The Doe’s Latest Stories

To celebrate my 30th birthday, I embarked on a solo adventure to Edinburgh. Like a lot of young travelers, I enjoy using dating apps to meet local people and see the country through their eyes. Finlay (an alias) looked like he’d teleported from the beaches of Southern California. When he met me at the door of my hostel in Edinburgh’s Old Town, I was instantly smitten with his golden tan, sun-bleached hair and icy blue eyes. Over drinks, I attempted to fill in this blank canvas: He’d grown up on an island of 600, the youngest of six siblings. He was a passionate traveler but loved his country and had voted for Scottish independence. He never, ever dated local girls. I liked how he was able to laugh at his lame music taste. Despite having the feeling that Finlay was drunker than me, come closing time, I agreed to accompany him to a jazz bar, only to realize it was closed when we arrived. Finlay was furious. I started to have a bad feeling but told myself to relax and not to worry about it.

The victim-blaming and denial were almost worse than the night I had endured with Finlay.

I Was Physically Assaulted by a Tinder Date

I was going to piss myself if I didn’t find a toilet soon, so we went back to his nearby apartment, where Finlay poured us both a drink and chose some music. He settled himself down at the coffee table, engrossed in the rolling and smoking of cigarettes and apparently lost in a world of his own. I quietly listened as he began spitting out accusations in a surreal, one-way conversation: I was Miss Negativity. A headbuster. Controlling. Had a strong opinion of myself. Made boys’ lives hard. “No wonder you’re single,” he said. I discreetly made video recordings to send to a girlfriend, or maybe I subconsciously knew this was a bad situation and wanted some kind of evidence. I expressed my discomfort and said I wanted to leave. The next thing I knew, my body was trembling as Finlay stepped into my personal space. “Please move away,” I told him. “You’re scaring me.” Next: shock as he lunged at my hair. The kitchen lino beneath my cheek as he dragged me across the floor. “I might die tonight,” I thought.As I hyperventilated, he panted in imitation. “Are you a dog?” he said. I can’t be sure but he might have barked.“Calm down,” said the police officer after I escaped.It had taken eight days for them to arrest Finlay, before quickly releasing him from custody. My word was not enough to detain him. In my grief, I took to social media to share his face and warn others. If I wasn’t doing something every waking hour to keep what I experienced from happening to another woman, then I wasn’t doing enough. I realized that the rare possibility of a man succumbing to a false accusation was more important to many than the frequent physical abuse of women. Although I was mentally prepared for some backlash, to see the accusations with my own eyes was something else entirely. The victim-blaming and denial were almost worse than the night I had endured with Finlay. “Did you think that Tinder is possibly not the best place?”“We only have your word for this.”“Part of me suspects this is bullshit. I’m sorry you’re having a bad day.”“He’s innocent until proven guilty.”“Violence against women? No violence is taken as seriously as it should; absolutely no need to specify gender.” Before having my posts reported and deleted entirely, each response triggered my newfound anxiety, with trolls using my history as a mental health writer to discredit my claims. I was going out of my way to warn others about this dangerous man while still recovering from my own trauma, and this was the thanks I got? I drank and I drank. “If something like this happens and you want to get a result, you need to build a case that everyone can believe instead of just expecting them to take you at your word,” they said.I’d stopped recording before the attack because there was no storage space left on my phone, and even if I hadn’t, who knows what he’d have done when he snatched my phone from my hand? Why didn’t he hit me, so I’d at least have physical evidence? Why did I think someone that attractive would want to treat me well? “You’ve got a strong opinion of yourself,” he’d said.And then it happened: Just when I thought I couldn’t feel any worse, the messages began trickling in from local women. Many had seen his face on the apps and thanked me for warning them. Some had had their own run-ins with Finlay.

It’s been a stark reminder that my voice as a woman is worth less than a man’s.

Societal Disbelief of My Assault Shows How Far Women Still Have to Come

A few weeks later, after I’d thrown myself into publicly shaming the police and contacted the press, my case was picked up by Edinburgh’s domestic abuse unit. I was finally being heard. It turned out that several other women had reported Finlay before my own incident. While I’m pleased that justice may be on the horizon, how many women must come forward for our word to carry the same weight and bearing as the Finlays of the world? Making space in my mind for this experience has been easier than making space for society’s rejection of it. While friends have rallied around to remind me I wasn’t to blame, it’s been a stark reminder that my voice as a woman is worth less than a man’s. Women took my claims at face value, while men demanded evidence—because every woman understands the terror of simply moving through the world. While the biggest threat to a man is ending up in a cell, the biggest threat to a woman is ending up in a morgue. Let’s focus our fears in the right direction.

