Emergency rooms are full of emotion. Sometimes the happy family of a newborn baby. Sometimes the loss of a family member or friend. But in one particular patient I saw something different. A teenage girl who sat in a bed accompanied by her sister and father, showed no emotion at all. She sat upright in her bed, staring straight forward, expressionless. I asked a few of the other RN's what had happened and their reply was simple, "school fight". They didn't seem uneasy about the girl's situation as I did. I approached the blonde girl with a puffy lip, and a bruised eye, and asked her what happened. She stared blankly for a moment then opened her mouth; no words came out...tears welled in her eyes. The girl's father spoke to me in private. The girl had been blacked out, choked, and beaten in the school bathroom. I cleaned up her cuts and iced her bruises; she barely flinched. I knew something else was wrong, I just didn't know what. Attack victims often have security issues and feel the need to always be around someone after their attack. They feel scared when they are alone, and feel nervously paranoid. I pulled the girl aside. I could see the sadness within her eyes and we just sat in silence...then she spoke. She said "it hurts" and put her hand on her chest. I asked the girl if she had been hit there and she replied "no, my heart hurts." The tears began to well up again. The only thing I could do was hold her. I just wanted to make her feel safe again. Tears ran down her face as she hysterically told me her best friend and boyfriend of two years cheated on her. She said the worst part wasn't that he cheated but was that the girl who had done this to her was his new girlfriend. She waited and waited for him to come down the hallway to come see if she was okay, but he never showed. He never even called. The girl who had found herself so happy at the beach a few days earlier with a guy that she trusted with her life and heart now felt so depressed, betrayed, and alone. I, Amber Patchell, was physically assaulted. April 2009 nine was the hardest month of my life. I felt like life wasn't worth living anymore. I felt that if maybe I took my own life, maybe then he'd miss me. My amazing family stuck right by me every step of the way. And for that, I thank them for making my life worth living again. Today September 25, 2009 I am a stronger person and have the strength and determination to make it through anything. I did not let this "bump in the road" end my life, instead it allowed me to live my life with the knowledge that I am as strong as I allow myself to be.
Wow.
This girl was me.
This was a really good story.
The part about overcoming this "bump" should be extended and more detailed because it offers a shakey conclusion.
This girl was me.
You lose me here. Are you saying that the nurse scenario was made up and that you actually were the girl in the story? Or, are you saying that you identified with her so strongly that you confused her terrible physical trauma with your own past heartbreak? Or, were you actually attacked too? Clarify this however you can.
Do you like this version better?(the bold is the only difference)
My brain is fried! Thanks for your help & opinions.
llamapoop, nice username btw, this is the prompt
If there has been some obstacle or "bump in the road," in your academic or personal life, please explain the circumstances.
does that clear up any confusion or do you think I still should fix it? And thank you!
Sorry, your draft doesn't cut it for me.
I understand your opening as willfully deceiving for dramatic effect (i.e. the girl was literally you). I rather like it.
You can't fabricate the version of events while writing in first person though.
As you say "I", the reader is putting their unqualified trust in whatever you say. Violating that trust is painful for your reader be it in a certain genre of book or movie where it is accepted practice, or in this essay where it isn't.
Fortunately, this problem can be remediated by removing all direct links which establish the arbitrary circumstances as emanating from your perspective, in favor of obscure references that allow you wiggle room to refuse ownership of those accounts and descriptions.
Now, assuming I've been so far correct, you want to be especially careful in describing yourself as you evaluate the girl through whatever pretense. Identity consists of the spontaneous component and reflective component which double checks your beingness and actions. Cruelty, shallowness or inconsideration, it will be doubly magnified. Disparity resulting from ingenuity or a disorder of the mind may lead your reader to assume you are clever, afflicted with mental disorder, or both.
If you manage to address these issues, consider also addressing the more serious problems:
- You're what, 17 or 18 or 19 now..?.. meaning the relationship was benign. That hurts your credibility when you confess quasi suicide contemplations over it. It reflects poorly on your judgment that two years was inadequate for the purpose of knowing the guy in any meaningful sense. You sound asinine explaining that it hurt more because he left you for your friend. Supposedly battered, enough to warrant a hospital trip, you are all the while waiting and hoping that the bloke will come down the hall to offer a show of support..?
On the whole, you'll pardon me for judging you on the basis of this essay as mentally unstable, shallow, insecure, immature, and deceptive. etc. etc.
I don't know what some people here think...
If someone who doesn't even review essays regularly can detects lies, embellishments, exaggerations, whatever euphemism floats your boat, how do you think it will fare in the hands of a jaded admissions officer?
Keep the literary device for your new essay or a future essay in college, and toss out the rest.
Do not lie. Do not write anything that presents you in an unfavorable light. Do not write about events that are irrelevant in the context of this essay, however central they may be otherwise.
Actually, I think the second guideline covers most or all undesirable elements. Of course, it's circular to tell an irrational person to avoid things that aren't rational; how would they judge?
Amber,
You are a strong writer. A very strong writer. But the topic does nothing for you. I have to agree with Mustafa here ... the topic doesn't put you in a good light. It shows you as vulnerable instead of a good candidate for admission. I know that this pain went deep and it probably did affect your grades, but the "bump in the road" essay isn't the place to tell the college about your pitfalls, but to offer up any extenuating circumstances that would explain a lower-than-expected GPA, an ACT score of 14 the first time you took the test, or other blips on your paper record. If this breakup did negatively affect your GPA, you can explain it, but there still has to be a deeper redemption. If I were sitting on an admissions committee, I'd be very reluctant to admit you with this essay. I would worry that you'd fall in love, suffer a break up, and then fall apart on campus--especially without the support of your family.
While your writing shows skill, the biggest problem is that is doesn't fit the purpose.
Yes even I thought that the sudden shift in person is quite ineffective.
As a reader, I was lead to believe that you, as the narrator, were a nurse or doing some level of work at the hospital. You then go on to discuss the consultation, and then suddenly, you are the battered girl. The transition is not a very powerful one and quite unnecessary as well.
I cleaned up her cuts and iced her bruises; she barely flinched. I knew something else was wrong, I just didn't know what.
^From that sentence for example, I could be lead to believe that you as a nurse of some kid cleaned the battered girl up. Now, that I have finished reading your essay, I really do not know if you cleaned yourself up, by yourself, or whether a nurse did it and you are just narrating your essay from the nurse's viewpoint.
Also, did you really not know what else was wrong?
In my opinion, I think that the introduction is a bit overly dramatic. The essay topic itself, does appear to be quite weak. Noto and Mustafa pretty much say why.
what would you suggest i change? i really need help!
I would not include "Today September 25, 2009". I would just write "today".
Send 27 cattle and a mare. I'll have an essay at your behest that an admissions officer will fawn over.
Change the essay so the first part is in the first person. Then, replace your current conclusion, where you switch into the first person, with deeper reflections on what you learned from this experience.
