Stories Plus

It’s hard to choose a single word to define who I am at my very core. Everyone is a mix of different characteristics which can be difficult to separate. However, if I must choose one to define me, then I will choose the one that got me to where I am today and drives my every choice: passionate.

I was only 11 years old when I realized my love of writing could take me somewhere. I was in the fifth grade when I decided I wanted to be an author/illustrator. As I grew older, I settled on simply a writer, and found the words to accurately describe why I felt so passionate about my works. It was about sharing a small piece of me with others, but also about expressing all the adventures running through my head. I realized I wanted to pull people from reality and take them on a journey. I want them to feel strong emotions. I want them to laugh, to cry, to fall in love with characters or hate them with every fiber of their being. I didn’t care if they loved or hated me. So long as they loved the stories I told.

Over the years, it got harder to stick to my passion for writing, but it’s what kept me going throughout my school years. There was a time I was so depressed, I couldn’t find anything I loved about myself, but I didn’t give up because I still had a passion to drive me forward. I tried college for a bit. I wanted a creative writing degree. College wasn’t for me back then with the way my mental health was, but I would love to go back and take creative writing classes someday. No matter what happened, no matter how I felt, I had writing to pull me through. A passion I would never give up on. To this day I still try to find ways to share my stories with others through this blog, YouTube, discord, or even just fanfictions on AO3. I love hearing feedback and it drives me to keep pushing for my dreams despite the obstacles.

My passionate nature isn’t just about writing though, I also feel strongly about LGBTQ+ community. I want very strongly for them to have a safe place to just exist and be human, even before I realized I was a member myself. I’m not afraid to be myself and call out those who try to use the bible against me. For anyone who follows the Pope, he declared so long as we hold God in our hearts there’s no reason we can’t go to heaven. I’m not going to hell and I never was because I try to be a good person and at the end of the day, isn’t that all that matters? I love my friends and family and I want so badly for everyone to feel safe no matter who they are or who they love. I ended up becoming a sort of online mother or older sister to a lot of kids in the LGBT community. I still have a lot to learn, but that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve someone safe to talk to about who they are. It doesn’t replace the need for a real life person to go to, but it helps.

I also feel very strongly about mental health, disabilities, and all their related services. America is not doing a good job taking care of its citizens in general, let alone those who are really struggling. I’ve struggled with my mental for over a decade now and it’s astonishing to hear someone describe it and others question how that’s even possible. For example, when I was in high school, my friend’s older sister came to one of our classes to discuss college life and she mentioned a friend of hers who had gotten depressed and needed reminding to take a shower. I remember seeing all of my classmates giggling or discussing “who doesn’t take a shower?” but I understood. When you no longer care about something, you stop taking care of it. I talk very openly about my mental health journey in hopes of showing others that it’s okay to talk about and it shouldn’t be taboo and that there are other people in the world going through it and they aren’t alone. I’m always willing to share my experiences and how I found the will to live again to show it’s possible and worth the fight. And after years of experience I have the words to express why it is important and how it works to those who don’t understand.

I also work in respite care, which is a service through government insurance to help provide some respite from families taking care of someone with special needs. I work for a family with a teenage daughter who has special needs and can’t fully take care of herself. She needs constant supervision and help putting on shoes, taking baths, and brushing her own hair. She just doesn’t have the proper motor function or cognitive recognition to handle taking care of herself. Luckily, I’ve only dealt with one rude person in public who tried to blame her for this one man getting frustrated at the dozens of kids playing in the pool. But I reminded her there was a lap pool for this very reason. She’s a very sweet kid and while most people don’t understand her, it’s nice to see how she grows and how some people do interact with her, especially within her own neighborhood. But no matter what happens, it isn’t her fault she was born this way and there’s no reason she can’t exist in public spaces. Disabled people shouldn’t just be hidden away from the world because they “might get in the way” or whatever people think. She’s just a kid who wants to swim in the pool, play on the playground, or read in the library. Yes, she comes with some quirks and I do my best to make sure she isn’t disturbing anyone and she plays nicely. But I will never stop sticking up for her when people try to say she shouldn’t be in public because she doesn’t understand. That’s my job.

I hold many passions in my life and in the end I use my strong sense of justice to fight for what I think is right. I try to be a good person and help those who I think need it. Unfortunately, I do end up reacting strongly to bad news and it hurts, but I still push forward. There’s only so much I can do, but I will find a way to do what I can. I may not be able to change the world, but I can change lives, and to me, that’s what matters.