I am originally from Washington State, where I grew up on a small family farm. My childhood held moments of gentleness—gardens to tend, animals to care for, the quiet rhythm of rural life. But it also held the lessons no child should ever have to learn: how to fear hands that were supposed to lift me instead of bruise me.

I was adopted by my grandparents when I was four years old. I knew my biological mother growing up, but I didn’t meet my biological father until much later in life. That mix of belonging and distance shaped more of my identity than I realized at the time.

I started ballet at three, and for a while dancing meant freedom—movement, joy, a way to speak without words. But eventually, I was taught that to succeed, the body I was born with was wrong. My curves, my softness, my shape were treated as flaws to be eliminated through extreme methods. The joy that once sustained me cracked under that pressure, and I walked away.

I became a mother, married young, and divorced young. Patterns repeated and unraveled. I have been married twice, and I am also widowed—a story I will share when I’m ready in my blog. What I can say is that my twenties and thirties were a ride, full of moments that could have broken me, but didn’t.

Somewhere in that journey, I had another daughter. Both of my children are girls, and they are the brightest parts of my world. I began my healing journey for them—though I can admit now that I started much later than I should have.

Writing has always been a part of me, though for most of my life I kept it hidden, sharing pieces only with my best friend. But in 2023, I enrolled in college and finally stopped looking back. I’m now working toward a degree in Creative Writing with a minor in Business Writing, choosing at last to honor the voice I spent years silencing.

Today, I live in Oklahoma. I’m engaged to my best friend of more than twenty years, raising my youngest daughter, and caring for Writer Cat and Hellhound Puppy, who complete the beautiful chaos of my home.

This is who I am: a survivor, a mother, a writer, and a woman gathering her shards—not to hide them, but to build something powerful from them.