I was born when the Berlin Wall was still up, in Frankfurt, Germany. I was too young to go myself, but my parents took a visit to Berlin in November, which terrifyingly coincided with the wall being taken down. They had to make checkpoints during an evacuation under threat of getting shot. They made it back, and we later moved back to the US for my dad's job (the military) and I proceeded to move a lot during childhood, just 3 times in the US, where I finished the brunt of my elementary school. I was a bright student and got put into a gifted program (didn't last, disintegrated after I got off ADD meds and went through some times), where I was selected as a representative of my school. I shook then Vice President Al Gore's hand at an assembly. A little after this, I moved out of the states to Uxbridge, England, where Winston Churchill used to have a bunker. I took a few tours of it.

It was around this time my parents began to split, a rift I had a weirdly prophetic dream of, around age 7, but that dream probably came off childish "spot the difference" scenarios at friend's houses with their parents and mine. Those observations were likely compounded by my mother's compulsion to drink whole bottles of wine and smoke cigarettes alone on the patio in evenings. My mom did not move to England with my dad and brother and I. The most prominent experience I remember is going to the Isle of Wight for a weeklong class trip and learning about cousinfucker Queen Victoria, and turning 12 there.

After that we lived with my mom in SoCal, then bumfuck Tennessee, then SoCal again and it was generally a weird experience of cohabitation with my mom's high school boyfriends. It got pretty bad, not much because of them, but because of her drunken bouts, and I tried my best to be her most vocal opposition. Eventually, myself, my brother, and even the children of her last boyfriend were all temporarily foster kids while the CPS did an investigation on her, my dad, and her boyfriend at the time. It's a really strange part of my life that I can't always piece together accurately, but I guess this is pretty common when living or closely dealing with an abuser. My last vision of my mom before graduating high school was her holed up in a psychiatric unit after her most recent suicide attempt.

(I guess I can touch on this briefly, I've seen her a few times since but it always ends badly. I've since kept my newest number from her, and wish her a happy birthday, a merry Christmas, and a happy new year. Any information I give with her she manipulates, and picking away at the rose-tinted saran wrap you put over bad things about people you love reveals some very big truths. It's hard, but not impossible to progress past biological ties. This year I've been getting back in touch with her siblings and mom and it's been pretty good.)

We got ready to go to Germany again with my dad. I was pretty excited to come "full circle" as it were. That Christmas was still one of the best ones of my life, finally getting there, and getting our passports, and being done with that chapter of tribulations.

I graduated high school inconsequentially. A couple of years after that I joined here, and the rest I've probably overshared already. I think there are a few parts I didn't cover at all, after stopping my presence here in 2015? and then returning at the beginning of this year for a simple TWG. The block function is free if this re-emergence bothers you, though. Please feel free to use it.

Shortly, though, I was in the military for a while, the most interesting thing was being in Seoul when president Park got impeached, and President Moon-Jae In won after making a pretty aggressive campaign in StarCraft II. I got out of active in Colorado Springs, Colorado, which is where I lived when a significant event happened where I live now: Charlottesville, VA.

Here, a statue of a Robert E. Lee, a Confederate key player still stands, no longer covered in a plastic wrap, but protected by a hideous orange picket fence and no trespassing signs. A few blocks away is an ongoing memorial to the woman that died to vehicular manslaughter on a pedestrian mall. It's a really strange duality to consider. It does, however illustrate well the political climate of the US overall today; otherizing, free speech, and an ongoing oppressive history, but perhaps I'm waxing poetic about it.

Other than that, I'm pretty okay with life but I want to progress professionally someday. I want to help make the world a better place as unobtrusively as possible.

one thing that really fucks me up re: the military & mental health that they have all of those bullshit "seeking help is a sign of strength" campaigns and it's an e8 saying so, which I guess is supposed to tell you "wow it even affects successful people" but realistically they won't let someone go with a storied career. it's a different story when you're e4 mafia or something and easily disposable. not to mention inpatient psych admission is an immediate barrier to tight shit like SF or Ranger etc, takes away clearances, things that can limit or eliminate any career path in the military so I don't get why they make campaigns like that when the policies in place directly contradict the statement

