I want to be an Emergency Medicine Physician and use that to make a positive impact on the world. This may not be the most traditional, community-focused answer, but I want to be there for the people, serving them with dignity and care, no matter the situation. I want to be there for the whole person, not just their body. I want to be there for my community, one person at a time. One of the things that has always stood out to me is how often mental health is treated as separate from physical health, especially in the hospital, and how it is left unaccounted for in the idea of holistic health. A patient can come into the emergency department experiencing symptoms, both physical and mental, but one is often taken more seriously than the other because it is easier to see. I want to improve the way we handle our emergency departments in the United States so that we pay better attention to what lies underneath test reports. I want to be the kind of physician who listens to people, because listening is often the only way you will ever know what is really wrong, and why people may be struggling with the healing process. Sometimes people need physiological treatment, and sometimes they need someone willing to listen to what they are saying. I believe that we could all do a lot more listening. With that listening ear, we protect our patients, because mentally healthy patients often heal faster, physically, than patients who are struggling with their mental health. I also plan to make a positive impact through volunteer service in my community. Over the past few years, that has meant time spent volunteering at my local hospital, as a teacher's assistant for a gifted math club, for virtual services offering aid to the blind, and serving as a junior firefighter. These experiences have looked very different from one another, but they all have one thing in common: they gave me opportunities to help people, and serve my community with care, which I will continue to do. I believe that the majority of the positive impact on the world comes from thousands of small decisions to show up, help where I can, and treat people with care and dignity. Whether I am working in an emergency department, volunteering in my community, or helping one person at a time, that is the impact I hope to make.

I went in to grab some stuff for my grandma. Easy, right? Well, the store I had to go to was in the middle of a college town in the beginning of the fall semester, meaning that there were hundreds of people in the store at once, all with shopping carts filled to the brim with school and dorm supplies. However, there was also a grocery section, where I needed to grab the items that my grandma had provided on the list. After a few minutes, I succeeded in this endeavor, checked out the groceries with the money she had given me, and pocketed the last dollar back into my wallet (as she allows me to do for helping her with tasks like that). When I walked out of the store, I looked around like I always do, surveying my surroundings. There are several people in front of me and behind me as I walk out of the store, but I notice an older lady sitting on the bend in the concrete next to the outer walls of the building, cuddled in some obviously deteriorating blankets, with a beanie on and her pack of few belongings next to her; she appeared to be homeless. As soon as I looked at her, I took a few more steps and stopped, looking away from her like I had forgotten something. This is because I had, so I turned around and walked back into the store. I reached into my wallet once I got back into the store, opening the pocket of my wallet that held cash, staring at the singular dollar and the few pieces of change that I had left in there. I knew that this wasn’t a lot, but I believed that it was enough to help. I browsed the shelves for a long time, looking for what I could get for her with my measly dollar. Eventually, I found a milk chocolate bar on the shelf — it was a dollar and thirty-two cents. I grabbed it, praying that my money would be enough with the taxes that I needed to spend. Miraculously, it was the perfect amount. I finally got out the door — thankfully, the woman was still there. I got down to her level, handing her the plastic bag with the candy bar inside. The look on her face was something I will never forget. That experience reinforced something that I still believe today. Helping people doesn't require having a lot. It requires paying attention and deciding to act, even when other people walk by.

My “awkward” thing is how I have always been the opposite of nonchalant about quite literally everything. Even as a young child — five to seven years old, probably, I was one of those people that could not process anything quietly. I would always run my mouth about something. Not in a rude way or anything — moreso I just wanted to care about people and things. I think it was my childish way of processing the world, plus the reason my parents had to pull me away from the cashier’s at the grocery store before I told them enough information to steal my whole family’s identities. The only way anyone could stop me from talking about absolutely everything was if they gave me a stack of books and told me to go read, then I’d finish whole chapter books in a day if nobody stopped me, because I wasn’t nonchalant about that either. A little after that, up until my mid-teenage years, I got bullied a lot. I wasn’t necessarily a kid that automatically got the social cue of “If the other girls are being mean to you, that’s a sign to leave them alone!” Funnily enough, I did the opposite. At first, when I was young, I would continue to follow them around while they ignored me, asking them why they wouldn’t come play with me and what I did to make them upset (because little me couldn’t seem to figure out that sometimes people just don’t like other people, and that you’re not required to have a reason in the strange social stratosphere that was the elementary school playground). As I got older, it definitely de-escalated from literally following the other girls around the playground, but it did turn into texts asking “Hey, did I upset you?” when nobody else, especially the person I texted, seemed to care. It turned into perfectionism over everything, because I never knew how to be nonchalant about anything, and being the friend that would pick up the phone any time, morning, noon, or night, if any of my friends needed me. For a long time, I viewed my “awkward” as a weakness, when I should have realized that it was meant to be a strength, never something I was supposed to change. I realized though, my inability to be nonchalant is the reason I invest so much time into the people around me, the causes I care about, and my education. I care too much about people, I care too much about the world around me. It has become the reason I ask questions, the reason I keep showing up for people, and the reason I refuse to do things halfway. While I spent years wishing I could care a little less, I have learned to appreciate that part of myself that made me so awkward. Maybe that’s not a bad thing; awkward wasn’t meant to be be bad, maybe it’s just a sign you have something worth keeping.

I want to be an Emergency Medicine Physician. This may not be the most traditionally mental health focused healthcare field, but I wanted to be there for the crises, the chaos, and the hospital stays that turn into more than just a few nights; I want to be there for the whole person, not just their body. I believe that there is a need in taking the mind as seriously as the body, and I believe that it is something that a lot of people lack in primary healthcare, because it is so deeply focused on a mentality that “seeing is believing”. I want to change the way that we handle emergency psychiatric and psychiatry-included cases, and how we show compassion to people in hard situations. Listening to people is the only way you’ll know what’s wrong. I believe that I practice the values of kindness, patience, and servant leadership through volunteer activities in my community. From anything from getting my first 200 hours volunteering at my local hospital, to being a teacher’s assistant for the kindergarten to second grade gifted math club at my school, to starting as a junior firefighter at my local fire and rescue and going on my first calls, I have to practice these strengths. It takes the kind of strength you ask about to be able to comfort the neuro floor patients, who are confused and angry and hurting, and take it out on you because they have no other outlet. It takes that kind of strength to pick up and coddle a crying first grader when they don’t understand how to fix a problem. It takes that kind of strength to help families get stuff out of their loved one’s totaled vehicles, keeping them safe and getting what they need back to them the best I know how, while somehow also keeping track of the information about loved one's well-being. I am a woman of resilience, if nothing else. To be patient, kind, and servant-hearted, you also have to be tough. You have to learn how to pick yourself up. My own mental health struggles started very young due to severe bullying that lasted for several years. This affected both my self-esteem and my confidence; it turned me from a bubbly child to a far more mellow teenager. However, I learned that resilience is not about a lack of struggle, but a way to move forwards past it and to be the polar opposite of whatever is trying to drag you down. It has made me an advocate for other people’s mental health and has taught me how to be patient with people who the world around us would not necessarily deem deserve it. I do not believe I would be who I am today and so willing to advocate for mental health support, if not for the people around me supporting me and the resilience I have built.