When I was young, my brothers and I would pack our bags and fill the family car up with gas so that on the day after the last day of school we could head off to Cape Cod for the summer. What a wonderful feeling of excitement and anticipation. My grandparents lived in a little Cape town where we would attend parades on Main Street and spend time on the beach listening to the sea, and my grandparents would watch us play all kinds of sports with our friends. At night just before dinner, I would wander upstairs to spend time with my grandfather while he worked in his office. I knew he ran an antique business, but he frequently worked on something far more intriguing. That was when I learned more about my family’s involvement in health and wellness.
My grandfather runs the Health Promotion Foundation, and he spends many evenings reviewing proposals from substance abuse counseling centers. Subsequently, I learned my Great Grandfather had devoted much of his life to The Smithers Foundation, which he started to fund research, treatment, and rehabilitation for alcoholism and drug addiction. Now I am continuing this tradition by supporting youth health through sports, and I have begun, in a small way, to do this as a coach and through my company stringhut.com which serves lacrosse players at the youth and high school level. Seeing children become involved in sports matters to me. This is particularly true for less advantaged children from urban areas who have little access to fields or open spaces to play. At a time when obesity and diabetes are rising, it is critical to get young people involved in physical activity. Sports teach young people to value healthy habits in order to compete effectively. Also, they learn leadership and teamwork skills and quickly understand that exercise makes us feel good in ways that video games, drinking and drugs cannot. Just as a carpenter requires the right tools to build a cabinet so too do young athletes need the proper equipment to participate in sports. Most equipment is very costly and therefore demands a sizable financial commitment from families. In response to this need, I am currently designing a website where people can donate and exchange lightly used sporting goods. There will also be links to connect parents to programs in their area where their children can try new sports. Perpetuating youth involvement in sports is critically important to me. If kids can become active early in life, they will likely want to be healthy throughout their lives. Our society has become progressively less active and for the first time, today’s children could be the first generation to live shorter lives than their parents. Motivating youth at the local level to challenge themselves by being outside and running with their teammates is something that gives me tremendous satisfaction. And hopefully, someday just before dinner my grandchild will wander into my office and ask me what I am doing.
As a little girl I remember going Morrel mushroom hunting with my maternal grandparents and cousins at my great-grandmothers property. My great-grandmother raised sheep until she was 86 years old and the family had to sell them for her safety. She was crawling across the road in the winter to care for them. I remember her always heaving at least one “bottle baby” in the house every year; the grand kids loved to help her feed them. I always loved going to her house on the weekend and making molasses cookies with her and drinking hot
I looked at my cousin in dismay as she said, “Be proud that your skin is light, primo. People won’t judge you.” Despite my Hispanic family’s efforts to instill me with pride in my Hispanic culture, I often felt conflicted with a sense of identity. Here I was, standing outside the house, consuming every ray of sunlight that danced upon my skin in a desperate attempt to be darker. My Hispanic family tried their best to teach me to be proud of my heritage, but my Caucasian family always taught me that white was superior.
After 17 years of having Ecuadorian blood running through my veins I have come to fully embrace and love what it means to be Hispanic. More than anything else, my Hispanic heritage has taught me the value of family and the perseverance one must have during all stages of life. The world I come from is very family oriented; every weekend is a family reunion, where my parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandma join to cook together, listen to music, and spend time talking with one another. Though we do not abide to the nuclear family model, having so much family around has provided a support system like no other. There is constant motivation and hope propelling me to never stop at anything but success. I get my fair share of these motivational
I never would have imagined feeling like an outsider in my own home. Unfortunately I wouldn’t even go as far as considering my current home as “my home.” I live in a house with eight people and two dogs and for some, that might not even be slightly overwhelming, but for me it is. I try to keep my heart open about the situation, but I always end up feeling like I don’t belong. Given the circumstances of my situation, I would say life definitely turned out better than what I initially expected, but I was left feeling like a “stranger in a village” having to live with a family that is nothing like my own.
Everyone has objects or people they are grateful for, I am thankful for my cell phone, boyfriend, and family. I am grateful for my phone because when I am bored it gives me something to do and it also helps me look up information when I do not have a computer handy. I am grateful for my boyfriend because he always finds a way to calm my worries and takes me on trips. I am forever grateful for my family because without them I would not be who I am today and I would not have the things I do.
