I don't remember a time before my mom was a single mother. My mom is a joyful woman who has always laughed loudly and created happy memories with her children. She was also angry and was often overwhelmed; she would yell even when nobody had done anything wrong, and dismiss concerns when she couldn't carry anything else. I've never questioned if my mom loved me. She did what she could to provide for us, but she wasn't perfect. She didn't have all the resources or the patience in the world. My mom had to make sure we all had our most basic needs; there was almost no time for anything else. I had two very high-needs siblings with emotional and mental health struggles, who had a constant need for supervision, emotional talk-downs, and appointments; there was typically no time left for me. Most of the time when I needed something, the message I heard amounted to, “You need to deal with this yourself. I don't have time for you. I'm sorry, I wish I did.” I often struggle to ask for help when I need it, and I distrust when others offer help. At the same time, I can get stuff done, take charge, and lead. This trait feels core to my being, and I can't picture myself in any other way of being. When I was 13, I was going to a middle school for acting. A couple of months in, I realized I hated it, and I wanted to get out. I wanted to go be with my best friend at her Episcopal middle school. I used my Chromebook, looked up her school and the application process, and realized the applications were due in two days. I completed a full application for private school all by myself without telling my mom during school that day. Telling her, or even thinking that I should didn't cross my mind. I never thought of a world in which I didn't do it alone. The next day, she got a call from them asking for some of the clearly incorrect or missing information, and that's when she learned that I had even applied. She was angry, confused, and supportive all at the same time. When she filled in the information, the head of admissions, who called my mom and heard her reaction live, was so impressed that, at my initiative, she admitted me without requiring the typical standardized test. My independence both led to the positive outcome of my going to that school and all the positive influences that school had in my life, but it also shut my mom out of the decision-making of my life and had me working as a rogue actor while making decisions that affect everybody. Going into college, with my mom not having nearly as many burdens to carry as she used to, she asks to be more involved. I want to involve her, but it's been a struggle for me. It's hard to remember that now I don't have to do everything myself. Shopping for college, for example, got done. It was easy for me. I paid for everything myself, and I did it all on my own, but my mom was upset when she realized she couldn't shop for college with me and that she had missed a part of the mothering experience she hadn't had before and probably won't have again. I never struggle to get things done, but sometimes I miss some beautiful things, and I hope to improve this part of myself.

I believe that the next big science/engineering advancement will be the ability for humans to live on the moon. My prediction is that we will see this become a reality with NASA’s Artemis program, meant to bring humans back to the moon to explore uncharted areas and even set up a lunar base. So far, they have managed to make space flight more fuel-efficient by using gravity to help the shuttle move with significantly less fuel. This is why the flight path of Artemis’s flight path looks quite different from all other lunar missions in the past. So far, they have done a flyby, but soon they will land on the moon, and eventually the goal is to create a lunar base, where astronauts can live, similar to the International Space Station, where astronauts live for up to a year at a time. One place where I predict major scientific advancements is in the study of early Earth formation. Because the Earth has many changing biotic and abiotic factors, early Earth geology is difficult to study. The moon broke off from the Earth early in the Earth's history, and is preserved because of its lack of running water, wind, and life. It has been theorized that, on the south pole of the moon there is preserved water that could contain the volatile compounds that helped create life on earth. This means we may make major scientific discoveries when exploring previously unexplored parts of the moon. I believe that we will gain significant knowledge of how the Earth, and early life, came to be. I predict that we will also see the invention of an entirely circular water system, stemming from the creation of a moon base, which will necessitate it, since there is no accessible water on the moon, and transporting water to and from the moon is extraordinarily costly. This means that we will be able to filter all water used to cool technology, used in appliances(such as toilets, sinks, and showers), and all water that we excrete, and filter it back into potable water. I predict this will be achieved through ultrasound based water filtration, high energy soundwaves that create microscopic bubbles in ice, which create a chemical reaction that removes contaminates. Because this uses sound, which is more easily accessible than other forms of water filtration, I foresee this becoming a widespread system, not just in space but throughout the world so that many people can have fully circular water systems. This would be a major advancement because it would create essentially drought-resistant societies. With the rise of global warming and the wealth inequality gap, more and more people throughout the U.S.A and the world have seen their water supplies poisoned or dried up. If people were able to recycle all the water they use, we would see many places have an increased quality of life and lifespan. As a future physician I am drawn to the life saving technological advancement, and deeper understanding of life and the environment that I believe will come from this lunar exploration. Advanced water filtration technology will increase wellbeing and health for all people, and this interests me as this is the ultimate goal in medicine, to protect and save lives.

