Being the oldest of 4 children, I am a natural born leader. The influences of my mother and my younger siblings have made me strive to be the best person I can be and to work hard to reach any goal that I set for myself. Having been home-schooled until the 8th grade, I have a strong sense of family, leadership, self-motivation and responsibility.
My priorities in life are school and family. My passion in life is swimming. I began swimming on a summer league team at age 10 and was hooked. I was not able to swim year round for financial reasons until I was 12 but I still swam at the local YMCA several days a week on my own. My best events are the 50 free and 100's in back, free and fly. I am an excellent relay sprinter in the 200 free and medley relays.
I switched high schools after my sophomore year and that was a challenging transition. Going from a Division IA school to a Division 4A school meant more competitive classes and swim team. Even though I was new to this caliber of team, I progressed to 4A States my first year. I quickly became a strong part of the team and developed a great sense of camaraderie with new teammates and coaches. My academic goals in high school are to make the Honor Roll all four years. My collegiate goals are to find a college that suits my academic level and major while continuing to focus on swimming all four years.
I have faced many obstacles to get to where I am today. I have gone through my parents divorce and my father stepping out of my life. I have had hard times due to financial struggles. I have had to take a back seat at times due to my siblings having things in life they wanted to pursue. A shoulder injury put me out of the pool for a year. I could have easily given up swimming. That would have probably been the easy thing to do. But I worked hard, went through months of physical therapy, switched to a rehabilitative, injury-prevention team, and made it back. There was a void I felt being without swimming. It is a feeling that makes you appreciate your health and your sport more than you did before.
Through those trials in my life, I have remained a dedicated athlete to the sport of swimming. Swimming has helped make me who I am today. It has gotten me through some very tough times. I've continued to push myself because of the personal goals I have set. I am a devoted team member, dedicated to the sport, intense, positive and caring. I respect my coaches and take criticism well and work to improve my mistakes. I have the ability to regroup and refocus my team when sidetracked. I have learned through swimming that I am a strong leader, hard worker, determined, resilient and perseverant.
I am looking forward to swimming at a collegiate level, working hard for my team, building relationships with those who share the passion that I do, and eager to learn the most that I can and make the most of the opportunity that I am given daily. I will give swimming my 100%.