact that I've gained resiliency, strength, and independence; I've committed myself to positivity. While today's world may consider a positive attitude a sign of naivety, my experience allows me to consider it instead a positive consequence of struggle-a sign of strength.