Freshman year, I felt like an alien disguised as a girl. Coming back to school after COVID and the death of my older sister, I felt I had forgotten the secret language of socialization that everyone else remembered. I looked for places where I fit in, first in sports, then in music and in art clubs, but I didn't feel welcome in these spaces. I was allowed to come, but I didn't have a spot where I belonged. At lunch, I met a girl named Nola. She was a senior and the co-captain of debate. Nola was welcoming. She asked me to join the debate team. For the first time, they welcomed me, not just as a participant, but also as a friend. Debate was a judgment-free place where I could work on myself and my abilities. Nola was there for me the whole time, pushing me to become a better debater. She invited me to varsity practice and pushed me to participate in tournaments. In my freshman year, I performed very poorly in school. I didn't believe I could do more or perform better. I was disorganized and ashamed of myself. School was a Sisyphean task. I never told people how close I was to failing. Nola asked me one day how school was going, and for some reason, I decided to be honest. She understood and told me she was sorry. She said she had been in a similar situation, and told me how she got on her feet, and she told me she had ADHD and wondered if I might have it as well. Soon after, I went to my first debate round with a partner I didn't know. Our first round resolution was “We should eliminate fossil fuels in the next 20 years,” and we were the opposition. In the second round, the topic was skewed in our favor, yet we still lost. I was upset. I tried to hide it when I talked to Nola at the tourney, but she knew. She told me about her first debate tournament, where she lost every round. It actually made me feel a lot better, and I managed to just barely pull through on the third round, and when the ballot came out, I screamed because I was so overjoyed. After that tournament, each loss felt like an opportunity to learn, and each win was a marker of how far I've come. Becoming a better debater helped me realize how capable I was, and inspired me to improve my grades. Nola opened this door in my life and made school a place where I fit in and achieve. These things made me realize that I could achieve great things and go to college. Now I'm going to college, and I hope to pursue medical school. Debate has made me a better listener and better at explaining, a strength I will bring into medicine. I used to feel hopeless, but debate showed me who I really am and that I can succeed.

At twelve years old, I got a common infection: bacterial pink eye in both eyes. My mom took me to the emergency room, where they prescribed eyedrops and an antibiotic. It was no big deal. I trusted that medicine could fix it and that the doctors would do what they said, and they did. I was a curious kid, and I wanted to know how this magic cure worked, so my mom and I watched a video about antibiotics, where I learned that the drugs that I was prescribed didn't exist until the 1950s. That meant that if this had happened 80 years ago, I could have easily gone blind. I believed that medicine was important before this, but I never realized how it shaped my life. I had never questioned if someday I would catch a disease and die, because that kind of thing didn't happen around me. For the first time, I saw that the only reason for this was the science that had been helping me from before I was even born. This sparked my interest in medicine and made me want to be a doctor, so I could be a part of that essential work. In my religion classes, we started learning about healthcare inequality, and I was taught the unfair treatment people of color have faced in medicine. This includes being treated like ‘guinea pigs’ in unethical experiments and the false belief that they feel less pain, both of which have caused a historic distrust in medicine. I learned that black women are 3 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. The more I learned about American medicine, the more I understood that things that should be a right are made into a privilege, which causes detrimental effects to the most vulnerable people in our world. The world I live in, where medicine is part of life and where I have never questioned whether high-quality health care would be available, was not the world of many. Mothers, just as loving and wonderful as my mom, were three times more likely to die, simply because of the color of their skin. Pregnant women and babies are some of the most vulnerable people, and they have been dying unnecessarily. In a field meant to protect them, that's a problem that desperately needs to be addressed. This inspired me to be an OB/GYN. Now my goal is to work hard in college, studying biology as a pre-medical STEAM pathway, and to engage in research exploring how to improve healthcare for those most underserved in our community. I want to work to create a space by women, for women, where they feel truly safe. My dream is to someday create a clinic where I can provide no-cost maternal care to at-risk communities and help improve the community I value so deeply.

