When I first started university, as a science student at McMaster, both of my parents were suddenly diagnosed with cancer. My mother was diagnosed first, with breast cancer, and then my father with terminal lung cancer. As my parent's oldest son, I was tasked with the challenge of taking care of both of my parents while continuing my education, oftentimes, doing my schoolwork in the lobby of a busy hospital, during a pandemic. Nonetheless, I persisted, hoping and praying that my parents would be okay, and, motivated by the doctors taking care of my parents, that I too would be able to use the pain of this experience to one day become a doctor.
However, after a long battle with cancer, my father passed in my 2nd year of university, which put my entire world on pause. Not only was I paralyzed by grief, my family was suddenly thrown into financial turmoil. My mother, already a cancer patient, could not work and my younger siblings went to universities far from our home in Guelph. My father also did not have life insurance or any kind of insurance.
Because of the financial situation of my family, life quickly became very difficult. We were behind on our rent, heat, Wi-Fi, car payment, and other bills. I recalled thinking doing my schoolwork in a large, loud, and busy cancer center was difficult, however, it was dwarfed by the new difficulty of having to do my homework in a cold, McDonald's parking lot in the middle of the night, often moving from one fast food restaurant to another to get internet because we couldn't pay our outstanding home Wi-Fi bill.
I wasn't only moving from one fast food restaurant to another to complete my homework. I was also working several jobs at different fast-food restaurants as well as food delivery services to help pay my family's bills. As I said, my mother was a cancer patient, unable to work, so I shouldered the majority of my family's financial burden, despite my mother's protest. I was hungry, exhausted, and riddled by grief; however, I had made a promise to my father, during his last moments, that I would pursue my dream of becoming a doctor no matter what, and I strive to uphold that promise to this day.
Adequate life insurance may not have prevented my father's passing, but it could have prevented the unimaginable financial situation my family was thrown into. We could have kept our car, avoided mounting credit card debt, and been able to comfortably afford my education.
Two years after my father's passing, I am now using my experience to strive to become a doctor, who will help people like my parents, and I am being mentored by distinguished physicians at McMaster to research the social determinants of health in Canada (specifically researching health equity barriers in the cancer diagnostic process). This scholarship will allow me to pursue my dreams by both applying to and going to medical school.
