Undergraduate /
When I was young I dreamed of running feet. My story [3]
Prompt:
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.I don't like my conclusion at all- I would appreciate some help please!!! :) :) Thank you!
When I was young I dreamed of running feet.
Two pairs of them, the figures of my cousin and I leaping and bounding over the hills in our backyard. A fuzzy blur of trees in full bloom appears as we speed by, a mini roller coaster drop occurs in our stomachs when we stumble down a hill, the wind blows tangles of hair into my face, and there's the soft crunch of grass beneath my feet.
When you tell a story it's like giving away a piece of yourself. I need to say the words to tell what others are too afraid to ask, even after time wants to keep them quiet after it has scabbed the wounds over, the scars that remain have sculpted who I am today.
Disabled. The word sounds so discouraging. It's a word applied to other people, people who got into accidents, people who have lost something. To claim to be that was the pure antithesis of everything I wanted to do.
When I woke in that hospital I was still running. Only this time in the hospital room there was a table that stood over the bed. I can still recall the excruciating pain when I slammed my freshly operated leg into the underside. My mother, sleeping on the couch next to me was startled out of sleep to my screams, trying to explain deliriously that I'd had a dream.
I lost my leg just days after finishing first grade in the beginning of June. It was 8 days after my 7th birthday. It was the single event that changed my life.
It's something that I still find difficult to talk about, but I can tell you. I can tell you about the identical scars that run up my legs, left behind by doctors searching for viable veins to replace my crushed popliteal artery, I could tell you about blood clots, about aspirin and so many shots the holes wouldn't stop bleeding, the visceral stinging that comes with hundreds of IV's, and the tape doctors put over skin grafts. I could talk about shattered knees, and broken bones, about thick swathes of bandages I was wrapped in, hallucinations brought on by vile tasting medicine, and how doctors looked at you behind their masks.
It's so much easier to speak of the good things.
I replace those painful things with stories of motherly nurses, dozens of stuffed animals, hundreds of letters sent by children I'd never even met before, going outside for the first time in months, my dad- completely exhausted- sleeping in the tiny couch next to my bed for weeks on end, seeing my siblings for the first time in weeks, and walking for my first second time.
Both are true, but there's only one I would consider saying to absolute strangers.
It's harder, though, to talk about the pride I feel when doing simple tasks like running or jumping without pain. Two years of physical therapy and endless frustration culminating in others not even noticing my disability without visual confirmation.
These events have shaped my life, and I know without them I would never have been the same person that I am today. Through my disability I found a passion for reading, languages, and history. The hardships that I've encountered have made me a better person and increased my resolve to finish the things I start.
We've all experienced some sort of tragedy in our lives, but at a certain point you stop conceptualizing it as a tragedy. After the pain has gone numb and the wound has scarred over we become content with our struggles and regard them as something that makes us different. Something that makes us more worldly, and better in touch with our empathy so that we can sympathize with others going through much worse. Our struggles are what defines us, draws us together, and makes us human.
