What Kind of Doctor Are You? by Allyson

What Kind of Doctor Are You? by Allyson - June 2017 Scholarship Essay

For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to be a doctor. One year for Halloween I was Doctor Hardin. At age six, I really had no idea what being a doctor truly entailed, but I saw the doctors around me and knew I wanted to be like them. I saw the way they helped people, and I wanted to be able to do that. Around that age, I also grew to love anatomy through the strange experience of “dissecting” fish. When my grandfather would finish filleting the fish he caught, he would let my sister and me look at them. We would examine each organ and try to determine what it was. Being six or seven, we were probably wrong most of the time, but this experience truly sparked my love for anatomy. Therefore, while I didn’t really understand exactly what being a doctor meant, I have always wanted to be one.
In middle school, I started to think more about what kind of doctor I wanted to be. I was overwhelmed with a number of fields I could go into. I knew I did not want to be a podiatrist, optometrist, or something similar. I wanted to work with the inside of the body. This was when I began to think of pediatric oncology. You see, when I was three, I was diagnosed with neuroblastoma. I underwent surgery and chemo, and by age four, I was cancer free. While I do not remember much of that time, I remember the doctors and nurses. I remember that even though I did not want to be in the hospital, the doctors and nurses did all they could to make me feel better. They went to extra lengths to make me feel comfortable in the hospital. Small things like calling the CT-scan a donut (and rewarding me with donuts if I did well) or giving me “magic cream” so the shots didn’t hurt made potentially scary procedures fun or at least less scary. Now, I want to be like that. I want to be able to help kids get healthy again. I want to help comfort parents through this awful time.
Now, in high school, oncology is still my main dream, but I am also interested in psychology. This past school year, I took an anatomy class, and during the section on the nervous system, I became very interested in the brain and the way it works. I find it very interesting how the brain analyzes problems, how it reacts to issues, and how it can be changed in reaction to circumstances. For example, I find it fascinating that stereotypes such as the idea that blue is a boy’s color can be so deeply ingrained in a person that he doesn’t really take into account that it is a stereotype. This is why I have an interest in psychology. I would love to study more on this subject. If I choose this field, I would be able to help others through difficult circumstances. I would probably want to work with people that have mental issues - such as PTSD, depression, anxiety, or anorexia - or in the hospital comforting patients who have just received awful news.
As I go to college in the fall of 2018, I will most likely enroll as a pre-med major. I am required to take some psychology courses for that major, and that will help me decide if I will switch majors or not. I have also thought of majoring in pre-medicine and minoring in psychology. That way, I get the best of both worlds. Either way, I want to help people. I know that either field will be difficult, especially emotionally, but I plan to work hard and do my best to help others in any way I can.