What a week

Ok so it is only Monday, but WOAH what a week it has been.  Today felt like I had ran a marathon. In fact this morning feels like was days ago.  First of all, I just need to say how much I hate traffic. I believe that if Jesus was in Atlanta rush hour traffic in the morning time, He would part it like the red sea. Second, I hate waiting at the doctors office. All I need is my thyroid medication, why does this have to be a 3 hour gig? Third, the first time I had time to eat today was at 5:30 in the evening. That is just wrong on so many levels.  Thank you God that I survived this monday! Now I just have to survive the rest of the week!  I feel like the rest of the week will be a cake walk after today! Well now off to my glorious loving comfy bed.

Letter to Grad School

Why should any graduate school want me as a student? Why should this university want me as a student?  My story is one that should be synonymous with the story of biology.  It is a story of the evolution of a human being, and one that makes me perfect for you.

I promise you, I am not like any other graduate applicant that you have seen.  It is not that I am Einstein smart, but I have a ton of heart and I love what I do.  I have a heart that wants to make a difference in our world, and who feels without a shadow of doubt that biology, and specifically immunology, is where I belong.  To show this to you, I am going to express a very personal perspective on my story.

                  I grew up in a strong Christian home, and up until 11^th grade; I was in a series of private Christian schools.  Something, which is known to be true, is the lack science that is taught at these schools and mine was no exception.  It was not until I transferred to the local public school that I got my first taste of a real science class.  As much as I loved it, it scared me to death.  I had no working knowledge of the subject, and at that point never saw where it would be a part of my future.  I had my heart set on a career in animation.  It seemed like the logical choice for me, since I had a knack for computers and I loved editing film.  I ended up starting my college career at a local university to get my feet wet.  Unfortunately, I became distracted by all the freedom that I was suddenly experiencing. I got my eyes off of my future and almost destroyed it.  Thanks to amazing parents, family, and the grace of God, who never gave up on me, I got out of the situation and ended up at a local community college hoping to salvage my future.  My plan was to take on a general studies degree, get my GPA up and go from there.  The plan was going great, I had been in talk with Disney about a possible internship with their animation department, and was set to graduate.  The spring before my last year, I was having doubting fears on whether I was doing the right thing.  I prayed and asked God if this was His will for things to work out, but if it was not His will, for him to stop my plans in their track.   Then, towards the end of that summer, I got a call from the financial aid department of my school explaining that there had been a strange issue.  The electric FASFA that I had filled out had come through BLANK.  As I am sure you know, you cannot summit those without filling them out.  I was going to have to come up to campus and fill out a paper FASFA.  The damage had been done though.  I was not able to go to school that fall and would have to push graduation to the next summer.  This destroyed my plans of the internship.  It was obvious to me that God had answered my prayer. I had been volunteering, as an assistant in my church’s youth ministry and have always loved working with teenagers. I applied to start what I thought was a Christian college, the fall after I graduated from Gordon College.  I thought that I was supposed to become a full time youth pastor.  I got in and things went on as planned.  Well, that is until two weeks before my graduation from Gordon.  I was then called to the office once more, this time to deliver the news that my advisor had been wrong, and two classes that I was currently taking, no longer counted towards my degree. This meant that I would have to come back in the fall. I went to the Dean’s office and after several hours of searching, we realized that my general studies courses that I had picked fit perfectly for an Associates of Science in Pre-Dental Hygiene.  A field I had never thought of.  You see that love for science that I discovered my junior year of high school had lead me to take extra science classes in college.  There I was two weeks before graduation changing my major. I graduated and went to the “Christian College” just as planned. Only I found out shortly after arriving that it was not what was advertised. It took me 2 months to get out, and I decided then that I was going to try and do something with this associates degree. I attended Georgia Highlands College with the hopes of getting into their Dental Hygiene program.  Of course, shortly after I arrived, I found out the program was in danger of getting canceled.  In order to save it they took a smaller than normal class for that year and I did not make the cut.  Strangely though, while at Georgia Highlands, my Microbiology professor told me a story that set a fire in my heart and a passion that I knew was just for me.  He told us about the work being done in AID’s.  He spoke about how 10% of the population that was of European descent is in a way immune to one of the strains of AID’s. This blew my mind and I had to know more. I then transferred to Southern Polytechnic State University.  I have learned so much since I have been at SPSU.  This is the first time that what I was doing felt right.  I can be in a lab for hours and not even realize it.  I constantly drive my parents crazy with my ramblings about everything that I have been doing in class and lab. 

                  You might think that I have changed my mind many times; therefore, what makes this any different?  I believe that the road that I took to get here was a very curvy and strange one, but I have always been one to love the scenic routes.  I have learned though this to follow my heart and my heart has brought me here, and I know that this is where I belong.  I will work harder than anyone you will meet.  I know my GPA is not spectacular and I am working on that.  What killed my GPA was fall 2011.  My family had a crisis.  My mom was in and out of the hospital, there were many times I thought we were going to lose her. She is now getting much better.  While this was going on, one of my younger sisters was having surgery on her ankles.  I was trying to take on a full load at school, take care of my family, and work fulltime.  I learned that I was not superwoman, and I have been working my butt off to correct all the damage that was done.  I will not be one to let a problem get in the way of my work.  I have fallen more than once, and I always get back up. I want to make a difference in the scientific community, and I want to do that with you! I hope that this essay has given you a glimpse of who I am, and what I am about. As I first said, my story is one of evolution and growth, a story about self-discovery and heart.   I am not who I was when I first started college, and I will continue to grow through your program to become the scientist I was and am destined to become.

This is my story. It is a shortened version, but the major details are all there.  I hope that you can see through it that GOD always has a plan!

Graduate School

Wow so this blog has been inactive for 2 years. Let me tell you those 2 years were filled with many ups and downs. I can not even to begin to tell you all that has happened. What I will say is I am half way through my first semester of Grad School. I did survive getting my Bachelors in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry and shoot I picked up a minor in Chemistry along the way.  God works in mysterious ways. If I had not gone through what I did with my ex, then I would have stayed in my comfort zone.  Thanks to me being outgoing and social, I got a job as a TA in the chemistry department at my undergrad school.  I feel in love with teaching.  If someone would have told me that I would love doing that 5 years ago, I would have laughed at them.  I am now working on my Masters in Pathology and Immunity.  I am a Professor at a local college teaching a Biology related lab and I am loving every minute of it.  Do I always love Grad school? No I don't.  I love some of my courses and dread every minute of others.  Thats the way Life is.  I just want to take a minute and say this. At the end of the spring in 2007, I was a college dropout, who was messed up in the wrong crowd.  I did things that I am so ashamed of doing.  I royally messed my life up!  Anyone would have thought and some even told me that I would amount to nothing.  What use was I? I had destroyed my GPA, I had no ambition, I burned the bridges with my family, I was messed up.  I am here to tell you that NO MATTER what you have done GOD CAN use you!  He turned my life around in a way I never thought possible. Looking back now I can see His finger prints all over my life.  You might be in a place where you think that nothing is going right, that you have destroyed your life. It WIll be OK! I promise.  It might not be today or tomorrow but it will happen. It took years for my life to get better and to be brutally honest there are days that now 6 years later that I still have the residual complications come up from my past.  BUT GOD brought me to this so HE WILL bring me through it!
I am going to post in a minute my letter that I sent with my application to graduate school.  I detail in it how amazing God worked my life out for this.  He is doing so in yours too.
GOD BLESS!