Everyone has problems. At least that’s what my 7th grade teacher told us. He asked us to imagine rolling up all our problems into a ball and throwing that ball on a pile filled with the problems of all other people. He then argued to us that-given a choice-each and every one of us would choose our own ball over all others.
Although I was too young then to understand his metaphor fully, I knew that everyone had problems. And I was no different.
Growing up, depression became a natural part of my life. Throughout middle school and into high school, I suffered from a low-grade, but persistent gloom. Sometimes it stayed in the background, other times it took center stage. But always it performed.
One day during my sophomore year of high school I started to gasp. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt that my lungs just wouldn’t fill with air. It continued that whole day, and into the next. When for weeks I couldn’t get the gasping to stop, I finally saw a doctor. She checked my lungs and my breathing and finally told me flatly, “I think you’re depressed.”
The gasping stayed with me that whole year. No matter what I did I couldn’t escape it-or the depression that caused it. More than anything I just wanted to live a normal life. Any color was better than gray. And any ball was better than sadness.
I would have given anything to pick up another ball.
In the summer before senior year, that’s exactly what I did. I stumbled, for the first time, across a different ball-one that someone else had thrown into the pile.
That year, I stumbled across fear.
During the semester, my 11th grade advanced biology teacher nominated me for the National Youth Leadership Forum on Medicine. I was able to attend-with the help of my sister who used her internship money to pay the hefty tuition.
I was as sure, at that time, about becoming a doctor as I was that this conference was a good idea. I discovered later, of course, that I was deathly wrong about both. Medicine wasn’t for me and the conference didn’t turn out to be such a great idea. In fact, had I known at that time what would happen after the conference, I may have encouraged my sister to instead buy stock-or maybe I would’ve just pretended to take my pulse.
It should’ve been nothing more than a passing comment. But it wasn’t. You see, the mind is a delicate place, and retains a balance so fragile, it’s best left untouched. On that summer day in June, I disturbed that balance and didn’t even know what I’d done.
During a session about how wonderful it is to be a doctor of osteopathic medicine, we were asked to take our pulse. I had trouble counting mine, so the medical student helped me.
#yasminmogahed
#almagribinstitution
#biography
#inspirational
20 июл 2020
