I had to walk away from my family (NC 6 years), my hometown, dump nearly all my childhood friends, drop out of school, to truly live authentically, true to myself, in safety and with a loving environment in my life.

Because it was excessively unsafe for me to be authentic and to be myself - being myself led to beatings, violence, psychological abuse, harassment, sexual violence, from parents, family, friends, teachers and neighbours. Doing things and expressing myself in ways that felt completely natural and authentic to me attracted all of that bullshit on myself.

I just wish that earlier in my life I had the bandwidth and support to be myself, live authentically and lean freely into my creative and athletic interests. That’s what I deserved.

There’s a lot of things about me that are extremely different from established social norms - I’m a queer racial minority, I don’t want to marry or have kids or buy a house, I have very feminist political views, I don’t work a 9 to 5 and have a creative job, I dress kind of boldly - and I used to be VIOLENTLY PUNISHED AND ASSAULTED as a child by Nparents, family, friends, teachers and neighbours for those things. I still carry that trauma and there’s still a part of me that’s scared that being 100% my authentic self with all of its differences from the norm would lead to more trauma and abuse for me, even if I’m aware that my circumstances have drastically changed, that I’m safe and a full grown adult now.