"Anorexia is not an illness of the body; it is an illness of the mind." Quoted by Lynn Crilly. Anorexia nervosa. Two words when by themselves, are troubling enough, yet once put together, can cause chills and dishearten any individual. Described as an eating disorder causing individuals to obsess over their weight and what they eat, I have been struggling with anorexia nervosa my whole life and my youngest memory associated with it was the day my pediatrician had told me I was on my way to becoming morbidly obese, and if not fixed, can eventually lead to death. It was then when I had started to worry about my weight, and began to lose the pounds, and while everyone was praising me for how fast I was losing the weight, they would not have been praising the way I was losing it if they had known the truth. I do not think anyone has heard of a 10-year-old on an exercise bike for 6 hours a day, and only drinking sparkling water to feel full and not eat as much, yet that was me. At 10 years old I was not outside playing freeze tag games with my friends, at 10 years old the only games I were playing were the game, "how many calories are in one bite of this apple?", the game, "if I were to exercise 3 hours before school and 3 hours after school how much weight would I lose today?", and eventually once I had lost all the weight, my anorexia nervosa had become an unhealthy obsession of control. Whenever I had felt no control in my life, if the world were against me, I would resort to my anorexia nervosa as comfort, thinking I would feel better starving myself, not eating, having control of my weight since I have no control over anything else; at least I had control in that, even if it was extremely harmful. Throughout my journey of being treated for my mental health conditions, I was shown the utmost respect and care from healthcare professionals, specifically, my nurses throughout many ER trips of attempts at harming myself. This experience with numerous ER trauma nurses has helped shape my career aspirations, resulting in me attending Goodwin College pursuing a bachelor's degree in nursing in hopes of becoming an ER trauma nurse, to extend the same care the nurses had shown me onto others when I become a nurse. What had stuck out to me the most, were the way the nurses had shown kindness to a complete stranger, showing kindness to someone who had no intentions of wanting to live on this Earth, kindness to someone who would scream and throw things at them for simply wanting to cure me and help me eat more; kindness to a stranger because of the passion they had for their job. Those nurses were the majority of the reason why I had chosen to not fall deeper into the clutches of anorexia nervosa, yet rather become better, and became the person I am today.

My goal of pursuing a career in STEM has been heavily supported and fueled by my grandmother, who is also a mother to me, Carmen Rosa Rodriguez. For her name and story should have higher importance than mine and be outlined because I would not be the woman I am today because of her. The positive impact she has given to me throughout my whole life despite hardships we have faced such as choices of helping me with school or paying the light bill for the month, deciding if she should continue to work even at an old age to attempt to help with my education, and even staying up late when I was a child to help me with homework despite having a grueling 12-hour shift as a CNA; my grandmother had shown me that despite the hardships coming hand-in-hand being a first-generation, the benefits and reward outweigh any possible risk. While I am very grateful for my grandmother Carmen for the positive impact she has made on me to continue pursuing my STEM passion and being the best version of myself, I am also aware of the saddening fact not everyone had the same support system. Through a career in STEM, I intend to positively impact the world by creating a support system, an organization where families can be assisted themselves and their children who had the same dream as my grandmother, to provide a better life for the generations to come. I believe we can all come to the consensus, no matter what someone's race or belief may be, that this is a wish shared across every single individual in the world. Through proceeds of my own accord after graduating and achieving a career in the STEM industry, I plan to start and name this organization, "Support Throughout the Nations." Providing covering education costs, or bills associated with education for any family in any country, and would hope to involve other contributors with a similar accordance of my own, having gone through the same hardships associated with not having enough money for education, in order for the pool of assistance to widen in hopes of reaching not hundreds, yet millions of families across the world. What good derives from continuing the cycle I myself and others have gone through in terms of affording education? No good at all, which is why we should all stand together, and contribute to organizations such as what I had outlined and families in order to make the world a better place. Thank you for taking the time to read my essay, and I would love to extend the upmost greatest thanks and appreciation to my grandmother Carmen Rosa Rodriguez once more, and for all the Carmen Rosa Rodriguezs' around the world.