Whenever a mass shooting occurs, my first thought is always, “Who did he kill first?” or, “Who was his first victim?”And I don’t mean who was the first victim at the school, club or public space. I mean which woman the shooter was close to did he turn his rage on before committing an act of mass murder? After all, more than two-thirds of mass shootings that have been analyzed have shown that the perpetrator kills a family member or intimate partner first. Other studies show that these domestic violence-related mass shootings have the highest fatality rates. As someone who has worked with victims of violence in the justice system for the last 10 years, gun violence is not limited to the horrors that we see splashed across the media, temporarily awakening the masses from their sheltered slumber long enough to maybe change their profile pictures or argue with a relative about gun laws before returning to their unaffected daily lives. Gun violence is a constant whirlwind of abusive intimate partners, trigger-happy teenagers, suicide and lethal force directed toward Black and brown communities and the mentally ill.

We even know he is illegally in possession of a firearm because he has sent her pictures of it along with his threats.

I’m Working to Keep a Rape Victim Safe Because Their Case Isn’t a Priority to Law Enforcement

I live in a city with a population of just over 40,000. It’s primarily a military and agricultural town with a tight-knit community. Last year, we had 42 shootings in the span of six months, and there has been a 35 percent increase in gun violence since 2019. As I am writing this, there have been two shootings in the last three days. I hear gunshots on a weekly basis in my neighborhood, and there have been no less than four fatalities within just a few blocks of my home in the last year.I no longer feel safe walking my dog once the sun has gone down, and I am careful to stay in the most familiar neighborhoods, out of public parks and spaces. It’s through my professional work with victims that I feel the effects of gun violence the most. First, there’s the obvious increase in serving the victims of gun violence and/or their family members. Second, there’s the neglect that my clients—domestic violence, sexual assault and abuse victims—experience in their cases because detectives are overburdened with the ongoing gun violence. Solving any type of murder is always prioritized over the survivors of crime, even the ones who are actively in danger of being murdered. Currently, I’m working with a victim of domestic violence and rape by her partner. She has filed four different reports citing extremely violent incidents in four different jurisdictions over the last six months, but no arrests have been made. The cases sit open while investigators work on other cases involving homicidal gun violence. The most recent case is in limbo while the detective writes his report and obtains a Ramey Warrant for the suspect, but he is also investigating a fresh gun-related homicide case that came in a few days ago. Meanwhile, the suspect in the domestic violence case is calling the victim 200-plus times a day to harass and threaten her. We even know he is illegally in possession of a firearm because he has sent her pictures of it along with his threats. So other advocates and I are working with the victim to do everything we can to keep her safe while also not interfering with the investigation that the suspect isn’t aware of. Should he find out, it could potentially put the victim in even more danger.

The Solution to Gun Violence Is Not an Either-Or Proposition

It's also important to note that not all gun violence leads to death or involves illegally obtained firearms by the seemingly deranged or disgruntled outliers of society. These are often the situations that the public never hears about. I have been working with a victim of gun violence who is a local police officer’s wife. He was arrested and charged with domestic violence and spousal rape a few weeks ago. The officer used his perfectly legal, government-issued firearm to forcibly threaten his wife and rape her at gunpoint. He then threatened to kill her and frame it as suicide if she told anyone. That officer is out on bail and unpaid administrative leave. While the public is aware of the bare bones of the case, the details about the gun have been kept out of the media so it looks like just a “bad apple” who allegedly roughed up his wife. Most people may not even see this as a case of gun violence, but what I see is someone who has committed extreme acts of violence and who could potentially lose his 25-plus year career in law enforcement, along with his pension and his children. Did I mention he was also involved in an officer-involved shooting where he shot and killed a mentally ill homeless man who was brandishing a knife? He was found justified and competent to return to work after only a few weeks of paid time off and no mental health follow-up.These are examples of what I see behind the steel curtain that is the criminal justice system—and that’s just in my tiny pocket of the country. When I hear people going back and forth about the solutions to gun violence, it feels like it’s usually focused on two solutions. It's either mental health services or gun control. From my perspective, the answer is that it’s both and then some. It’s prevention and intervention, with easily accessible mental health services, community outreach and support in struggling communities and training and oversight with law enforcement. It’s also common-sense gun legislation that raises the age that a person can purchase a firearm and restrictions on the type of firearms and amount of ammunition that can be purchased at one time.

What I see is someone who has committed extreme acts of violence and who could potentially lose his 25-plus year career in law enforcement, along with his pension and his children.

