Undergraduate / University of Texas - Austin, Transfer Applicant (Important issue - My Mother) [8]

Promprt: Issue of Importance, write about something important to you. This can be personal, social, economical, political, or anything.

Essay:

Issue of Importance - My Mother

My mother has always been the most influential and important person in my life. There are not many things I have not learned solely from her wise words while growing up. I grew up without a father, but I can say that whenever I felt a father's absence, my mother was there every time to take his place. Her efforts on giving me the best she could are something I never in my life have taken for granted, but they are also something I don't think I have duly valued as much as I do today.

As a kid, my mother let me sleep or linger against her chest. She would always tell me the same exact phrase whenever I asked why she couldn't, "Because that's my boo-boo Kevin!" There were times when it would hurt my feelings because the only parent I had could not hold me in her arms, and then as I grew older I realized that it really was her surgery that kept her from holding me all those years. She would show me her scars on occasion, point to them, and say, "This is where they cut me." It was the small things like this which my mother would take the time to explain to me that eventually led me to admire the mother-father status I would see her as.

Seeing her as a mother and father at the same time made my mother the most important person in my life. As I grew older I perceived what my mother exhibited as a person as invincible. She went to work every day without missing a day just to make sure the bills were paid since we had family living with us most of the time, which depleted our income quicker than if it had just been my mother and I. Before work she would always find time to cook me breakfast, and after work dinner. Although I saw her as the invincible super-mom growing up, today I see her differently.

My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer for the second time in the summer of 2008. Her treatments and medical endeavors have given me the unfortunate opportunity of truly understanding the nature of human predisposal to life-threatening diseases. The misconception of her invincibility was now gone; now instead of her catering to me, it was I who had to cater to her every need. I thank my mother for everything she has done for me because had it not been for her efforts I would not be the motivated person I am today. Her life is the most important thing to me, and through the exhausting experience of seeing her with cancer, both physically and mentally, I have learned to value her living much more than when I was a child.

My experiences with my mother while growing up, learning to appreciate her contributions to my quality of life and her ensuring my success, as well as living closely with her through cancer over the past year have led me to assess my mother's health an important issue in my life. She has taught, or given me the opportunity to learn, every moral and a common sense I know about life as I see it today. After coming to the knowledge of the dangers and characteristics cancer exhibits first hand, I realize now only a fraction of what it feels like to see the loss of life in a loved one, and could not bear to see the actual loss of my mother.