PS hobbies and interests

**Kbee** · 07-06-2009, 01:44 AM

I'm looking for a bit of personal statement advice please (am only thinking about it at this stage, not drafting it yet!)
I'm a mum to a 3 year old and a 1 year old, I work full time at the moment and i volunteer in a hospital at the weekend. As you can imagine, all my 'spare' time is spent with my kids and I've got absolutely no time for hobbies. This leaves me with two options re personal statement: make up some interests or be honest and say that outside of work my kids come first and all of my time goes into activities with them.
I would obviously much rather be honest but I don't want to shoot myself in the foot. Any advice would be much appreciated!

**giella** · 07-06-2009, 07:43 AM

Do you do anything with your kids? Go on trips? Read with your children? Go to activities with them? Surely you haven't stopped being a human being altogether? You must do something to relax. Photography, reading, travelling? These are the things that motivate us. Whilst you may well put your children first, you surely live for something other that feeding, bathing, changing, working and volunteering.
There'll be something, even though you perhaps don't have the time to prioritise it and be a world class ice skater or what not in your spare time. Whilst interesting and accomplished people possibly do make better doctors in the long run and maybe make medical education more engaging, in your case, I think you've got a wealth of experience in raising children and work etc anyway and medical schools would probably like to just see that you have something other than work to get you up in the morning and that you're interested in things outside of medicine - such as reading etc.

**Kbee** · 07-06-2009, 04:28 PM

Thanks Giella.

I do a fair bit of reading on the train to work and go for the occassional jog, but apart I do things non-stop with the kids when I'm not at work... otherwise they'd be climbing the walls with boredom! We do all the usual things like swimming, trips park, trips to the zoo, trips to the library, playgroups, fairs, painting, crafts, playing games etc, etc. But I'm not sure if it's the kind of thing I can sight on a PS because every parent does all of these things all day long! But on the other hand having kids has taken the focus of my life away from me to them, which has matured me and given me a wealth of life experience. I'm just not sure if an admissions tutor would be convinced though!

**Singh.Simran** · 07-06-2009, 09:48 PM

Sounds convincing to me. And i think only a tiny proportion are parents so it will hardly be same old same old...

**Martigan** · 07-06-2009, 10:03 PM

Kbee

I'm in a similar position, with my time with my son being pretty sacrosanct.

I had to fight for several years in court to get to see him. so he is no 1 priority when He is with me.

**dotvicky** · 29-06-2009, 11:28 PM

You could formalise what you do with your kids about how you're really interested in ensuring their personal development is completely fulfilling and spend time devising plans for them and how you find that very rewarding.

That's not phrased very well but you know what I mean. I am a mum and while I certainly spend plenty of time with them, I am more selfish and have a nanny that does a lot of the taking to parks etc. etc. so don't assume that all parents are as dedicated as you are and while I can write about my running/triathlon/dancing blah-blah-blah, you shouldn't be disadvantaged because you dedicate your time to your little ones.
Cheers
Vicky

**sukh21** · 06-07-2009, 03:40 AM

Hi Kbee,

Wouldn't a lot of the admissions tutors be parents and so understand how much of your spare time would be taken up by spending time with the kids?

**Martigan** · 07-07-2009, 05:36 AM

I was at Cambridge on Friday. They seemed pretty supportive of me being a parent. :-)

**Fried_Rice** · 11-07-2009, 05:14 PM

I really don't think you need to have many different kinds of hobbies so long as you can given examples of leadership, teamwork, communication skills, time-management skills etc.

As far as I am aware, when the universities mark your personal statements, there are no boxes to tick for 'plays an instrument >grade 5' or 'ridiculously good at teamsports' and that sort of thing, but rather the boxes will be things like leadership, teamwork, communication skills, time-management skills and so on. It doesn't particularly matter how you show that you have all of the above, if you can say that you have gained these skills from activities, then you should be fine!

Good luck!

ps. The only exception to the rule as far as I am aware is volunteering, with some universities apparently having rules for long-term volunteering (perhaps to show perseverance).