Friday, 8:15 AM. Freshman year. I’m sitting in the car with my mom on a dark and dreary day in Springdale, Arkansas. Tears stream down my face as I gasp and sob and beg her not to make me go into the unassuming red-brick building. “I can’t,” I repeated over and over again, my hands shaking and legs bouncing against the floor of the car. “Please Mom, can I just stay home again today?” Sometimes, she’d dejectedly say yes, frustrated that her daughter, someone who had been so outgoing just three years prior, before the move, would be so anxious about simply going into school. Three days later when Monday came around, I wasn’t as lucky with my pleading. I walked through the chilled halls with flickering fluorescent lights beating down on me and hid in the bathroom before first period. There, I felt safe - an escape from feeling the agonizing sting of perceived social rejection. I hadn’t cracked the social barrier between my peers and I, and I figured it was too late. This became routine: feeling like my existence was not relevant to the lives of the people around me. When freshman year ended, we moved again. This time, I wasn’t filled with anxiety; I was the happiest I’d been in years. I was back home, where people saw me. I had stayed in contact with my old friends through social media, and I felt a new sense of motivation accompanying the warm embrace of belonging that awaited me. Over the next year, I joined a plethora of clubs searching for my fit. I found meaningful things to fill my time and provide a sense of purpose during my high school career. I joined the yearbook staff, enjoying the communication skills I gained through interacting with new people for interviews. I was also given the opportunity to make close friendships with other staff members, expanding my web of support and safety I’d spun since returning to this safe place. One September morning, I sat in class, engaged in seemingly mundane conversation with my classmates, but it meant more than that to me. I realized that I truly had an entire community of people who saw me, as a whole person. I wasn’t invisible anymore. This social “safety” that I had been previously missing limited my exploration of my passions and strengths in favor of a constant fight-or-flight state. I understood at that moment that having support from those around you is truly life changing in a paradoxical way: the more you’re seen, the less you rely on that validation in order to be happy. Weeks later, I sit in the warm, lavender-scented office of my therapist, Jordan. We have our regular discussion about recent personal victories and challenges, and I note how far I’ve come in the time leading up to my senior year. “What’s different now? How have things changed?” Jordan questioned. I ponder, trying to pinpoint exactly what changed. “I don’t know. I was in class the other day,” I began. “And I just realized I had people to talk to. I don’t base my worth on just that anymore.” Jordan smiled. “It sounds like you do know. Maybe, it’s that simple.” I once thought I wouldn’t be alive today., Now I have dreams and goals for my future. My personal battle for mental health turned into a motivator to understand why people do what they do. I became infatuated with the science of the brain, leading to my passion for neuroscience. What used to be daily panic attacks in the school parking lot is now a hopeful outlook on what I can accomplish each day, knowing I have people beside me and knowing I will have many others in the future. Now, it’s my turn to use this growth to help others.

Friday, 8:15 AM. Freshman year. I’m sitting in the car with my mom on a dark and dreary day in Springdale, Arkansas. Tears stream down my face as I gasp and sob and beg her not to make me go into the unassuming red-brick building. “I can’t,” I repeated over and over again, my hands shaking and legs bouncing against the floor of the car. “Please Mom, can I just stay home again today?” Sometimes, she’d dejectedly say yes, frustrated that her daughter, someone who had been so outgoing just three years prior, before the move, would be so anxious about simply going into school. Three days later when Monday came around, I wasn’t as lucky with my pleading. I walked through the chilled halls with flickering fluorescent lights beating down on me and hid in the bathroom before first period. There, I felt safe - an escape from feeling the agonizing sting of perceived social rejection. I hadn’t cracked the social barrier between my peers and I, and I figured it was too late. This became routine: feeling like my existence was not relevant to the lives of the people around me. When freshman year ended, we moved again. This time, I wasn’t filled with anxiety; I was the happiest I’d been in years. I was back home, where people saw me. I had stayed in contact with my old friends through social media, and I felt a new sense of motivation accompanying the warm embrace of belonging that awaited me. Over the next year, I joined a plethora of clubs searching for my fit. I found meaningful things to fill my time and provide a sense of purpose during my high school career. I joined the yearbook staff, enjoying the communication skills I gained through interacting with new people for interviews. I was also given the opportunity to make close friendships with other staff members, expanding my web of support and safety I’d spun since returning to this safe place. One September morning, I sat in class, engaged in seemingly mundane conversation with my classmates, but it meant more than that to me. I realized that I truly had an entire community of people who saw me, as a whole person. I wasn’t invisible anymore. This social “safety” that I had been previously missing limited my exploration of my passions and strengths in favor of a constant fight-or-flight state. I understood at that moment that having support from those around you is truly life changing in a paradoxical way: the more you’re seen, the less you rely on that validation in order to be happy. I once thought I wouldn’t be alive today. Now I have dreams and goals for my future. My personal battle with social anxiety turned into a motivator to understand why people do what they do. I became infatuated with the science of the brain, leading to my passion for neuroscience. What used to be daily panic attacks in the school parking lot is now a hopeful outlook on what I can accomplish each day, knowing I have people beside me and knowing I will have many others in the future. Now, it’s my turn to use this growth to help others.