In order to make the special people in my life feel loved, I let them know they are appreciated. Now, anyone can buy a present on someone's birthday, wish them a happy birthday or even a happy new year, yet in my opinion, appreciation is the best way to make people in your life feel loved. "Don't forget, a person's greatest emotional need is to feel appreciated." Quoted by H. Jackson Brown Jr. Extending appreciation beyond thank you's and more into outwardly thanking them for all the hard work they do for us, whether through non-verbal or verbal means, can strengthen our bonds and form a lovely attachment. Whether it be showing your grandmother she is appreciated for cooking for you every night so you cook her dinner for once, or showing your partner they are appreciated for supporting you through college so you plan an amazing date night to show your appreciation and devotion. These acts of reinforcing your appreciation for someone will show them how much you love them, without just telling them, and is one of the most greatest emotional needs a person needs. Without appreciation, how do we know how someone feels about us? How someone loves us? Without appreciation, how do we know what we are doing for someone is right? Without appreciation, all the hard work we do for someone, at times, we can feel not appreciated taking an mental toll on us. When was the last time you showed appreciation to your guardian for taking care of you? Appreciation is one of the greatest gifts you can give to someone in your life to make them feel loved.

When thinking of happiness, and what may seem to make one happy, many thoughts of course must come to ones mind first and foremost; thoughts such as family, their passion, their career, their hobbies and even favorite TV shows. While we can all agree those thoughts come to our mind first when asked the source of our happiness, yet I would like to detail another source of happiness which comes second nature to us; the happiness of the 'little things', or 'simple things' one may call. One may wonder what the 'things' in 'little things' refer to, those little things being unique to everyone yet a general consensus of seeing the smile on their lovers face, seeing a friend after a long time, the feeling of getting into bed after a long day, the feeling of stepping outside on a nice spring day and the feeling of waking up everyday knowing you're still alive. As far the little things in which make me happy; seeing the smile on my grandfathers face when I bring him cans to recycle to help with money, the comfort ice cream provides me after a long day at work, the satisfaction of hitting the submit button after completing an assignment which I put my all into and donating shoes and clothes back to my community knowing it was a little thing which brought me happiness when I was little. Happiness is unique and comes in many forms for everyone, yet we can all agree, what makes us the happiest are all the little things we don't think twice about.

Something I have learned about myself in the past which I have found valuable is the strong empathy I feel for those around me, despite if the individual in question is known to me or not, and in my opinion, the world we live in currently with the state of affairs it is in, needs empathy. With more empathy in this world, an numerous amount of suffering can end. Understanding what an individual may be feeling helps me respond appropriately to the situation, showing the person they are heard, their feelings are noted and respected despite if their may be physical or mental differences between us, the best thing a person can ask for, is their feelings to be heard, to be understood. The traits of an empath consist of what was noted above, as well as an innate feeling of kindness and compassion extended even to strangers, connecting with individuals easy, being able to relate to any type of individual, being an natural healer, a natural shoulder to cry on and nurturing others. Upon finding this out, I had made it a goal of mine in my life to not shy away from my empathetic side, yet embrace it, and include this trait in my daily life, seeing as it does more harm than good to friends and strangers alike. There may be times where I am ridiculed for it being called, 'sensitive' or even an 'crybaby,' yet those words do not phase me due to the fact the benefit and rewards outweigh harmless ridicule. Referring back to my introduction, the world needs more empathy, being an key tool to cultural reset and transformation across the world, for the better.

Throughout my whole life, it was no secret I was going to become the first generation college student in my family, prevalent at an early age with my grandmother and grandfather, and even older brother, purchasing me high school level education books for me to study being 8 years old. Throughout the years, I have seen the push, the urgency, the passion in me becoming the first was my grandparents hopes of me not having to go through the same hardships they had so young, wishing they had went to college, and the positive impact they had shown me throughout my whole life regarding to my education, has only made me work harder and appreciate the all they had done for me to have a better life. Seeing the positive impact they had made on my life, their hard work resulting in me almost being done with my prerequisites for my bachelor degree nursing program with a grade point average of 3.67, all while maintaining a full-time job; makes me want to give others that same positive impact in hopes of giving them what my grandparents gave me. My positive impact on the world while pursuing my college degree, will include of volunteering through an numerous amount of programs throughout my community, more specifically to name one, through the Big Brothers Big Sisters of America program. Being a big sister to an younger individual from my community means the world to me seeing as how much of an positive impact my big brother has been; showing someone else the same qualities he had exhibit onto me will push my future little sibling to follow in the same steps as me. To show someone no matter what is going on in life, no matter what they may go through, they can always keep going and end up successful. In my community, there seems to be a cycle, a rather abusive cycle to say the least, which I see countless kids go through and even if it means having 20+ younger siblings through the program, I'd rather sacrifice my time to give my devotion to those younger kids to stop the said cycle, and enrich their lives. Once I make an positive impact on the lives of these future younger siblings, they will start a new cycle, one where they'll take what I teach them, and once they grow up, adopt a younger sibling as well, and spreading the positive impact I had dawned onto them and soon enough, said positive impact reaching around the world. I believe making a positive impact on the children and youth of our community, and the children to do so in their own communities around the world once they are grown, will shape our future for the better, as children are the future.