Important of Education for me by PAUL

Important of Education for me by PAUL - November 2020 Scholarship Essay

Type 1 diabetes hit me like a truck. No warning, no prevention, no cure, and, as a result, no hope. I distanced myself from school, responsibilities, and healthiness, while my motivation to work hard for anything faltered.
Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks insulin producing beta cells in the pancreas. Insulin is a hormone needed to regulate sugar and carbohydrate use in the bloodstream for the creation of ATP for energy. Right now, there is no cure. It was hard to work on anything without diabetes getting in the way. Simple things like doing math homework would become drawn out fatigued tasks or, oppositely, I would be too energized to focus my attention. I was very much someone who wanted complete control over situations, but this disease took that away from me. I wanted to reclaim that control by taking charge of this problem and not letting it control my path in life. I had all these interests in engineering and biology, and diabetes gave me an outlet and a path to focus those into a meaningful career in biomedical engineering.
I realized I was in a unique position to make a difference because I had diabetes myself, which would only drive me further to find solutions to the many existing problems with diabetes. I immediately wanted to make an impact, so I became a junior advocate for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) and participated in walks and other charity events to both raise money for research and distribute supplies for low income diabetics. Many families cannot afford insulin pumps and sensors, let alone insulin itself, with the average annual cost for treatment around $18,000. This is something I hope to improve in the future by creating long-lasting and more affordable pumps. The biggest step for me is getting a college education, since there is only so much, I can do right now with how hard it is to convince Congress to increase insurance spending for diabetics.
There are many differences that could be made to the technology and medicine itself to make it easier to give diabetics what they need. As previously mentioned, insulin pumps and sensors are expensive technology that must be replaced at least twice a week. I want to make important improvements like longer lasting pump sites and higher capacity insulin cartridges at an overall cheaper cost to make pumps a universal commodity; something it is far from right now. Amputations are also a huge problem for both type 1 and 2 diabetics. I have always had a huge interest in cybernetics, so even investing my time into the failsafe for diabetics would be well worth it by creating limbs that function better than our natural ones. The worst-case scenario for diabetics is they become amputees and still must deal with diabetes with no concrete solutions for either.
Part of me is thankful for getting diabetes. It has given me an excuse to pursue my love for engineering and solving problems. It taught me lessons of perseverance and directing bad moments into something meaningful. As much as I grieved in the moment, I finally found appreciation for where it has gotten me.