At twelve years old, I got a common infection: bacterial pink eye in both eyes. My mom took me to the emergency room, where they prescribed eyedrops and an antibiotic. It was no big deal. I trusted that medicine could fix it and that the doctors would do what they said, and they did. I was a curious kid, and I wanted to know how this magic cure worked, so my mom and I watched a video about antibiotics, where I learned that the drugs that I was prescribed didn't exist until the 1950s. That meant that if this had happened 80 years ago, I could have easily gone blind. I believed that medicine was important before this, but I never realized how it shaped my life. I had never questioned if someday I would catch a disease and die, because that kind of thing didn't happen around me. For the first time, I saw that the only reason for this was the science that had been helping me from before I was even born. This sparked my interest in medicine and made me want to be a doctor, so I could be a part of that essential work. In 8th grade, I was taught about the plagues of early America, the rampant disease, childbirth deaths, and lack of knowledge about how disease was even spread. It shocked me to learn that people have been on earth for 300,000 years, and yet modern medicine only began developing in the last 200 years. Something as simple as doctors washing their hands wasn't common practice until the mid 1800s. In my religion classes, we started learning about healthcare inequality, and I was taught the unfair treatment people of color have faced in medicine. This includes being treated like ‘guinea pigs’ in unethical experiments and the false belief that they feel less pain, both of which have caused a historic distrust in medicine. I learned that black women are 3 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. The more I learned about American medicine, the more I understood that things that should be a right are made into a privilege, which causes detrimental effects to the most vulnerable people in our world. The world I live in, where medicine is part of life, and where I have never questioned whether high-quality health care would be available, was not the world of many. Mothers, just as loving and wonderful as my mom, were three times more likely to die, simply because of the color of their skin. Pregnant women and babies are some of the most vulnerable people, and they have been dying unnecessarily. In a field meant to protect them, that's a problem that desperately needs to be addressed. This inspired me to be an OB/GYN. Now my goal is to work hard in college studying biology and go to medical school. That way, I can become someone that people can come to and trust that I will listen to them, and do everything in my power to keep them and their babies safe, regardless of race. I want to work to create a space by women, for women, where they feel truly safe. My dream is to someday create a clinic where I can provide no-cost maternal care to at-risk communities and help improve the community I value so deeply.

At twelve years old, I got a common infection: bacterial pink eye in both eyes. My mom took me to the emergency room, where they prescribed eyedrops and an antibiotic. It was no big deal. I trusted that medicine could fix it and that the doctors would do what they said, and they did. I was a curious kid, and I wanted to know how this magic cure worked, so my mom and I watched a video about antibiotics, where I learned that the drugs that I was prescribed didn't exist until the 1950s. That meant that if this had happened 80 years ago, I could have easily gone blind. I believed that medicine was important before this, but I never realized how it shaped my life. I had never questioned if someday I would catch a disease and die, because that kind of thing didn't happen around me. For the first time, I saw that the only reason for this was the science that had been helping me from before I was even born. This sparked my interest in medicine and made me want to be a doctor, so I could be a part of that essential work. In 8th grade, I was taught about the plagues of early America, the rampant disease, childbirth deaths, and lack of knowledge about how disease was even spread. It shocked me to learn that people have been on earth for 300,000 years, and yet modern medicine only began developing in the last 200 years. Something as simple as doctors washing their hands wasn't common practice until the mid 1800s. In my religion classes, we started learning about healthcare inequality, and I was taught the unfair treatment people of color have faced in medicine. This includes being treated like ‘guinea pigs’ in unethical experiments and the false belief that they feel less pain, both of which have caused a historic distrust in medicine. I learned that black women are 3 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. The more I learned about American medicine, the more I understood that things that should be a right are made into a privilege, which causes detrimental effects to the most vulnerable people in our world. The world I live in, where medicine is part of life, and where I have never questioned whether high-quality health care would be available, was not the world of many. Mothers, just as loving and wonderful as my mom, were three times more likely to die, simply because of the color of their skin. Pregnant women and babies are some of the most vulnerable people, and they have been dying unnecessarily. In a field meant to protect them, that's a problem that desperately needs to be addressed. This inspired me to be an OB/GYN. Now my goal is to work hard in college and go to medical school. That way, I can become someone that people can come to and trust that I will listen to them, and do everything in my power to keep them and their babies safe, regardless of race. I want to work to create a space by women, for women, where they feel truly safe. My dream is to someday create a clinic where I can provide no-cost maternal care to at-risk communities and help improve the community I value so deeply.

