About

So… you want to know more about me? I am usually really quiet and secretive about myself, but I feel it is time to change that and open up a little bit. This is the reason for this blog, to tell my story and share my life with others. I wanted to provide others in my situation with the knowledge that they are not alone in the world.

I was born and raised in West Virginia. My father had his dad and step-mother watch me for a while until I was about three months old. At that time, my grandparents wanted to adopt me and claim me as their own. The timing of this was right around the time that they had just lost their newborn daughter. So they wanted a child in their life and so I guess they chose me.

My father wanted to keep me but my grandmother, his step-mom, demanded that if they were to keep me that they should be able to adopt me. So it was pretty much, he was forced to let them adopt me. I lived with my grandparents and only knew of them as my mom and dad up until the age of 11, at which time they told me I was adopted. This was a shock that took a long time to understand and to get over. My brother was really my dad and I had no clue.

I had a lot of issues growing up that made life even that much harder on me. I was being raised by overprotective parents to the point I really had no outside contact with people for most of my life. I spent the majority of my life alone in my room, playing games by myself. There were a few times that I was able to interact with people, but only for very short periods of time.

I got along really good with my cousin and she was like my best friend in the whole world. It was always so much fun playing games with her and having so much fun. I also had friends that would visit their grandparents and the end of the street we lived on. Two boys and a girl, we also had so many fun times together.

My life in school was just as bad as it was at home. I was always being picked on and bullied. I was never left alone and always ended up with like no friends the whole time I was in school. Eventually, I ended up on homebound schooling in the middle of ninth grade.

I was 15 years old when I went on homebound, and it was all due to various problems that several doctors had found. The first and biggest one was Marfan syndrome, which is a very bad problem for so many systems in the body. Second was the Fibromyalgia which caused me pain every single day for pretty much my entire life. Third was Manic Depressive Bipolar, which as it sounds, made me tired and depressed almost every single day.

Eventually, my grandmother was diagnosed with breast cancer and ended up becoming bedfast. My grandfather wasn’t in very good shape either as he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. And to top it all off, they both had really bad eyesight. My grandfather lost one eye when a doctor tried to remove a cataract from his eye and decided to never get the other eye fixed. So it ended up being me that took care of them every day, 24/7 and with not really any help from anyone else. Sure they had a company coming in to supposedly help them out, but they never did their job. All they did was come in and do a couple small things then sit down, watch TV, and drink coffee and smoke cigarettes.

So with all the extra stress of doing everything they needed and dealing with my issues, I was about to break. I asked for help and pleaded for help from other family members, but it always fell on deaf ears. I needed a break and no one was going to help me out. I was falling deeper and deeper into a pit that was consuming me. I saw no way out and only several ways to end what was going on. I had ended up in a crisis center after almost driving the car into a pole at about 55 mph. I wanted it all to end, I was tired of fighting myself and having to put up with everything else that was being dropped on me.

Eventually, after an attempted suicide, I decided to “come clean” about what was really bothering me. I finally worked up the nerve, three days after the suicide attempt, to tell my grandparents what was wrong all these years. I explained how for so many years it was like I was always fighting with myself. Trying to understand and figure out what was going on with me. My life was spent searching for answers to what most people take for granted and never think about.

So in the spring of 2007, I told my grandparents that I was a trans woman and that I needed to take some steps to make my body match my mind and heart. I had spent so many years trying to come to terms with it all and I finally realized that this was what I had to have or else. There were a lot of tears and a lot of questions, but in the end, it worked out pretty good.

I moved to Seattle Washington to be with my father in the summer of 2008. That was my best decision of my entire life, after coming out to everyone of course. I was scared to death to tell my father, because I had yet to see him for more than 2 weeks at a time when he would get a chance to come to West Virginia to visit. I wanted to learn about him and for us to connect and bond. I also had a hidden agenda for coming up here, to get help with my issues.

After about three months of living here with my father, I felt it was time to tell him about my issues. He took the news a lot better than I had imagined. Him and my step-mom, was fully supportive and their actions have proved that to me. I am so happy to have people who care and support me around me; it makes this all so much easier. I feel sorry for others that have no support at all, and I wish I could help every single one of them.

Not everyone is as happy and supportive as my father was though. My full brother seems to have a few issues with it along with his children. I spent the weekend with them when I felt it was time to explain this all to the kids, but it didn’t go over very well. I understand how confusing this all could be to a child and I apologize for making them feel bad or upset them, it was never my intention. So now, I try and keep my distance and not interact much with them as to not cause any more issues.

My current doctors have found that my depression and my internal struggles is what caused my physical issues. Once I started making the necessary changes in my life, most of my issues seamed to slowly wash away. It has been a long process and a lot of pain, but it is sure worth it in the end. I am not at the end of this journey yet, more like the start, but the steps so far are the best times in my life.

We are all born into this world with many differences, some of us never notice or they don’t bother them. Others, it may be a constant reminder on a daily basis. Either way, we all either learn to deal with it and go on or find a way to make it easier on us. Some of us might take medication to solve some problem we have, or require surgery to correct problems. Others may have to make drastic changes (to some) to make our lives easier.

I can’t understand why people can’t just learn to accept people. There is so much diversity among people today; we are all different in many ways. Yet we really are the same in a lot of ways. We all want to be happy, we want to be loved, and we want to live life. Why must we all have to make others lives hard just because they do things to make their own lives better? I live life in my own way and think “as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else, then go for it”. That is kind of a simple way of putting it but that is how I feel. If we do things to ourselves to make our life better and it doesn’t hurt anyone else, why should it be a problem for everyone else? It doesn’t make sense that people have to be so mean to others in this world. We only have one life, shouldn’t it be happy?

My Likes

• Nature – I love going for walks in the woods, waterfalls always grab my attention. Sitting there just listening to the water over the rocks. Butterfly’s… don’t ask!
• Music – I like a lot of different genres of music. Classic rock, rock, classical music, alternative, even rap (yes I know, it’s horrible).
• Food – Who doesn’t love food, I mean really.. My favorite food is my own spaghetti that I make.
• Computers & Internet- Yep, a geek for sure. I use the computer mostly for finding lots of new and interesting things. Plus to keep in touch with some of my family.
• Movies & TV – I love science fiction, drama, comedy and action movies. I love to try and find hidden meanings in movies, it’s just something I always do. My favorite television shows are usually nature/science shows. But there are a few series that I like to watch.
• People that are honest – I can’t stand it when people are not honest or lie all the time to get their way. It just really upsets me.

Dislikes

• Close-minded People – I mean, here it is 2010 and we still have people that think and act like back in the stone ages. “We no understand, beat with club!” Yea, just call that progress.
• Overly Religious People – You know these people, the ones that get up in your face and tell you oh so much of what you are doing wrong and what you should be doing.
• Politics – I can’t stand to talk about politics for any reason really. I would rather skip this topic or just excuse myself (most times) from ny conversation about it.
• People that cannot tell the truth – No matter what, they always have a lie to cover up another lie.. Ugh, I really hate that.
• West Virginia (Small states/towns) – I am a big city girl, I love the big cities for the fact there is more to do.

That’s just what I could think of right now, I am sure I can think of more later on. It has taken me 6 edits to get to this point on this page and that is really not cool. But anyway, this will be updated again over time.