The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success.

Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what
did you learn from the experience?

I write this in preparation to complete my fifth year of high school. After seeing every
specialist short of a podiatrist, and being labeled with every vague, unconfirmable diagnosis
from Dysautonomia to IBS, and being medicated for everything from a quack’s version of Lyme
disease to general depression, I cannot be sure what malady kept me bedridden for months to
years at a time. Mine has not been the standard nor the easy path.
Time and again I have fallen prey to ever-present pain that prevented me from rising
from bed, let alone attending class. I spent months of sixth grade in bed and in the hospital,
culminating in in an appendectomy. Despite this, I was able to put my best foot forward and
ranked among the highest applicants to the Liberal Arts and Science Academy (LASA). My
time there was an island of engagement in a sea of bed-ridden idleness. Surrounded by insanely
bright friends and challenging classes, it seemed the sky was the limit. I took classes beyond my
comfort zone, taught myself what I lacked from lost time, stayed up late putting off homework,
and even went to homecoming. For that one year, I felt alive, with a brilliant future laid bare
before my feet.
Sophomore year defeated me. My mysterious illness returned, and no more than a few
weeks into the school year, I began to spend more days in bed than at school, and it seemed that
the harder I fought, the sicker I became. I lay prone under my covers for the better part of that
year, and by the end of it, I was not better. Driven by persistence and denial, I returned to LASA
for nearly a semester of junior year. I was determined to stay and pushed myself far beyond my
physical limits. I broke.
It was over a year and a half before I stepped again into the high school arena. I had
missed too much time, and LASA was lost to me. It shamed me at first to resort to Gonzalo
Garza Independence High School, a school I believed intended for “high risk” students. I soon
learned better. They allowed me to attend one period a day, then two, three, four, and five as
inch by inch, I recovered. In that calm, accepting environment, I healed, and I thrived.
Becoming more ambitious, I stacked up multiple classes to complete in only a few months before
the AP tests, Game Mastered two separate Dungeons and Dragons campaigns, took up archery,
and joined the Principal Student Advisory Cabinet. I over committed too, stubbornly trying for
five hours of competitive fencing a week, triggering a minor relapse. Refusing to walk through
life as a porcelain doll, one misstep short of shattering, I learned to judge my limits and accept
them before they could consume me.
It’s been a long road, and not always one I am proud of. Some days I wish I had never
fallen, never failed, but I think I have finally come to accept this trial being a part of me. Each
step along the way brought me one step closer to who I am. I am a lover of learning, and of math
proofs. I am a nerd that thrives in being challenged and surrounded by similar peers. I am
stubborn with the fierce determination to push through pain and hardship. I am human with the
humility to face failure and to find a new way to move forward.
I turn my eyes now to a new adventure, a road away from the safety of home, a path that
both terrifies and exhilarates me. I know it will hold more trials of its own, but when I look
back, I know that I am prepared to face the future and whatever comes next.