Common app essay and drugs?

<p>Hi, so I'm starting to work on my personal statement and I'd really like to avoid writing a generic essay. Is writing about my older sister who had a drug problem and dropped out of college while I was growing up a bad topic? Can I spin that into a good sob story about how she influenced me to be a better person student and blah blah or do colleges not want to hear about that?</p>

<p>The topic is okay to write about, after all it was probably a major thing in your life. But don’t make a generic sob story and ‘better person’ generic stuff for goodness sake that is not insightful or helpful to you and sounding like a suckup isn’t the way to go.</p>