{"id":11650,"date":"2016-01-08T23:38:20","date_gmt":"2016-01-09T04:38:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/verastic.com\/?p=11650"},"modified":"2016-01-08T23:38:20","modified_gmt":"2016-01-09T04:38:20","slug":"have-you-ever-had-a-second-chance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/social\/have-you-ever-had-a-second-chance.html","title":{"rendered":"Have You Ever Had A Second Chance?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"blogher_content\">\n<p><script src=\"http:\/\/ads.blogherads.com\/bh\/70\/709\/70956\/1144985\/campaigns\/22\/2278\/2278238\/x90.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>I have mentioned before that both my parents are medical doctors, and that <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.blogher.com\/clicktracker.php?nid=2278238&amp;cid=2274867&amp;url=http%3A%2F%2Fverastic.com%2Fpersonal%2Fim-not-a-doctor-and-daddy-isnt-over-it-yet.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">they always wanted me to become a medical doctor<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0too because as far as they were concerned &#8211; dad especially &#8211; medical &#8220;<em>doctorness&#8221;<\/em> was in my blood. Wrong.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11653\" src=\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/Second-Chance-DP.jpg\" alt=\"Second-Chance---DP\" width=\"750\" height=\"500\" srcset=\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/Second-Chance-DP.jpg 750w, https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/Second-Chance-DP-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px\" \/> <\/p>\n<p>When I realized that the doctor thing was not going to work, I decided to try the next best thing: nursing. I took all the prerequisite courses and passed, and I even made it into nursing school. I survived the first semester of Fundamentals of Nursing, and then, in the second semester, I tried even harder to survive Med-Surg (Medical-Surgical Nursing 1) and Psychiatric Nursing, but it did not happen.<\/p>\n<p>I failed out of Nursing School, and I was sure my life was over. I did not have a backup plan, Plan B or anything, and I had not imagined myself doing anything else (although I loved writing) because at that time, nursing was my only career choice, and anything that resembled a writing career was a hobby and a joke, not actually an option. How could the daughter of two medical doctors become a writer? It was not possible.<\/p>\n<p>After I failed out of nursing school, I tried to get into other nursing schools, but everyone rejected me. I got the classic, <em>&#8220;Although you meet all the requirements, we are sorry we have chosen other candidates. We wish you the best as you endeavor in your academic goals.&#8221;<\/em>\u00a0 That was the letter I got every time. I took extra courses to boost my chances, including chemistry which I did not like but managed to ace. That semester, my GPA was 4.0. \u00a0Still, no one took me in. I stayed home for almost two years with no school and no work and there were too many times that I really thought that all my academic, financial, and career dreams were over.<\/p>\n<p>As a Nigerian, not being a graduate is not really an option, and when you keep seeing other people graduate, you start feeling useless. I felt useless. Then while I was home, I discovered blogging. An online friend I had made from a Nigerian chat room had a blog, and she invited me via email to go read it. I read her blog, and there was absolutely nothing interesting on it, but it did not matter. What mattered was that I discovered there was such a thing as blogging. I did not have any money, so when I found out that Google would let me get my own space for free via Blogspot, I suddenly had a new outlook on life. And that was how I started blogging and telling my own stories. January 26th will make it 10 years since I started blogging, and I have not stopped thanking God for the grace to do this.<\/p>\n<p>When I started blogging, I never wrote about what I was going through academically, financially, and personally, but whatever I did blog about, people left comments, and those comments inspired me so much.\u00a0I decided to abandon my chase for a nursing career, and instead, I applied to more schools for a degree in Psychology. I was accepted into the University of Maryland and I had tunnel vision because all I wanted was to graduate. It was my second chance, my chance at not messing up academically and proving that I could do something.<\/p>\n<p>FOX has a new show coming up soon, called <a style=\"line-height: 1.4em; font-size: 13.008px;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.blogher.com\/clicktracker.php?nid=2278238&amp;cid=2274867&amp;url=http%3A%2F%2Fgoo.gl%2FVUBQuI\" rel=\"nofollow\">Second Chance<\/a>. The preview reminded me about my opportunity for a second chance and watching it allowed me to reflect on that time of my life. I enjoyed watching it and remembering the times I proved myself. \u00a0 \u00a0It&#8217;s about Jimmy Pritchard, a seventy-five year old disgraced sheriff and father who made all the wrong choices. He was a drinker, womanizer, and always put work ahead of family. But he was killed when he walked in on an ongoing armed robbery happening in his son&#8217;s house. He did not stay dead for long because some wealthy scientists experimented and brought him back to life as a younger, better version of himself with physical abilities that he never had.<\/p>\n<p>So, does being younger and stronger make him better, too? Does he recognize that a second chance has been given to him to possibly right the wrongs he did, or does he just have a second chance to do the wrongs again &#8211; maybe even worse this time? Watch the trailer below and try to guess.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0XfujuzhmCs?rel=0\" width=\"750\" height=\"422\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Second chances are about redemption, starting over, fixing errors, etc, but for Jimmy, it&#8217;s a lot more than that for him. For Jimmy, it is mostly about family. I cannot wait to see what he does with his second chance. <strong>Second Chance premieres on Wednesday, January 13th 2016 9\/8c on FOX.<\/strong> By the way, what kind of second chance would you like to have, and what would you do with it?<\/p>\n<p><script src=\"http:\/\/ads.blogherads.com\/bh\/70\/709\/70956\/1144985\/campaigns\/22\/2278\/2278238\/x92.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\"><\/script><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I have mentioned before that both my parents are medical doctors, and that they always wanted me to become a medical doctor\u00a0too because as far as they were concerned &#8211; dad especially &#8211; medical &#8220;doctorness&#8221; was in my blood. Wrong. When I realized that the doctor thing was not going to work, I decided to<a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/verastic.com\/site\/social\/have-you-ever-had-a-second-chance.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11653,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"twitter_14738191_14738191":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[560],"tags":[565,1226],"class_list":["post-11650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-social","tag-sponsored-post","tag-tv","entry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Have You Ever Had A Second Chance? 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