A brief story on my life

I sit here now at the age of twenty-five and can still imagine the delicious aromas filling the air from my grandma's hearty meals she would often prepare for dinner. I think back to the great times in life when their was love and acceptance. I often heard the words, "I love you" and received a hug whenever my family went to bed or left for the day. Sigh, those were the good days and even now my eyes are watering as I think about what is missing in my life.

My childhood before the age of ten was semi-normal. My mom and father were divorced when I was very little and my mom and I moved in with my grandma and grandpa. I don't think my mom realized it then, but I would be living with my grandma throughout my entire youth. Because I was an only child, I was spoiled rotten and even received more attention than normal because I live with my grandparents, who became like my second parents. I loved all of them equally.

I did know, at a very young age, I was different from other kids. I didn't realize why, but I was constantly teased for my always accompanying girls. They were more mature, open and frankly, more fun. I found myself accepted more by them and teased more by the boys my age.

My mom became very ill when I was in third grade and doctors could not diagnose the problem. My mom fell into a deep coma and the doctors used the term grave on Christmas Eve. Her only option to survive was to transport her by helicopter to another facility. My grandma drove by car and I was unable to go. Instead, I was to stay at home with my grandpa. Over the next couple of months, my mom remained stable, but in a coma. My grandma only came home once and awhile and my world began to fall apart.

During this time, I began to discover my sexuality. I was alone with no one to talk to. I felt as if it were wrong to be attracted to other boys and I began to pull away from my peers and the rest of my family. I needed my mom and grandma and the pressure began to build. About a month into my grandma's and mom's absence, my grandpa suffered through a stroke.

I came home from school to find him unresponsive. He was sitting on the couch and couldn't seem to move or talk. I thought he was just being funny, so I left him alone and attended back to my school work. About an hour later, my grandma called and when I explained to her why grandpa couldn't talk, she told me to call 9-11. I found myself back at the hospital answering questions and scared out of my wits. The next few weeks were awful. When I came home from school, I had to act or play an adult at the age of ten or eleven. I was cooking, cleaning, bathing my grandpa and it just wasn't pleasant.

Thankfully, my mom woke up from her coma and they returned home. My mom was sent to a nursing home were she would receive around the clock care while she regained her strength. My grandma and I visited every night for weeks, so my childhood was non-existing. While my mom was in the nursing home, my grandma and I took classes on how to care for her once she returned home. We were taught how to lift her from a wheelchair, move her into bed, shower her, and help her go to the bathroom. My role as a child switched to caregiver for my mom. We struggled initially, but somehow we all prevailed.

My mom began gaining strength and slowly and surely, she started taking the initiative to do things on her own. I was so suppressed with my sexuality and felt as if I were lying (not only to myself), but to them. I felt selfish for wanting to tell them, scared as to how they would react, afraid of losing their love, worried about having to leave the house, and I became very depressed. For the first time, my grades dropped drastically, I was sleeping more, did not want to eat or get out of bed, and I lost interest in activities I loved such as bowling and playing piano. Nothing seemed to make me happy anymore. The only thing that gave me relief was my journal that I moved every night and acted as if I had OCD over. I would keep moving it in fear of someone discovering the journal or worse, the truth about my sexuality.

At night, I would sleep with the journal and guarded it like a dog guards or hides a bone. The journal became one of the most precious possessions I owned. Soon, writing no longer helped me. I attempted suicide one night after many weeks of contemplating my death. I could visualize my funeral (who would come), or who would miss me? What would other people say? Then, I would come to the conclusion that I was not important. I would have rather died than to disappoint my family with the deepest secret I held: the fact that I am gay.

After much though, I decided to down an entire bottle of pills for my mom's pain and went to bed. I don't remember anything else except for waking up in the hospital bed with beeps and muffling voices. My stomach was in great pain. Evidently, my mother came to the room after I crawled to the door and pounded on it unable to speak and barely able to breathe.

I was not allowed to mention the suicide attempt to anyone. What happened in the family, stayed in the family. My grandma was deeply disappointed with me. Everyone, including the counselor or therapist, thought that I had attempted due to the lack of attention I had received from my mom's illness and all that had happened with my family, but that just was not the case. I knew in my mind and heart it was because I was gay.