When I was nine years old, my mom started working at Victorian Manor in San Francisco, a nursing home where she oversaw the activities. Some days, during the summer, I would go with her. Many of the residents had dementia or were stroke victims. I didn't know how to help them, but I knew what I was doing brought comfort to them, and it made me feel good. One resident, a stroke victim, once sent my mom home with a nature magazine. She couldn't speak and struggled to move, but she wrote my name on it, with a heart next to it. When she gave it to me, I cried. It showed me how meaningful my visits were. Eventually, my mom transitioned to a new job at Piedmont Gardens. I knew I liked working with the elderly and underserved communities. Right away, I wanted to serve in Piedmont Gardens in the community. When it comes to people with dementia, it's often more compassionate to let them be in their own world and confirm their realities, rather than try to pull them back with jarring truths. Once, a resident told me that she needed to leave because her daughter was there, and minutes later, she asked me if her mom was coming to pick her up from school. To both I said, “No, that's not happening yet. She’ll be here in an hour,” and her mind was eased. I also helped organize a winter party for the residents. I worked with the administration to invite families to the party, and we got drinks, food, and crafting supplies. I got a friend from school and my little brother to come volunteer. All of the residents had a great time being around their families and doing activities. Planning this event showed me the importance of facilitating connection, not just between you and those you serve, but between them and the broader community. Even though the residents never remembered me after going there every weekend for months, I'm happy to know I made an impact on them and their families. Those with dementia have much better outcomes when they have interaction, and deserve to have caring people around them. I also made an impact on the caregivers, who are often overworked and underpaid. The residents impacted me as well; it made me happy to get to be around such great people and get to bring them joy. I am proud to have helped serve my community. I included a picture of one of my favorite residents, Marie, on her birthday!

At twelve years old, I got a common infection: bacterial pink eye in both eyes. My mom took me to the emergency room, where they prescribed eyedrops and an antibiotic. It was no big deal. I trusted that medicine could fix it and that the doctors would do what they said, and they did. I was a curious kid, and I wanted to know how this magic cure worked, so my mom and I watched a video about antibiotics, where I learned that the drugs that I was prescribed didn't exist until the 1950s. That meant that if this had happened 80 years ago, I could have easily gone blind. I believed that medicine was important before this, but I never realized how it shaped my life. I had never questioned if someday I would catch a disease and die, because that kind of thing didn't happen around me. For the first time, I saw that the only reason for this was the science that had been helping me from before I was even born. This sparked my interest in medicine and made me want to be a doctor, so I could be a part of that essential work. In 8th grade, I was taught about the plagues of early America, the rampant disease, childbirth deaths, and lack of knowledge about how disease was even spread. It shocked me to learn that people have been on earth for 300,000 years, and yet modern medicine only began developing in the last 200 years. Something as simple as doctors washing their hands wasn't common practice until the mid 1800s. In my religion classes, we started learning about healthcare inequality, and I was taught the unfair treatment people of color have faced in medicine. This includes being treated like ‘guinea pigs’ in unethical experiments and the false belief that they feel less pain, both of which have caused a historic distrust in medicine. I learned that black women are 3 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. The more I learned about American medicine, the more I understood that things that should be a right are made into a privilege, which causes detrimental effects to the most vulnerable people in our world. The world I live in, where medicine is part of life, and where I have never questioned whether high-quality health care would be available, was not the world of many. Mothers, just as loving and wonderful as my mom, were three times more likely to die, simply because of the color of their skin. Pregnant women and babies are some of the most vulnerable people, and they have been dying unnecessarily. In a field meant to protect them, that's a problem that desperately needs to be addressed. This inspired me to be an OB/GYN. Now my goal is to work hard in college and go to medical school. That way, I can become someone that people can come to and trust that I will listen to them, and do everything in my power to keep them and their babies safe, regardless of race. My dream is to someday create a clinic where I can provide no-cost maternal care to at-risk communities and help improve the community I value so deeply.

I was born in 2007, in North Carolina, with an older sister named Gwendolyn, but we called her Gwen. She was 3 and a half years older than me. Gwen loved being my older sister. My mom says that she used to let her feed me, less as a meal, and more as an activity to keep us busy, since I got barely any food in my mouth. She showed me everything she loved, and I learned to love it too. She would do my makeup with our plastic, dumbed-down makeup kits and paint my nails with polish. We would play with dolls for hours, and watch Nickelodeon and Disney nonstop. When I was six, our parents got divorced. Gwen took it harder than me, but she was always there for me. My parents moved away from Palo Alto to Alameda, and shared custody of us. My dad struggled with drug abuse and would often wake us up in the middle of the night. Gwen would always find a way to get us out, and sometimes, we would walk across the city together, in the middle of the night, with no shoes in our pajamas, to our mom's house. At the time, I felt sorry for myself, but looking back, I think it broke my sister. When my sister went to middle school, old things changed dramatically. She would have a week where she was high energy and super fun, but then a week where she would be violent and mean. She became harder to live with. Looking back, she was facing trauma, bipolar disorder, and substance abuse problems. When I was 12 years old, and she was 15 and a freshman in high school, she took a turn for the worse. She started self-harming and using harder drugs. My sister would often sleep until noon or later. On Sunday, November 21st, 2019, my mom and I walked in to check on her, only to find her dead. Gwen took her own life. For a long time, I didn't feel like myself. I felt I was watching my life through someone else's eyes. Grief distorted how I thought of her. In my young mind, I could only see her as the nightmares I would have and the reason why my family was falling apart. I questioned if her suicide meant she didn't love me at all. My disconnect from my life and my depression were such a prevalent force in my life, and so resistant to changing that I took part in an experimental program for ketamine therapy. I went to a doctor's office, and they administered it. I listened to my favorite music, and as I did, I started to see memories. Third-person views of my sister and me that I had forgotten. Me sitting in her bed as she showed me how to do makeup, her telling me how smart I was, and how much she loved me. I saw her breaking down into tears and all the bad things that happened to her, and I understood. She was in pain. As I got older, I started to consider a reality that I hadn't before: Gwen loved me and our family and was also clouded with mental health issues. Throughout life, I have often had to reconcile the fact that somebody hurt me, and they still love me, which I have found very challenging, but through this, I learned how to carry both truths and have become a kinder, more empathetic person. I don't subscribe to “what doesn't kill you makes you stronger”, but it made me kinder.

