I Want To Be A Scientist Essay

, Research Paper

When I was a little girl, my best friend’s dad was a neurologist. He tricked us with color and number tests and other brainteasers. I was fascinated by how my brain reacted to the games, and ever since, I have wanted to study the brain.

Later, as a high school sophomore, I still focused on being a doctor, and that year I was deemed worthy of an internship at a local hospital. So, the following summer, I gave up late mornings and relaxing by the pool to get up early and help doctors at the hospital.

I had originally applied for a neurological internship, which the program did not offer, so I was shuffled into working with doctors in the maternity ward and the nursery. Nevertheless, by the end of the first week, I was feeding babies, checking vitals, changing diapers, and rolling them in carriages to their mothers and fathers. Each moment I spent helping the doctors with the newborns, I wondered if I should be an o.b./gyn doctor instead of a neurologist.

One morning a few weeks after I began the internship, the doctors told me a mother was to deliver a baby, and she had given permission for me to view the delivery. For awhile the mother tried to deliver, but she was tense; the doctors kept telling her to relax and stay calm for the baby. The tense mother continued trying to deliver, and with the doctor’s encouraging words and the heat of the small, boxy room, I became conscious of what I was about to witness and wondered if I could handle it all.

Before I could change my mind, a small, smooth head slowly emerged. I discovered what I had expected – I could not take it. Tears filled my eyes along with the healthy newborn baby’s.

What I had seen, some never see — including the father who had decided he should stay in the much calmer hallway. As the beautiful baby was carried around from doctor to doctor to be examined and then to the mother’s arms, I realized that I did not want to be an o.b./gyn doctor. Residents had warned me that this job must be a passion or one would burn out from stress and constant fatigue, which I definitely felt after watching the birth of a baby.

As my internship continued, I helped doctors in the neo-natal care unit. After seeing delicate babies connected to beeping machines, trapped inside tiny incubators, I discovered I should not be a neurologist either. How could I raise a family and be content with the world when I would be studying people who live with the effects of a stroke, brain cancer, or a serious mental illness? I knew my emotions would eventually overflow and flood my whole life . . .with tears.

I am thankful for the internship because it proved to me that I did not have the drive or dedication for the profession that medical students should have. Without the internship, I might have made this decision in the midst of a plethora of science courses with a mountainous debt to the bank.

Since that summer, I have become aware that what I am involved in now may influence what I decide to do in the future. I recently decided I might enjoy marketing. After all, I love to express my creativity, and advertising and design have always been alluring to me. Therefore, I plan to test out of a full year of English, Math, and Science in my first year of college so I will be able to take some business courses.

I want to enjoy my life and be successful, which means I have to enjoy my job. The internship helped me learn what I do not want to do in life. I need to experience everything I can to discover my passion, and the internship gave me a head start in my race.