Since I was 14 years old, I have been fascinated by psychology. After struggling with my mental health throughout middle school and the beginning of high school, the clarity I gained after seeking treatment sparked my curiosity: how does it all work? Through therapy and medication, I was able to unravel and understand what felt like a debilitating mental condition. The reality that this–what I thought impossible after falling into the common trap of hopelessness–was possible inspired me. There is already so much that modern science can do to improve mental health, and it saves lives just like mine. I hope one day to contribute to this pool of knowledge, increasing this ability to help even more. Until then, I have the task of dedicating my life to learning everything I can about the complex things that are the human mind and nervous systems. Pursuing a major in Neuroscience will give me access to this. I plan to study hard to gain the deepest understanding of the content I am learning as well as to maintain a high GPA to signal to graduate schools my commitment to this field. Additionally, I hope to gain research experience with professionals to prepare me for my own professional endeavors after I graduate. Currently, I am hoping to attend medical school after completing my undergraduate degree so I can be on the track to become a Psychiatrist, but I am excited to see all of the other possible opportunities that will be available to me in college. While I do know my passions, I am open to exploring other professional routes within this field. Still, I know my end goal is to do something that truly matters, and I plan to one day make my mark by helping to decrease the burden of mental disorders on individuals.

Since I was 14 years old, I have been fascinated by psychology. After struggling with my mental health throughout middle school and the beginning of high school, the clarity I gained after seeking treatment sparked my curiosity: how does it all work? Through therapy and medication, I was able to unravel and understand what felt like a debilitating mental condition. The reality that this–what I thought impossible after falling into the common trap of hopelessness–was possible inspired me. To do that, I knew my learning had to begin as soon as possible. I took AP Psychology and AP Biology to gain a better understanding of what these fields entail. Then, after confirming with myself that this is what I feel passionate about, I asked two of my friends and my psychology teacher to work with me to form a Psychology Club in my school. The club is open to anyone interested in psychology, whether or not they have taken a class about it in the past, and it provides a space for us to learn more outside of what we already have learned in the classroom. We have meetings every two weeks, and we have participated in a variety of activities to feed and spark new curiosity in the subject, such as guest speakers who are professionals in different psychology-related careers, small-scale experiments to demonstrate a concept we just learned, surveys of our school population, and presentations about different psychological topics people want to share their knowledge about. The club created a space for us to explore our interests with over 30 other students who feel just as passionate as we do, and I always look forward to our meetings every other Tuesday afternoon; it is one of my favorite places to be, and I am grateful for the academic curiosity it has allowed me to feed. Modern science can already do so much to improve mental health, and it saves lives just like mine. I hope one day to contribute to this pool of knowledge, increasing this ability to help even more. Until then, I will dedicate my life to learning everything I can about the complex things that are the human mind and nervous systems. Pursuing a major in Neuroscience will give me access to this. I plan to study hard to gain the deepest understanding of the content I am learning and maintain a high GPA to signal to graduate schools my commitment to this field. Additionally, I hope to gain research experience with professionals to prepare me for my own professional endeavors after I graduate. Currently, I am hoping to attend medical school after completing my undergraduate degree so I can be on the track to becoming a Psychiatrist, but I am excited to see all of the other possible opportunities that will be available to me in college. While I do know my passions, I am open to exploring other professional routes within this field. Still, I know my end goal is to do something that truly matters, and I plan to one day make my mark by helping to decrease the burden of mental disorders on individuals.

In our world, there has been the long heated debate of women’s equality. Have women achieved that equality? Is misogyny still prevalent in our society? Are women simply “overreacting”? In my experience as a queer woman, I’ve had countless scenarios where I wanted to speak out against blatant misogynistic comments but was too nervous to because of a fear of judgement. For example, I was talking with two of my coworkers just a few days ago, and they were repeatedly making jokes about how women are supposed to act and how they’re a “keeper” if they’re subservient to their husbands. These coworkers were teenage boys, not even adults, who have clearly been surrounded by misogynistic influences through media or people around them. How could one claim women’s progress has gone far enough when situations like these still occur on a daily basis? And how would people’s misogynistic ideas continue if they were more educated on the history of the fight for women’s rights? After reading “After Sappho” by Shelby Wynn Schwartz, my passion for this topic grew tenfold. This novel, a fictionalized yet still informational retelling of different feminists in the late 19th century and early 20th century, is an eye opening and empowering story that effectively highlights the progress women have made compared to the present. It highlights real women who lived and fought for women’s rights, such as Natalie Barney, Romaine Brooks, and Virginia Woolf, to name a few. “After Sappho” is a historical fiction novel, and draws on inspiration from the work of the Greek poet Sappho, but the historical events and the works of literature and art referenced in it are all true stories, and the reader gains historical insight about women and queer people that isn’t typically taught in any history classes. I strongly believe that if everyone could read this book, they would have an altered outlook on how they view women, especially queer women. By putting real names and faces to the concept of the women’s rights movement, one gains so much more respect and understanding of how important it truly was, and I believe many today have taken these brave women’s efforts for granted or simply don’t know of them at all. To continue perpetuating misogynistic ideals in our current time is a disrespect to these brave women and what they worked for, and this book illustrates this beautifully.