In 2002, I was outed in the newspaper and in front of the entire student body when I ran for Student Council President and we held a debate. One of the kids stood up and directly asked, "When are you going to tell everyone you are gay?" I about fell to the ground. The newspaper wrote about it and I was outed to my friends and family outside of school. I had made a decision though. The day I attempted suicide several years earlier, I vowed to myself that I would never again let my emotions defeat me. I found a new-found strength within my being and that is to help other people through the pain, through the misery. I knew my purpose in my life at the moment and that was to guide others to a path where they will be welcomed and accepted within their community. When I heard the phrase, "When are you going to tell us you are gay?", I thought back to the time when I attempted suicide, and I shared my story openly.

I was shocked when I won the election, but I had some rough years ahead. In 2003, I graduated, but right before I lost my aunt to cancer. My grandma and I were the care givers through Hospice. The experience was quite painful and I will forever had the memories embedded within my mind. In October of 2003, I lost my grandpa to cancer. We had Hospice again, and I decided to stay at home for college to help my grandma. My mom had remarried several years prior to this and in 2004, she died from complications of her disease. She was brain dead and we had to make the decision to pull the plug and let her go. Six weeks later, my step-dad committed suicide from taking her pills and having too much alcohol. My grandma and I didn't think it was intentional, but I question the truth still in my heart. I was with my grandma when we found him on the floor.

I was thankful to be living with my boyfriend at the time. He offered a lot of support, but he dumped me in the next couple of months after being together for two years. I became too serious and mature for him. Oh well, is my reply. My family came first and I lost everyone with the exception of my grandma. I became depressed once again, but found stability and strength within my grandma. We bought a house together in 2005. I had dropped out of school to pull my life back together and began in the fall of 2005 to become an English teacher. My schooling was interrupted once again when my grandma almost died in April of 2006.

She had five major organs shut down. I called my professors and told them what was happening and promptly called work and told them I would not be in until further notice. Somehow, she pulled through. The doctors were reluctant, but they decided to let her out of the hospital. She begged and pleaded with them because her and I had tickets to attend Wicked in Chicago for Mother's Day. We were both excited to finally be able to see the show and spend time together. She was in a wheel chair, so I drove into the city, carried her down to our front row and center seats to watch the marvelous musical. When we exited the theater, she was crying over my mom and her health. By the door to the Oriental Theater, laid a shiny black rock just sitting there and I picked it up, told her to always carry this rock with her and remember the happy memories in her life and what she is grateful for. I then told her how much I loved her and how thankful I am to still have her in my life.

December 15th, 2007, I came home from my bowling league and found my grandma on the floor. She was already gone. No one there. One hand placed on her chest and the other on the floor. In that one moment, my entire life came to a crashing halt. I couldn't believe she was no longer a part of my life. I had lost my entire family and now my grandma too. Leaving me alone at the age of 23, to plan a funeral, and pick up the entire mortgage of the house without a college degree. I was angry at myself for going bowling, angry at her for leaving, and I started to yell at none one in particular, "Why me?".

My distant family such as cousins, great aunts, and uncles, did not send food to the house. They did not call and check up on me. They were waiting for me to make the first move. When I didn't call, they assumed I did not want them in my life anymore. I needed them and I was left alone. Thankfully, I had great friends who stood by my side.

I was alone on Christmas, opening the gifts my grandma had bought and made for me. I sat and cried as I rocked back and forth on the floor, looking at the gifts I had bought her. What do I do with them, I thought to myself. It was the worst Christmas I have ever endured. The day after Christmas, I journeyed to my ex boyfriend's house down in TN, where I received love and attention; not only from him, but his family. We decided for me to move down there because I had no where else to go, and I could not keep up the mortgage alone.

I sought out a real estate agent and put the house on the market. We found a buyer within a couple of days and I was approved for a loan if I put down $20,000, I could buy a home for $135,000 or less. Awesome, I was so excited to be able to move and have money. My ex was going to move in with me and help with the bills, but in a couple of weeks, he dropped another bomb on me. He was engaged to a girl and no longer wanted to move in with me, but still wanted me to move down. I decided not to leave the area because he would be focused on his new life and I was really starting to worry about my needs and what was going to happen in the future.

