So like it states this is a paper I had to write for class and I actually like it, and i haven't posted anything in like forever. so i hope I get an A.



What has made me into the person I am.


Have you ever heard the term: “When life hands you lemon, make lemonade.”? Well that is pretty much the story of my life. Although I have yet to make “lemonade”, I feel I am finally on my way. I have had many downfalls in my life that have set me off track. Not only a track others set for me, but a track I set myself on many years ago. Of course as everyone knows, low times come with high times, eventually. I guess the easiest way to explain this would be to tell you about my school years; Elementary, Middle, and High school.

I first need to give you about a few people that influenced my life growing up. These particular others included my parents, teachers and friends. When I was young I was raised with the concept that I could be whatever I wanted to be when I grew up, including a stripper. In my early years of education, I didn’t pay much attention to school. Don’t get me wrong, I was interested in learning; I just had other things on my mind than focusing on what some stranger had to tell me. I had a mother that was at home everyday dying of cancer and still trying to raise a family to the best of her abilities. Between radiation and chemo, it was hard not to hate the world.

To hide her fear of dying, she took my brother and me on several vacations to Disney and Cancun; we even went on a cruise. But that is no way to raise two children under the age of 10. But she did try to raise us to respect ourselves and other, and always put others first. Her major fault in her teaching was not letting her kids be kids. It was our job to talk care of her and make sure she had what she needed. My dad was around, but he was her source of income. But neither of them prepared my brother or me for the reality of the situation; my mother was going to die.

She finally did die the summer between my 3rd and 4th grade years in school. This was hard on my brother, being 10, and me, being about to turn 9, but we made it thru. The worst part was that my brother wanted empathy and there was no one to give him that. Not too many people lose a parent and such a young age, and if they do they don’t remember enough to help. Needless to say, we weren’t much of a family after that. My dad became friends with this woman that eventually became his wife and my brother became the family favorite. I was left in the back, away from everything and everyone, to do as I pleased.

It wasn’t until middle school that I started acting out. It wasn’t and extreme rebellion or anything like that, I just observed my brother and tried to be more like him. I wanted my dad to love me again, because it was like he hadn’t for so long. This is why I joined the football team and was in that stereotype, tomboy. I hated that word; it just proved that people didn’t really know me and that people didn’t want to get to know me.

In high school, I finally started to become my own person. This was in large part due to support I had from the few friends I had made in middle school and some of the teachers I had that encouraged me to be my own person. I also learned why my dad and his wife never seemed to like me as much as my brother. This theory I thought of with my own cognitive complexity and it surprised my entire family. The worst part is that it was true. My dad hated me because I reminded him too much of my mother. For some reason, he just couldn’t deal with that.

It makes sense why I would be like her; she was my idol. I prayed everyday that someday I could be even half the woman that she was. She had a drive like I had never seen; a drive to live. The friends I made in high school let me see that it’s okay to be whoever I wanted to be. The communication between my friends and I, opposed to my family and I, was so open and refreshing. They actually wanted to get to know me and not who my family wanted me to be.

When I finally voiced my opinions to my family, about why they hate me so much, they somewhat agreed and they still do. This is why after I graduated, with honors (a personal goal of mine); they waited about a week before they threw me out. Right now I am learning what it is like to be a person in the “real world” and how hard it is to worry about work, school and maintaining your sanity. I don’t have a lot of feedback from my parents, and I don’t think I really want it. They have had their say in every aspect of my life for almost 19 years and that just made me want to kill myself.

My family influenced me to be like them, and blend in; my teachers and friends to me to be me and live my own life. Where I fit and what I am doing, I don’t entirely know yet, but for right now I am happy. I am going to school, with a man that I love more than I ever knew I could, and finally doing something with my life. I finally don’t need everyone’s approval, just my own. This is a reflection of my life because every stage changed me: elementary, middle and high school. So even though life gave me “lemons”, and I mean a lot of lemons, I’m finally making my own “lemonade”.



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as of January 15th, Alex and I are engaged!!