Law School Discussion

I do think it would add to the overall topic of my PS, though I have one concern. Namely, I am concerned that the admissions people would wonder why I'm not applying to the dual degree program off the bat, but rather waiting until my first year in law school to apply to the other half. I don't know how to talk about wanting to do the program without making them wonder about this....

Okay I'm not really sure if this belongs in this area or not, since I'm not even sure if it belongs in a personal statement or in an addendum attached to the application or... well maybe something else.

Background: From about the end of my first year in school until the beginning of my fourth I suffered from a severe gastro-intestinal illness. I was on medication for said illness for part of this time, but it still affected my ability, in some cases, to attend class / perform well. There was a quarter during this period in which I had to undergo a series of diagnostic tests in the hospital... a period which was very scary for me as my doctors had no idea what was going on and cancer was a possibility at one point. I actually had to withdraw from a class as a result (the professor wasn't understanding that I had to miss class for these procedures... but that's a story for another day). My issues were largely resolved by surgery that I had after the first quarter of my last year in school and I've been doing much, much better since.

Now, during this period of time, my grades were lower than they probably should have been. I'm not offering this as a complete excuse... I, like many undergrads, did some stupid things which hurt my GPA, but I do feel that this illness contributed in some ways.

So... should I mention this somewhere? How do I go about doing it? Would admissions committees believe me or even care? I don't want to make it seem like I'm trying to offer only excuses but...

Sigh...

Hello all. I'm band spankin' new here (yey!), so I apologize if this topic has already been addressed... though since the search function is so inadequate it would be hard to tell if it has been.

Anyway, I graduated from school this past June and am in the midst of my year off. I'm applying to law schools right now and am in the process of writing a personal statement (yey). I know that I have a strong desire to pursue a dual degree... either a J.D. / Ph.D. in political science / something similar, or a J.D. / M.A. in the same areas. However, as I am not completely certain of this and also did not feel up to taking the LSAT and the GRE at the same time, I'm limited my applications to law schools at the moment, with the intention of possibly applying to dual degree programs during my first year of law school, which I've heard is actually a common course of action.

My question is, should I include this little nugget of information in a personal statement? Does it add or detract to my desirability as a candidate for admission? I know the PS isn't really that huge of a component of admission... but I don't want to unintentionally f it up by including something I shouldn't...

Any thoughts?