My life has been anything but easy. But I hope that maybe by writing about it and sharing it, I can help someone who I don't even know. Granted that could be quite a stretch, but it's worth the shot. However, many of you, or all of you don't know me. And that's cool and all, but if you can relate to my own story maybe you will by the end of it actually know me without really realizing it.

So where do I even begin? Well obviously, with my birth probably—that's going to take up seven pages alone so I'll skip to the short version. I was born back in the day, with a cleft palate. If y'all don't know what it is then Google it, because I can't do it justice. But anyway, due to my birth defect I had three surgeries to fix it. I don't really know when they all were, but to be real, they were all in the first three years of living. After my surgeries, I was forced to go to speech therapy for 9 years and within those nine years, I was able to learn sign language and how to speak. I know, crazy right? However, in my early years of life, I had always been shy in fear that people would make fun of me and my speech. But to fair, if I was really comfortable around you, I wouldn't shut up. And yet I still don't shut up when I should in today's time.

Due to my birth defect, I was able to qualify for an Independent Learning Plan (aka IEP). In the education system, it's considered a part of Special Ed. I knew I was special, but I didn't think I was that special. That is indeed a joke, you can laugh. Though, when I was young, I was petrified for people to know I was considered as "Special Ed" because I firmly believed it held me to a lower standard of achievement, which by all means it never did. I had been an honors student all throughout middle and high school, graduating high school with honors. But it wasn't until I was in high school that I realized that, my speech defect could never define me and couldn't hold me back. I'm glad I was able to learn that, because if I hadn't, going into college it would have been hard and applying for colleges would have been dreadful when it was the most exciting part of my life. It's needless to say that I never let my birth defect define who I would become and be.

Yes, I know this is going to sound like a Lifetime movie, but hear me out. High school was great and all, but when you were diagnosed with depression at a young age of seven, your self-confidence can be at rock bottom. Over the years, my depression had hidden dormant. It was my freshman year when things were the absolute worst. I remember getting a call from the guidance office stating that I needed to be seen. It was my mother's birthday, and it was finals. So, of course, this was just the perfect timing. Anyway, I remember sitting in the guidance office crying and showing my wrists. They were still cut up and raw from the night before. To explain this all to my mother on her birthday was the worst present I had ever given her. Then came sophomore year. I was so set on moving in with a family member in a different town just to escape the town I lived in and the people in it. But to my despair, that did not happen.

Just when I thought my issues were "cured" I was wrong. For the last three years of my life, I've battled a mix of multiple challenges. I have fought through athletica bulimia/anorexia and OCD stemming from anxiety. My depression had come back and my psychological health was being tarnished again. My anxiety created my OCD, and my OCD had created my eating disorders. Constantly thinking I wasn't skinny enough for society's perception had killed me. My eating disorders had damaged my female reproductive health and muscle. I must say that if you know anything about me, going to the gym is my sanctuary and is my "me" time. So losing muscle that I had built was detrimental to me. I'd played tennis and soccer throughout my life and my coaches always complimented me on my physical strength. But what I failed to realize is that my strength was my beauty. Because of society's perception of beauty was to have a thigh gap or to be skin and bones, it killed me knowing I wasn't pretty enough. But I do have to say, that over the past year I've tried learning that having strength is beautiful. Besides, why would you want to have a thigh gap, when you could have a thigh brow. If you don't know what it is, google it. But in the end, I've realized that my body is a temple and it's perfect the way it is. Keeping up with the squats and Russian deadlifts is prettier than keeping yourself starved.

If you didn't know me before, maybe you do now. And if you knew me before, maybe this opens your eyes to who I really am. I know that it's a long shot, but if anyone could really relate to my story then writing/sharing this was a success. Even if you don't relate to it, it's still a success for me, knowing that I've gotten the confidence to be 100 percent honest.