A meaningful experience that changed my life and will affect my college experience and contribution to the UCF community is the time I fractured my shin during a Cross Country race. The race started like any other, but ended by changing my e on life through pain and disability. When I went to the Chain of Lakes Invitational starting line for the varsity race, I felt the same anxiety and soreness as usual. The race started and I ran as quickly as I could to try to place in front of Trent, a teammate who had beaten me in every previous race. The first mile went by and an unusually high level of burning pain went through my right leg. After the second mile the burning pain worsened and my foot started to go numb, but I would not let myself lose to Trent again. After the third mile, with only one hundred meters left in the race, I caught up to Trent, but just as I thought I could win, my entire right leg went numb. About twenty five meters from the finish line, my right leg began violently shaking with each step until I collapsed five meters from the finish line. I tried to stand while people yelled for me to finish, but my leg buckled and I fell again. I grabbed at the grass, tearing it out of the ground as I tried to move until officials came over and carried me to the medical tent.
This experience taught me many valuable lessons; the need for research and preparation, I should have known that I had extremely flat feet and had worn shoes that catered to them; how rapidly things can change and the importance of adaptability, the loss of the ability to use my right leg forced me to immediately change my life and reschedule my time; and how important understanding other’s problems and supporting them is, I drastically needed help after my injury and was, and still am, sincerely thankful to the officials who carried me to the medical tent and Trent and Taylor who helped me to my mom’s car. This experience will affect my college experience by making me more...