There is a quote that says, “Do what you can, with what you have, with where you are.” Teddy Roosevelt coined that line. I have held onto it when I caught my brain focusing on lack. This mindset has been my brain’s default for decades. Instead of this, I now try to focus on what I am capable of accomplishing right here and right now.

In keeping with that sentiment, I would like to invite you on my journey. I am on a journey to myself, my authentic true self. Life for me began in a tumultuous way. Early memories clouded my thinking. I was alone to process violence. Abuses were inflicted on my mother and my four-year-old self on through the first half of my life.

I was alone due to shame and secrecy; we just didn’t tell. When I did open up it was met with what I perceive now as apathy. Now, science has canceled out shame. So many others have shared experiences, strength, and hope in inspiring ways. I am eternally grateful to the brave souls before me. I humbly add my stories to existence as a light through the blinding fog on the road to ourselves.

CPTSD is what the label given to me reads. What it has meant in my life experience is a bending of myself. I twisted myself into what I thought others wanted me to be to gain acceptance. I wanted my needs met and sought any attention. I craved forms of what I believed love was. I have lived a life full of fear, lack, and longing no matter the surrounding circumstances.

All of that bending led to a breaking point. My abusers did not need to ridicule or belittle me anymore. They did not need to physically harm me. I had taken up doing that to myself. My thoughts were of darkness and death, of Nothing. I did not want to exist and the life I held onto was so painful. I lived in dense fog.

Through all the darkness, The Nothing, I saw there were still things in life to live for. I have given myself a new name, YY Driver. I am choosing to take the wheel. The things that held me here, that kept me alive, are my lights on the road to myself.

*Please know what I share is triggering for some so surround yourselves with supports. Stay here with us. The world needs us, all of us that know the darkness, The Nothing. The world needs those of us who live in the fog. We can show it is possible to be the driving force on our way back home to ourselves.