I ended up receiving a promotion through work, that gave me $28,000 a year plus bonuses. The mortgage was a little under 1,300 a month not including utilities, gas for the hour and a half drive to work, food, and other necessities. Within a couple of months, I was cut off from the world. I lost my internet, my cell phone, television, and had problems coming up with gas money to pay the bills. Not only that, I put my name on the funeral and there was little life insurance. Today, I still owe $11,000. The bank stopped social security (I did not know she was getting that) because she had just turned 65 and my name was on the account, but I was not following it closely. They pulled out two months of social security and made the account negative causing everything to bounce, putting me into further debt with the bank resting at around $1,000.

My insurance was due and I decided not to pay for it. My plates were expired and there was no money to renew them. My life was crumbling around me. Within three months, I had lost my license, had two cars impounded for lack of insurance, expired plates, and then suspended license because I failed to pay for the tickets or appear in court to prove I had fixed the problem.

My ex broke up with his fiance and asked me to move back down. I was defeated and decided to sell the house. On December 28th, 2008, I closed on the house. I walked away with $18,000 a far cry from earlier in the year when I would have walked away with close to $70,000. The economy was bad, but I decided to do it or face foreclosure. It took $10,000 to move down to TN to start my life over again, but I did. I am now in the Chattanooga area, working on helping out youth struggling with depression, suicide, and GLBT issues. I have created an organization called STITCH (Standing Together In Tolerance Changing Humanity) www.sewingdiversitytogether.com and reminding people to not give up. I am still dealing with the struggles of the past years, but I have survived. My life can only improve from here and I am hopeful in looking toward the future.

A special group of students

The second part of our journey lead us to Portage High School. We were met by a counselor of the school and walked up to the second story (did I mention the school is huge). Gail Thomas, my personal representative in NW Indiana and marketing director, Timothy Reeves, my film and technical director, and I, executive director of STITCH all met together. We all sat in a circle and I asked for everyone to share their story and a little about themselves.

During this time, some talked about love and life, while others talked about physical and mental abuse, rape, someone had a friend who comitted suicide, and I could feel the hurt and pain just flowing out of them. As we moved forward, I asked how many of them have been bullied of harrassed in some way and almost everyone raised their hand. I was shocked by the amounts of pain they all faced on a day-to-day basis. My heart goes out to these students. I found myself wanting to cry out and hug each and every one of them as they shared their personal stories. The courage some took in telling their story, in front of a group of people was nothing short of astonishing.

In hearing their stories, flashes came back from my own past connecting me on a deep level with their emotional scars. I remembered my thoughts prior to attempting sucide and how lost and unconnected I felt. I was angry toward the people who made my life miserable, fear of people discovering my sexuality, scared of losing my loved ones once they found out I was gay, lonley for keeping my life a secret, and helpless not knowing where to go and who would understand.

I can only hope, I showed them, I no longer feel this way. My life is now full of love and friends even after losing my family in death. I have gained life-long friendships that I consider more than friends, but family because they have always been there for me through the thick and thin. I hope the students see their support group as a healing place where there are people around them who care and believe they matter. I know this because I am one of these people.

I also hope that they see how important each and every one of them is in our community. Every single one of them has something to offer society and to the future of our society. I have learned from them as I hope they learned from me. I do not deny, I do know everything and I am not always right, but the more I hear, the more I learn, the better equipped I become to help others. The stories and life experiences they shared, will definitely help me in aiding others. I want to see great things come out of this group of students, and in fact, I expect it.

I did not just feel and see pain when I entered into the room. I saw leadership, action, and a will to make a great community and a difference in the world. I love this because I know how difficult it is to be a part of something others in the school and community frown upon, but such a group is needed to offer support. They have two wonderful counselors who care very much about them and want these students to succeed and I am so happy they all have an outlet. Well, they now have three people they can turn to. I will be more than happy to do whatever I can in helping out anyone who needs me in some way. I chose this line of work, not for money, not for fame, but to help others. I find this way helps me to keep moving forward and to heal myself as well as others. I am so happy I was invited and was able to meet this wonderful group and I hope I connected and helped in some way.

This concluded my trip to the north. Later that night, I drove home thinking about everything I had learned and coming up with new innovative ideas to help them around. I do know that I will be in touch with the counselors more to be giving them information. I hope they do the same. I will be back in town in Aril for the Day of Silence and am looking forward to seeing everyone again.

A welcoming Congregation

Although my journey to the north was fairly short, the activities, people, and memories will forever permeate my thoughts. The first adventure placed me in the Unitarian Church of Hobart, where we celebrated marriage equality.