I’m Focusing on Community-Based Efforts to Reduce Our Town’s Gun Violence Problem

I’m currently part of a community-based task force for youth safety that is a combination of service agencies, government agencies and community members. The focus is on reducing gun-related violence in our community and forming a crisis response team to assist victims of gun violence and their families. The group is divided into committees focused on prevention, intervention, response, outreach and activism. The prevention committee is focused on education in both gun safety and mental health. The intervention committee is focused on gang violence; the response committee is working on a crisis hotline and emergency mental health response; and the outreach and activism committee focuses on raising awareness through marches, vigils, community canvassing and contacting elected officials. We also have a couple of people researching what interventions and programs have been successful at lowering gun violence rates. One initiative of the outreach team is visiting local gun shops and working with the owners to establish policies to not sell guns to anyone under 21. The intervention committee is also recruiting reformed gang members to work directly with the gangs to turn over firearms. I’m part of an initiative to provide free, non-clinical mental health services to the community.We have a lot of really great ideas—some will fail; others may take months or even years to see results. But every single person is committed to the long haul. Our primary focus is the changes and safety measures we can make in our community because we all agree we cannot rely on outside help or the government to make long-term, significant changes. Everything needs to be independent of whoever holds office or which political party holds the majority. My hope is that people across the country may read this and seek out groups in their own communities already doing this work or take the initiative to start it. The founder of our group—a mother who lost her son to gang violence—summed it up when she said, “We can’t stop gun violence everywhere, but we can do everything in our power to stop it here.”

My dad moved to a different continent when I was 11 years old. I didn’t really understand why. I thought it was a temporary situation. It wasn't. I remember feeling embarrassed at school whenever the topic of fathers came around: Father’s Day, parent-teacher meetings, random conversations with classmates. I couldn't explain why my father wasn’t around. Although I did keep in touch with my dad (mostly through email and the odd phone call on special occasions), I never dared to ask him directly. I knew there was a financial reason, that he left to be able to better provide for me and my siblings, but I never confronted him. I never even admitted to myself that I felt hurt. It was my first heartbreak, but I worked hard to convince myself that I was strong and capable of handling it. It wasn't such a big deal. Plenty of people go through similar experiences, and much worse.

I overcorrected to the opposite extreme.

Therapy Is Helping Me Heal Scars From the Past

Now, in my 30s, after spending a great deal of money and time on therapy, I realize just how much this event has shaped me as a person. I never thought of myself as having daddy issues at all. I was shy, centered, responsible, a good student, never partied hard or even dated much throughout school and university. But I can now identify patterns that link to this and to growing up with a repressed fear of abandonment and rejection. I became extremely good at communicating using written words but not so great at expressing myself in person. I learned to hide many aspects of myself and my life that I was ashamed of, and I didn’t want people to jump to conclusions about me from the way I grew up. I wanted to prove to the world that I didn't have daddy issues. I don’t even know what daddy issues were supposed to be, but in my younger self’s brain, the image that came up was an insecure, needy girl who dated older men. Someone who was looking for a man who was a sort of messed-up partner and father figure to fill in the void her dad left. Or someone who didn’t have a lot of self-love and would settle for less than ideal relationships because she didn’t grow up with a dad who would protect and remind her of her own value. Because of my fears of showing daddy issues symptoms, I overcorrected to the opposite extreme. I was acting the role of the strong, independent woman who didn’t really need a man. If I dated, it was only because I wanted to, not because I was looking for someone to fill in my dad’s shoes. Ironically, running away from these imaginary daddy issues may have led me to actually developing unhealthy behaviors.My longest relationship was a long-distance one, perhaps because I felt most comfortable with an ocean in between, imitating the relationship I had grown used to with my dad. Recently, my psychologist pointed out a series of similarities between my latest serious partner and my dad. I freaked out and broke up with him. I was determined not to date someone similar to my dad, even though I was unconsciously attracted to people who reminded me of him. I am still single and have trust issues. I tend to find ways of messing up potentially good relationships, maybe because I feel safer ending it myself rather than waiting for someone to leave me again. My fear of abandonment often makes me lose out on opportunities, as I sometimes reject someone from the start for no good reason. Through psychoanalysis, I am becoming increasingly conscious of patterns in my behavior and why I react the way I do. If the first step is self-awareness, then I am at least making progress in this direction. I still have a long way to go in terms of working through the buried pain from my childhood, but I am grateful that my dad is still around, even if it is only by text or phone.As an adult, Father’s Day is no longer embarrassing or sad. I never really acknowledged it before because I didn’t feel I could wish him a happy Father’s Day in our circumstances, but it no longer causes any internal discomfort. I have come to terms with my past and am determined not to let it sour my present.

