Breast Cancer PS - close to a final draft? Forum
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Anonymous User
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- Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am
Breast Cancer PS - close to a final draft?
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Last edited by Anonymous User on Wed Jan 04, 2017 10:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
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UVA2B
- Posts: 3570
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Re: Breast Cancer PS - close to a final draft?
No disrespect to you and your journey through cancer diagnosis, but this entire statement is unworkable. You need to work on sentence structure, grammatical structure, and flow of narrative.
I'm not trying to make you feel bad, but I tried to assume you could cut out the first paragraph because it was so bad, but then it never got better. I would sincerely recommend you read some other samples before trying another statement. You likely have a great narrative worth telling, but it needs to bring the reader into your experience, not meander through your life. For instance, as a cancer survivor, you've endured massive life and personal adversity. That's admirable and open to a narrative. But it can't be simply a starting point. The way I read your statement was effectively, "I had cancer. listen to my story." I don't mean that to be dismissive of your battle with cancer, but more hope to convey the message I received from your statement. Nothing about your statement drew me in to the narrative you're hoping to craft.
What I would suggest is to key into something significant about you (cancer can be the vessel, but it has to be a unique take on that angle, even if it's not truly original). The adversity narratives I've read didn't focus on the adversity specifically, instead focusing on something interesting within a normally accepted version of adversity. It's harsh to classify cancer as a normally accepted version of adversity, but the truth is ADCOMs will have read cancer survivor stories as well as many other types of adversity, so if you want your statement to stand out, find an interesting angle you hope to convey and make it focused on that singular theme.
I'm not trying to make you feel bad, but I tried to assume you could cut out the first paragraph because it was so bad, but then it never got better. I would sincerely recommend you read some other samples before trying another statement. You likely have a great narrative worth telling, but it needs to bring the reader into your experience, not meander through your life. For instance, as a cancer survivor, you've endured massive life and personal adversity. That's admirable and open to a narrative. But it can't be simply a starting point. The way I read your statement was effectively, "I had cancer. listen to my story." I don't mean that to be dismissive of your battle with cancer, but more hope to convey the message I received from your statement. Nothing about your statement drew me in to the narrative you're hoping to craft.
What I would suggest is to key into something significant about you (cancer can be the vessel, but it has to be a unique take on that angle, even if it's not truly original). The adversity narratives I've read didn't focus on the adversity specifically, instead focusing on something interesting within a normally accepted version of adversity. It's harsh to classify cancer as a normally accepted version of adversity, but the truth is ADCOMs will have read cancer survivor stories as well as many other types of adversity, so if you want your statement to stand out, find an interesting angle you hope to convey and make it focused on that singular theme.
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Anonymous User
- Posts: 432052
- Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am
Re: Breast Cancer PS - close to a final draft?
Nah, honesty is what I came for. If it needs total reworking, I need to know that. Thank you!UVA2B wrote:No disrespect to you and your journey through cancer diagnosis, but this entire statement is unworkable. You need to work on sentence structure, grammatical structure, and flow of narrative.
I'm not trying to make you feel bad, but I tried to assume you could cut out the first paragraph because it was so bad, but then it never got better. I would sincerely recommend you read some other samples before trying another statement. You likely have a great narrative worth telling, but it needs to bring the reader into your experience, not meander through your life. For instance, as a cancer survivor, you've endured massive life and personal adversity. That's admirable and open to a narrative. But it can't be simply a starting point. The way I read your statement was effectively, "I had cancer. listen to my story." I don't mean that to be dismissive of your battle with cancer, but more hope to convey the message I received from your statement. Nothing about your statement drew me in to the narrative you're hoping to craft.
What I would suggest is to key into something significant about you (cancer can be the vessel, but it has to be a unique take on that angle, even if it's not truly original). The adversity narratives I've read didn't focus on the adversity specifically, instead focusing on something interesting within a normally accepted version of adversity. It's harsh to classify cancer as a normally accepted version of adversity, but the truth is ADCOMs will have read cancer survivor stories as well as many other types of adversity, so if you want your statement to stand out, find an interesting angle you hope to convey and make it focused on that singular theme.