Prior to the marriage equality event that took place in the afternoon, a church service was held in the morning about, "Standing on the side of love". My best friend, Timothy Reeves, accompanied me from Chattanooga for my duration of the trip. Having been brought up in the Catholic religion, the traditional religious views turned him away from the institution while attending college.

We both were surprised when the Reverend if the First Unitarian Church bashed the Catholic church with their views on the GLBT community as well as immigration laws. The sermon provided was more of a philosophical view on love and history rather than a sermon announcing a belief in God, or telling others what is the right way to believe. We both watched as people shared their joys and sorrows, threw balloons in the air and taught the children that adults are not always right, but adults do certain things out of love for their children.

The latter was reinforced later in the marriage equality event. The board president gave a speech on the people who attend the church. He proudly announced, that the church had Pagans, Humanists, Christians, Atheists, people with no religion, and others and that Sundays can be a whacky place with all different beliefs.

The STITCH representative in NW Indiana and my marketing director, Gail Thomas, made a brilliant statement, "Out of all religions, the common denominator is love". The Unitarian Universalist Church lives by this one code and spreads it outward into the community.

Tim and I could feel the love within the atmosphere and other visitors called the attendees of the event, "family". An outsider walking in for the first time, would feel welcomed within the halls of the church. People immediately flock to your side asking a person about themselves and making them right at home. The students various schools, who helped in the event, loved the unity of all people.

Surprisingly, Tim asked if there was an Unitarian Church in the Chattanooga area. We are planning to attend this Sunday. I can only hope this church reflects what I have come to call home with the Unitarian Church of the north. Tim wanting to attend on Sunday, shows the power of love and joy as well as acceptance toward all people. If the church as the board president said, seems to be strage with strange people, then this is my kind of church and place.

First Class is Over

My first class has now come to an end. I received an "A" in the class and that motivates me more to do well in the classes to come. I was actually surprised how much work went into the online classes. A lot of reading, writing, and responding to other people made up the majority of the grade. The work was not difficult in itself, but just a lot in five weeks. My next class is sociology and I am looking forward to what I will be learning.

At the same time, I am working on my marriage equality speech that I will be presenting on Valentine's Day as well as speaking to the GSA at Portage High School, Tuesday February 16th. I am starting to fall behind and that is not a good feeling in the slightest. All I can do, is keep working and focusing on what is coming.

Work in February

My first class of school is coming to a close. At the moment, I still have an A with three more days to go, then start my new class: sociology. Yay! In just a week or so, I will be heading up north to deliver a speech on marriage equality in NW Indiana and visit Portage High school for their Straight Gay Student Alliance. I am working on trying to obtain some reading material for the kids and just made another youtube video on the day of silence. The last couple of months have been slow, and here we are now picking up momentum. The feeling is really good, and I am excited to see where this year takes me. We are also working on some fundraisers to keep our educational workshops and speeches going. This has been very difficult. We are a small team trying to juggle many different activities and I think all the momentum is taking a toll. I wish I could be up there helping my team, but I am grateful I have them. I could not even begin to imagine where STITCH would be without them. Thank you, thank you, thank you....Did I mentioned thank you?

Doug out. Hope you all have a good day.

Google ads and websites

One of the most amazing things I have come across is the power of Google ads. I would have never believed they work, but they do. I have had my Google Adsense page set up now for about three weeks and the traffic on the websites (3) is very minimal and I still pulled in about $15 from Google Adsense. I will be monitoring more closely, and reveal any secrets if I can possibly get this up to a large amount to take over the majority of my income, but we shall see. I will say this though, I hate setting up websites! Grrrr, I can't make anything work the way it should or look the way I want it to. I created a new website yesterday at www.nwindianadayofsilence.ning.com. This website is to promote the Day of Silence for April 16th as a movement to stop bullying, name-calling and harassment toward the GLBT community. My organization (STITCH) is sponsoring an event for all the schools and participants to come together in the community and share their experiences and find out what everyone can be doing to provide a safer environment to our schools.

An Assignment

Grrrr....I just received my feedback from my paper and I need to cut it down from 16 pages to 7 pages. How can I possibly write my life story in seven pages when I am 25-years-old a have lived a lifetime of events already? I am not a very happy camper right now, but oh well. I guess I have to do, what I have to do.