Paving the way through Nursing by Emily

Paving the way through Nursing by Emily - February 2024 Scholarship Essay

Desolate, gloomy, atrocious, and bleak. It's what I see when I step out of my aging trailer park home. Where I’m from, poverty is just around the corner, and what a lot of people take for granted isn’t always achievable for us. One of the major things I envied about other people as a child was their accessibility to receiving quality healthcare. Far too often have I seen people hesitant to receive medical care because of its horrendous conditions and unavailability, which eventually brings upon an accumulation of medical complications.

In one case, I had to witness the slow perishing of a neighbor. My neighbor, who had the same tan skin color as me with long black hair, found out she had cancer too late to do anything about it. When my grandmother informed me about this at the age of 8, I thought the doctors must have made a mistake. She was one of the strongest people I knew. With the continuing responsibility of feeding her family even while fighting for her life, she’d wake up before the crack of dawn, laced up in her Sketcher's shoes, ready for her 12-hour shift in a medicine factory. The signs proving her time was unjustly being snatched from her began in waves. Her once-tan face, full of life, became pale and yellow. Her plump red cheeks and black hair were withering away. And then the day came when she didn’t wake up. That period of my life was eye-opening. Our neighborhood, a family of immigrants from numerous Latin American countries, couldn't even properly mourn her. With the constant notion of having to work to live, we went by with our lives. This infuriated me. I thought to myself, “If only she had discovered it sooner. If only she could afford to get regular check-ups. If only there were providers who understood her situation and cared for her." This brought upon my desire to become a nurse. I’ve selected the major nursing to help advocate for those in underserved communities; To break down that barrier many low-income communities face.

In addition to witnessing those around me, my aspiration to become a nurse also emerged from my family and our financial hardships. For us, going to a hospital or a clinic, even just for a yearly checkup, wasn't something we could afford. In instances where we could afford it, we’d often get belittled by our providers for not “caring” enough about our health because if we did, we would get check-ups more regularly. In other cases, when we could afford it, it was often in an underfunded hospital with low supplies and few workers, so the care wasn’t always the best quality. Seeing the distress in my mother's face for not being able to provide quality care for me and my siblings caused me pain as a child, and my dream of becoming a nurse became concreted within my heart. Nursing will help me aid those in need and overcome the obstacles many underserved communities face so that people won’t have to face the same situations as my neighbor and mother.