Who I've Become by Danielle

Who I've Become by Danielle - December 2014 Scholarship Essay

Since I was in elementary school, I’ve known how to fly under the radar. With my parents going through a unpredictable divorce and an adopted teenage sister who seemed to be able to do nothing but find precarious, troublesome paths to walk down, I found myself in my school work. Not only did it give me a distraction, I found that it helped me stay on my parents good side more often than not.

Book work, in addition to being my safe haven, also extended a connection with my father, who I was eager to establish a good relationship with. He ended up at a local community college, once he graduated in the same town I now live in, and always wished to pursue higher education, but was unable to since he was to preserve the family farm that he inherited from his father who was at the time suffering from cancer. My dad and I have many similar interests such as music and mathematics, but have never bonded much emotionally due to the fact that my mother and I left when I was nine. Around that time, my sister decided to run away to her biological family at seventeen.

Now living with my mother, in a house that was no longer a war zone, my academics thrived in middle school, where I became ASB president and had all the opportunities I could ask for. Yet, entering high school was another story. I still loved books but the work no longer came as easily. I realized that I would need to start doing work at home, not just expect the teacher to let us finish it in class. It took me a while to grasp this concept, but once I did my grades in the majority of my classes began to rise.

My home life has never been quite the same as the other kids in my class. At the end of my sophomore year, my sister had an unplanned pregnancy where she then gave birth to my nephew three months premature. He then spent the next few months at the Sacred Heart NICU in Spokane and came home with his mother around my sixteenth birthday. Subsequently, I spent the first couple months, with many late nights and early mornings, now starting my junior year, caring for a new born with a heart condition with my mom and without the assistance of my sister who often came home late at night less than sober.

Fortunately, this situation did nothing but make me strive for success more. I knew that doing homework and studying for calculus tests were what was going to take me out of this small town and into a position of success in the future. Surprisingly, my grades have flourished with the added stress at home and a rigor in curriculum. I know that without my family, however messed up we are, I would not be where I am now. They taught me to never let where you come from allow you to second guess your potential to do great things if you have two things; motivation and the mindset that you can do anything you set your mind to. Education has definitely shaped me in to the person I am today.

I live my life by these words by Barbara Geraci. “Our background and circumstances may have influenced who we are, but we are responsible for who we become.”