I was born and raised in the Appalachian Mountains of East Tennessee.

When I was 13, I was offered a monetary gift to attend an elite all-girls’ high school. I accepted the gift, which created some weird family drama, but that’s for a different time.

Without truly knowing why, I often felt different in comparison to my peers, and that basically followed me around forever. My family life was complicated, and I felt ashamed because of it. I left home as soon as I could and attended the University of Tennessee, where I tried to start carving out my own path.

After college I got married then went back to school, where I got a master’s degree in the Science of Education and an emphasis in Clinical Mental Health. Shortly before graduation, I was longing to become a mother, so lo and behold, I shifted my tunnel vision, and we got pregnant on the second try.

When I was twelve weeks pregnant, we found out my mother had cancer. She died before my baby turned one. Almost three years later we got pregnant again, and in my third trimester, I lost my big brother to alcohol-induced liver failure. He was 36. One month after our second baby was born, my husband accepted a new job in Seattle, WA. It felt like a new adventure, and within two quick months, we had moved across the country with a toddler and a newborn, and a whole new set of circumstances.

It didn’t take long to fall in love with the Pacific Northwest, maybe because we were open to a fresh start. Yet, four years into our new life, I received the call that my father had died. In seven years, I had created my own family unit, while my entire family of origin had vanished. Life became very, very dark.

I felt the urge to write more regularly when my mind wouldn’t stop racing, and I had to get it out of my circuits. Piles of journals became filled with the chicken scratches of my desperate mania. Overtime, I found myself reconnecting with the world around me, and step by step, I pulled myself out of hell.

I’m hoping to solidify in words what I discovered on my journey to hell and back.

Thank you for reading!