Free Essays, Term Papers, Research Papers at Anti Essays

I was nine years old and living in Pakistan when I was diagnosed with a brain tumor called Medulloblastoma which is highly malignant. After my first surgery in Pakistan, my parents brought me to St. Jude’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. At St. Jude’s, my second brain surgery was performed and immediately after that, my cancer treatment started. I endured approximately eight months of chemo and radiation therapy. Chemo and radiation therapy have thus far been the most horrendous experiences of my life and will most likely remain the most horrendous experiences for the rest of my life. As a side effect of my treatment I acquired slight hearing loss, memory loss and hair loss at the back of my head where the radiation therapy was performed. The doctors at St. Jude’s stated that it was expected for my school performance to decline as a result of my treatment and my brain to function slower than it would have normally. I did have trouble in school. When I returned to Pakistan for fourth grade, after missing half of my third grade, I started having trouble understanding the school material. Before my treatment I was an A plus student in the second grade and half of my third grade year, which I achieved with little effort. However in my fourth grade class I used to try very hard but still got Ds in almost all of my subjects. My Pakistani teacher thought I was hopeless and hesitated giving me help because she thought of me as a waste of time and used to tell other students to help me instead. I struggled very hard but due to my own motivation I was able to pull up most of my grades because of studying by myself. After the end of fourth grade, my parents moved to Poughkeepsie in the United States where my dad found a job. I had to go to St. Jude every three to six months for a medical check up. It was much easier to travel to Memphis if we were living in the United States than if we were living in Pakistan. Therefore, for my fifth grade class I...