Shaping Me

Tell a story from your family that you believe has shaped you in some way. In what ways has it shaped you?

                When I was younger, around 1^st and 2^nd grade I would fall sick very so often and I would skip school to stay in the comfort of my bed. The whole day I would lie in bed watching television while my father who took a day off from work would bring me hot cocoa or milk. In that sense getting sick was amazing, no school, no work, only television. My brother would stay out my hair for once and actually pretend that he cared and that this wasn’t just another reason why he could not watch television. One thing that I remember very clearly is that I would not take any sort of medication until and unless the fever or cold progressed further. It’s not that I did not want to get better it is just that my father never bought any or even if he did he did not give it to me. He always said that my body was strong enough to fight the illness and we did not need to help it, I would get stronger every time I triumphed over the cold or fever. He would go into the biology of the immune system telling me things like the white blood cells are fighting the fever inside me, I never bothered with the specifics. Medication is the easy way out and should only be used if necessary, don’t beat around the bush if you can walk across it.

                This shaped in a few ways. Do not take the easy way out because there is always a catch, you give and you get. To this day I do not always take medication if I get sick, I sit in bed watch television or with a book until I get better which always happens over the course of few days. I always think that if I take medicine I will recover faster but my body will be ill prepared to fight out the next illness, leaving me more vulnerable. I get better faster and I give my bodies strength away for it. Another way this story shaped me is that I realized that when you are sick you get more attention than you would otherwise, people try to get you stuff if you ask for it simply out of sympathy and pity. I personally do not like this and think that I don’t deserve their pity for something as trivial as the common cold. As a result I tend not to show my sickness as much as possible. This story shaped me in that I try not to take the easy way out as there is usually a catch and that I try to minimize attention when something happens to, be it sickness, grade or life events.