I can't speak to a real deployment because I only ever "deployed" to somewhere safe and I didn't even interact with the local forces, just aussies and brits, but I saw more than one other medic get really fucked up after having some people die on him after his. it's really nobody's fault other than the people that send you there. even attached to "safer" MOSes I've had people I know die in the b's and after from suicide. no matter how many you hear of, that news never gets easier. someone from my last active duty squad killed himself last year and left behind his wife and toddler, it's heartbreaking to think about

i was born in toronto and lived with my parents and two older bros (they're twins). we moved to windsor, on when i was 1. we stayed there 'til i was a week from 8. we moved to massachusetts for 8 months then lived in the uae for a year. after that we moved to mn, which is where i grew up, essentially. my parents and older sisters (who we didn't live with) were from somalia, so i had the typical strict immigrant family thing going on.

growing up was fairly peaceful, barring the moving around for a bit. my parents stayed together. my mom worked as a nurse so we were raised in a middle class household. my mom had to work a ton of extra hours and was underpaid for her job though, but she had to stay there until we had green cards (we got that in dec 2013) or else we'd have to leave the country. so growing up i saw my mom struggling with her job. because of that i'm a really, really frugal person.

i had a decent relationship with my bros (or so i thought), and we were practically inseparable growing up. that was good because we were bullied a whole bunch growing up, for a variety of different reasons. for me, however, it was being a fat kid and then being weird. so, i never had friends, or real ones. the bullying continued until i finished middle school. i kept getting picked on more for sticking up for other kids, so i lost faith in people and wanted to keep to myself

i did really well in school always. i did grades 3 and 4 in the same year, so i was a year ahead. in the 7th grade, i started an accelerated math program, so i could finish multivariable calculus in the 11th grade. in high school, i was the 3rd in my class of ~500, and i got a perfect act score.

i started struggling with mental health in the 8th grade. i hated going to school once it hit. i'd miss often, but most of the times i missed i got my dad to call me in sick. on the days he didn't though, i'd have to go to detention :( . i tried to bring it to the attention of my parents, but they didn't believe in mental illness and told me to suck it up. i got into princeton my senior spring. for a few days i was elated, but after that i broke. my parents had to get me help. i was diagnosed with depression and social anxiety.

my parents were ashamed of me despite otherwise being a perfect kid, so i was disillusioned with living up to my family's cultural ideals. i also stopped believing in religion when i was 16 (i was muslim) after struggling with faith for 3 years.

college was a huge adjustment, and it was hard at first. school was hard for the first semester, and i was really shy and struggled to make friends. i began dating someone in my hall shortly after freshman year began, which was nice for a hot minute. then i learned that he spread rumors about me, and that was how my string of bad relationships began. i started improv right when i started college, but halfway through the year i started getting socially involved with them. they were my first friends. i milked princeton's resources to go to asia during my summers, so i had awesome times when i wasn't in school. sophomore spring i got out of my shell a bit and started partying more, and i had the typical experience of experimenting with drugs (weed, shrooms, acid). booze was my preferred drug though.

in my junior year, i started struggling with my mental health again, and i was faced with taking a medical leave of absence. i was about to do it, and even signed the paperwork, but then i decided against it because i had a feeling that i was finally gonna fit in in school (great reason, i know). i was in a psych ward during winter break (which was the worst experience of my life), but i was discharged and continue school. so i struggled through it and got shit grades, and i was right. i met jess my junior spring, and we became buds :D

the summer before my senior year, my brother bought me ice cream and sat me down to tell me that he hated me for most of my life. i was in shock, and i told him to get help.

i had short struggles with my mental illness from then on, but it wasn't as bad. then 2018 started and my life combusted, which i went into detail about in the past. but tl;dr: dated a rapist and eventually didn't believe the victim. probably the worst thing i ever did in my life. shortly after my ex was found responsible, i graduated from college, and my brother tried to kill me. i was in shock for the summer after (and even after that, although it wasn't as bad). i moved to texas to start my first job. started another bad relationship. hated my job. applied to medical schools (and ultimately didn't get in). i became really depressed and an alcoholic, so i had to get treatment and go home to minnesota. i'm estranged from my family because they didn't side with me on my situation with my brother

gonna get 3 months clean on the 1st. i live in a sober house and my parents don't know where i live. i'll be a us citizen on the 4th.

edit: my dad had a heart attack in jan 2018 too (on my birthday x.x). so that was the kickoff of my life combusting really. after that, i swore to myself that i'd live in minnesota again. and... well... i did it!