Rachel Schloesser

My sister, Rachel Family Photo

Rachel Schloesser was an original child who loved to sing when no one was looking, help around the house, and play with her siblings. She is the oldest of four children at age 19. Her brother Michael is 18, Joseph is 16, and her little sister, Caroline, is 14 years old.

She was born and raised in Minnesota where she attended a small, private school called St. Elizabeth Ann Seton. She attended S.E.A.S from pre-school to eighth grade. From there, she went to Cretin-Derham Hall, a Catholic School in St. Paul. Presently, she is in college at St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minnesota. She has achieved many things in life such as making varsity volleyball two years in a row, being in honors courses, finishing her senior year with a 4.03 GPA, getting accepted into college, and being able to manage her own life.

When Rachel was thirteen, her father was diagnosed with cancer. "It was difficult to deal with a deathly ill parent," she claims. When she was sixteen, her parents separated, then officially divorced when she was eighteen years old. This was very hard on her because it seemed like the family she once knew no longer existed.

To keep strong, people live by mottoes, quotes or psalms. Rachel's motto is, "There is no me in team." This doesn’t just apply to athletes but the world each one of us lives in. We are not alone. Her favorite quote she lives by is, "The way the world turns, the way we all react, the times we cannot know, until they hit so hard. The best days are our worst, and the worst days are our best. But always will be our days, and our fights." Rachel says the past is sometimes a hard thing to look at. Sometimes we ignore it or pretend it never existed or make up something that we wished happened. But it doesn't matter, because it's the past. We should look towards the future.

As my big sister, Rachel has shared a lot of her thoughts about life with me. She believes it is important to learn from experiences, make memories, and learn to love. Take something, a bit of knowledge, away from everything you do. Take pictures, journal, and share stories with each other, mainly for making memories and keeping them alive. Do something crazy, take chances, make changes, volunteer, teach, and preach. Don't be afraid to love someone; you might get hurt but that hurt is a new feeling that you have to experience sometime in your life. Spend quality time with your family and friends; they are your world. Find something to do and do it, even if you aren’t good at it. Get a passion for something and share it with the world. Find something that makes you who you are and don't be afraid of judgment. People are only human and we will all hurt others and, in turn, be hurt by them.

Today, Rachel is on the right track to be a successful woman. She is a college student, planning a major in psychology and possibly a minor in French. After St. Scholastica, Rachel has her hopes up to transfer to the University of Minnesota for a graduate program to further pursue her career.

The biggest influence in her life is her mother, Michelle. She looks up to her mother as a strong, caring, loving, beautiful, and new woman. People classify celebrities, superheroes, rock stars or famous sports figures as their heroes. My sister is not a celebrity, a superhero, a rock star, or a famous sports figure. She's not only my big sister, she's my best friend. The person I always have and continue to look up to is my sister, Rachel Schloesser.