As an African American woman, I have lived and worked in underserved communities and have experienced personally, the social and economic injustices grieved by underserved communities and the working poor. All of which, has increased my desires to work with such populations. A reserved person by nature, I have exposed an inner voice that I was oblivious to. I have expressed my inner voice to those living in underserved communities, who are seeking social and economic stability. I have come to classify and value the strength I have developed by the need, to survive in an underserved community. I use these as my continuous struggle against the social and economic injustices that I have experienced, as a product of an underserved community and as an African American woman. I have continued my struggle to overcome the barriers from my upbringing in an underserved community.
I don't have a lot of fantastic memories of childhood. There were no spectacular family adventures, no unique family projects that taught some sort of moral lesson, no out-of-the-ordinary holidays. We ate family meals together, but most of the time the children and adults lived in different worlds. The kids went to school, did homework, and played; the adults worked. I was lucky, though. When I wanted a little of both worlds, I could always turn to Grandpa.
As I was wondering about what to write about, I realized that the debilitation of the family unit is what causes so many of the problems today. Drugs, sex, and violence are all prompted by a lack of respect for bodies and other people. Children need to be loved, encouraged, and taught. Without proper guidance a child will not have the confidence or knowledge to make good, morally sound decisions.
My grandparents were away on a lustrous journey when we arrived. My dad went to fuel the boat, my mom loaded the boat with food for the day, and I went to go whittle on the roof of the garage. I went into the garage and got my filet knife out of my tackle box. Then went around to the back, climbed the fence, and got onto the roof. I had done this several times before and liked this place because it was serene and peaceful.
Some of my best family experiences were on family trips, but sometimes it was not in fact the activities at the place we were going but the journey there that held the learning experiences. Most of the family trips that we take are over eight hours long. There are many things that come from being in a cramped car for that long. One of which is you get bored unless you talk to other people, so that’s what you do. Sometimes you can find out a lot about a person by talking to them for that long, even people that you thought you knew completely. On one of my family trips my brother told about a time that his friend almost suffocated on a snow caving trip. It happened when they were crushing in the snow caves and it wasn’t working, then the last time that his friend tried jumping on it, the ceiling broke through and he was stuck halfway with his face buried in snow. My brother finished by tellin...
When I was a young child I would love to hear my parents tell me that we were going on a trip. I would be full of excitement, because I knew that we would be going to a place that I had never seen before. My parents, my brother, and I would pack our luggage and venture out in our small gray minivan. Three of my most cherished memories in our minivan are when we went to Disney World, the beach, and the mountains.
When I was younger, I spent a lot of time with my grandparents on my mom’s side. They were very close to me and they are still, as of today. My fondest memories were when we would always go to Chinatown in Philadelphia. Living along the infamous highway, i-95, I could vividly remember passing the railroad tracks on merging onto the highway. Driving on the highway, my grandparents would listen to traditional Chinese music while I would watch Shrek in the back seat. My grandparents would try to talk to me during the ride but I was so into the movie that I didn’t respond. Occasionally, I would look out the window and ...
A nurse that will venture into today’s care setting must be one that not only cares for the patient, but also cares for that patient’s family. A patient’s family is defined by King as an open systems theory as a social structure that has an impact on the growth and development of a person, Neuman’s system theory suggests that each individual is separate although they influence the structure the family unit, then Roy’s adaptation theory includes the community in the definition of the context of family (Potts & Manleco, 2012). Through the process of caring for all builds a circle of trust and support that is developed amongst the patient, their family, and the nurse. The patient will feel safe and secure, which will aid in their overall healing.
My most memorable family vacation took place two years ago. We went to Corsica, a French island situated in the south of France right next to Italy. I remembered waking up early excited to visit this new land. Used to take long flights, I was surprised to arrive to the destination after a one-hour flight. Even though the flight was short for me, it was stressful for my mom, she has never felt secured in a plane, probably due to the fact that she is afraid of height. When finally arrived at the destination, the dry and warm weather was there to welcome us. We all felt relief, and knew that this was the beginning of the summer. Excited, we had a lot of activities planned for the few weeks, me and my father could not wait to dive in the clear
This identity memo about me is only a snapshot. My intent is to reflect on where I am currently and on where I am heading. Herein I will briefly focus on some of my values and how it relates to education within my family and my culture. I will also shed light on my goals and what led me to pursue this MPH degree and if there were changes along the way. Next, I will reflect on my health or family influenced my assumption of public health, and my overall assumptions about people, health, and health care utilization. Also, I will then reflect on my expectations about my performance in the program, if they were met, and what will my MPH degree do for me as it related to career and family. Finally, I am going to explain what my experiences are