Makenzie Hicks
Bio
Just a girl tryin’ to live her best life, unapologetically.
Stories (2/0)
Why the United States Should Support Planned Parenthood
In a world full of wrongly accused reputations and (almost) an entire government trying to destroy a business, there are people like me who want to stand up for what is right. Planned Parenthood is not just a clinic a young girl would visit to get an abortion. Planned Parenthood is a place of refuge and support for young women all around the United States. Without them, we would have young women doing things they would not do otherwise if they were properly educated. We would have young women dropping out of college to take care of a baby that they tried every way in the world to prevent. We would have young women dying of cancer caused by Human Papilloma Virus because they aren’t provided scans or vaccines. Without this company, and its refuge, our young women would be in a state of crisis. As a country, we should be supporting a company that just wants to help and educate our youth, instead of trying to tear it down. Many people, when they hear the name “Planned Parenthood,” become panic stricken. Lots of people may think, “Oh no! Killing tons of babies! That is so wrong. How could anyone live with themselves?” when there is so much more to the company than just abortions. Not only do they provide this service, (safely if I might add) they also are the leading source of sexual education in the country. We should not need our population to get sexual education after they have made the mistake already; our population should have already known about these things and why they are important. Because they do not already have this information, the employees at Planned Parenthood have been trained to deliver this important information to everyone that comes through their doors. The Planned Parenthood education staff doesn’t only educate patients, they also educate students and children. The company itself reaches 1.5 million people each year. Out of that 1.5 million people, 65% of them are middle school or high school aged students. Their outreach program provides information useful for everyone. They have sex education information for people with no medical insurance, curious kids who have no parental support, and safe, non-biased support for people within the LGBTQ+ community. All in all, even if the company did nothing else, they provide important information for anyone willing to listen and receive it. Although Planned Parenthood plays an important role in the education and support of both men and women, they have a large portion of their company that deals with Women’s Advocacy. They are a large supporter of anything that benefits a women’s overall well-being. The widely encourage women to get to know their bodies and become familiar with its usual functions so that when something goes wrong they can identify it much easier. They have something within their clinics called a Well-Woman Visit, where they do many different check-up screenings to make sure the woman is at her best and that she stays that way. They have these screenings adjusted into different age groups. For example, if you are under 18, you may be given the HPV vaccine and have a conversation about your cycle to make sure everything is as normal as it could be. For me, this would have been much less awkward than my experience with the male doctor that gave me this vaccine and talked to me about becoming a “woman.” When you’re twelve years old, and in pain, all you can think is, “This man doesn’t even go through this, how would he know?” In conclusion, Planned Parenthood is more than just an abortion clinic. This is a place of safety, support, and refuge for all young men and women who are lost and need help. They have made a huge impact on the United States, and we should be intelligent enough to give them as much support as possible so that they can continue to impact our nation positively.
By Makenzie Hicks6 years ago in The Swamp
Loving Yourself Is Hard
The struggle started when I was eight years old. I remember looking at my parents and asking them if I was "fat." At eight years old, no little girl should even know what fat means, but I did. I wasn't fat, and I wasn't even chubby, but the little girl I was looked in the mirror and saw an extra 50 pounds on her body. I thought this was normal. Little did I know, this was merely the beginning. Fast forward on to middle school. My parents had divorced and so we moved from my hometown just outside of Cincinnati, Ohio to a small place called Clay County, Kentucky. This, in a sense, was the beginning of the large-scaled problems I had, and still have to deal with today. This middle school was different than other school I had been to. It was a small school, probably no more than 200 kids at the most, and this meant that everyone who went there knew each other. This made it very difficult for me as an incoming seventh grader to make friends. Everyone knows nowadays that kids can be really cruel, and I can vouch for that saying. I was a very short, small girl in middle school, and many people took advantage of that. I was pushed into lockers and told to go back to where I came from. I was bullied by boys that were bigger than me, was called a prude and a “city slicker,” and never really felt like I fit in. This gave way for my self-hate to sneak its way back into my life. Since then, I have continued to struggle with loving myself and accepting myself the way I am. It lead the way for my eating disorder to begin, and my life got really dark, but that is another story. Today, I am a freshman in college at the university of Kentucky, and I’m a major in Elementary Education. My goal for this year has been to learn how to love myself, and although I haven’t quite accomplished that yet, I am still working on it. Everyone is unique in their own way, and that’s okay! Being you is really the only option, because being someone else will only make you a clone. You are amazing just as you are, and when you realize that, a whole new sense of happiness will engulf your soul.
By Makenzie Hicks6 years ago in Motivation