I would start a makeup company with my sister. I always thought of my sister as the most glamorous girl in the world. She understood beauty and makeup in a way that seemed impossible to me. Her name was Gwen, and she was 3 years older than me. When we were little, we had tons of makeup kits, bottles of kid-safe nail polish in bright colors, bright pink lip gloss, and sparkling eyeshadow, all wrapped in the bright plastic packaging of some cartoon character. When I would put the nail polish on myself, I would get it all over my hands, and it looked terrible, but when Gwen would apply it, it was beautiful and shiny. It went about the same for all the other makeup we had. Looking back, it was probably just because she was 9 and I was 6, but I thought it was because of her unquenchable talent. As soon as my parents let her, she would spend all the money she got on real makeup. She experimented with every style under the sun, from natural yet glamorous wedding style makeup to extreme alternative looks. She died in 2019, but before then, she was into the ultra 2018-2019 glam. She wore a full face with colorful eyeshadow every day to school. She wanted to be an influencer and start her own makeup brand. She wrote an entire plan to do it that is still in our living room today. If I could start a business with her today, we would be focused on the bold, vibrant color that represented who she was. She was incredibly creative and would be perfect to lead branding, and especially naming. We would make bright pinks, rainbow palettes, and tons of pigment. We would blend that with more alternative marketing and sell to people who are interested in alternative subcultures that have very bold makeup. I would make our makeup brand about creativity and self-love. When she did her makeup, it wasn't about covering up what she looked like or enhancing it; it was about becoming someone entirely different, and that's what I would want our brand to be, an escape from the pressure to look perfect and be perfect and instead to become something new. I would also donate money to suicide prevention and to supporting the siblings of those who have died of suicide, to carry with our message of self-love and reduction of pressure. Our brand would be something to help other people feel seen and take the pressure to be perfect out of makeup.

Since I was little, I've felt completely out of control of my life. I faced abuse from people in my life whom I was meant to trust most. When I turned 8, I learned a coping mechanism and a way to control something; I restricted my food. At first, although mentally unhealthy, I faced no physical health consequences. My sister passed away, and then shortly after, COVID started. As life moved online, my eating disorder did too, and I became active in pro-anorexia spaces. I lost more and more weight, and by the time I was 13, I was facing serious health problems. I developed osteoporosis from vitamin deficiencies, chronic low blood sugar, low blood pressure, and excessively fast heart rate. Most days, getting out of bed, physically, was too challenging for me. Eventually, I was forced into a program, but was forced out once I was “acceptable healthy” due to covid restrictions. At this point in my life, I never considered movement as anything but punishment. When covid restrictions loosened, I began to do yoga at the advice of my mom. After yoga, I felt incredible. I began to show up for myself in yoga, and I felt, for the first time, like being myself could possibly be a good thing. I made friends in yoga, and they told me how much they loved running. These girls inspired me. I tried running, but it made me dizzy and sick, and I couldn't manage it for more than a minute. I looked into how to move into running online, and I saw people saying that starting on the stair machine was a great way to build up the cardio for running. I got myself a gym membership and slowly built my cardio. At first, I could only do it at a slow speed for 5 minutes, but then it became 10, and I became faster, and I kept progressing. Eventually, I was able to run a mile, then 2, then 3, and I even ran a 5K. Since then, I started to lift weights, run more competitively, and even do kickboxing. Now I lift at least 5 times a week, run at least 3 times, and came in the 90th percentile in a 5K with over 1000 people. Lifting weights, running, and high-impact activities have measurably improved my bone health. Running and building cardio improved my overly high heart rate, and my blood pressure has improved greatly. I have never felt happier, healthier, and more in control of my life and future than I do when I do athletics.