I was determined not to date someone similar to my dad, even though I was unconsciously attracted to people who reminded me of him.

Having a Feminist Dad Isn’t All That Common

Despite living abroad, my dad has always been my number one cheerleader. He has supported me in every way possible to study and pursue my dreams and has encouraged me to become a financially independent woman. I had the same opportunities as my brothers and never felt any difference between them and me. I grew up thinking I could achieve anything I wanted; I just had to figure out the way to get it. Obviously, technology has evolved and made instant communication much easier. My dad still acts as a sounding board when I get one of my crazy ideas and tells it to me straight, even if it is not what I want to hear. He challenges me and makes a point out of acting the devil’s advocate role, which means we often disagree and fight, but I always appreciate the different point of view. When I reflect about how far I have come, how much I have achieved and how proud I feel of myself, I can’t help but notice that none of it would have been possible without my dad. Even at a distance, his unconditional support granted me privileges to explore a range of experiences that ultimately allowed me to find a job I am passionate about. I have been able to travel, build up some savings and move to a different country to reinvent myself. My daddy issues never held me back in terms of setting goals and trying to live a life I am excited about. But it has held me back when it comes to the way I relate to the opposite sex. This is something I can’t ignore anymore, but at least I am no longer denying that I have them.

As the foot connected with my hip, I knew that it would just be ignored, like all the other times I’d been hit, punched and spat on. The verbal abuse from staff and patients ran through my head even after the day was done. I knew I was done as a nurse, but I still needed to pay my bills.My first degree was in healthcare. I worked in that system for just under a decade. But the thought of going to work would often make me panic—a throw-up, tense-muscles, intense-headache kind of panic. I’d been physically and verbally abused at work many times, and after a while, I felt broken and defeated. So I decided to focus on something else—getting another degree. I wanted a completely different life, and the “transferable skills” that everyone talks about were the things that hurt me most about my previous job. Being surrounded by intense emotions—like rage and fear, all the time—made me want to scream or cry. I’d wait until I was home and begin to play the bad stuff in my head over again, circling deeper into the drain of desperation and despair.Soon, I got an honors degree in arts, with an archaeology major. The problem was, it wasn’t enough to gain employment, even for an entry position. Nor was my post-graduate teaching degree nor the graduate certificate and other certificates that followed. That’s when I officially became unemployed. I chose to still pay taxes and moved back home with my family. I’d dug myself into a hole, had to leave my place, as I couldn’t pay the bills, and slowly started to dissolve into depression and hoarding. I felt broken. On top of losing my father, nothing makes you feel less independent than the thoughts that you had given up at your job and lost your home, all within the same year. I felt like I’d failed at being an adult. I’d achieved so much by the time I was 25, and now it was all gone.

Nothing makes you feel less independent than the thoughts that you had given up at your job and lost your home, all within the same year.

The Government Can Cut Your Benefits Over a Simple Clerical Error

Eventually, my friends started to leave. I thought that was due to my spiral and I didn’t want anyone to come down with me. Then, I was told it was because I was unemployed, which, to them, meant I was pathetic, lazy and self-indulgent (yes, that’s what they said). One said that being unemployed was worse than working in an unsafe job—to them, injury and mental health considerations were not important, so long as you were “contributing to society,” a statement that completely ignored my previous jobs. They also told me I was a burden to taxpayers and too picky when it came to working. None of these statements helped build my confidence or self-worth, both of which I was lacking.When you’re on unemployment benefits, you need to apply for about 20 jobs a month, make appointments, try mini-courses and attend work placements. If at any stage this isn’t achieved, the government cuts off your benefits without warning. Being unaware that I had zero money for food at the store was demeaning and harmful. Here’s how the next conversation goes: You call your work-support company and are told you’ve been cut off because you didn’t attend an appointment—you know, the one that you were at yesterday? Well, your attendance wasn’t submitted. Your money will come through eventually, but you’ve now received a demerit point. Keep getting those and you’ll be cut off permanently.I knew someone who had lost a letter stating that their local community college was closed for the holidays. They went without money for a month. They found out two days before Christmas that they hadn’t been paid while in line for groceries. I’d been unemployed for a couple of years, so I had no references, no experience and no real hope of finding another job. I searched for “achievable” or “survival” jobs, as I was told to accept anything, even if the conditions were bad or unsafe. A work-support employee told me, “You’re just a better person if you work.” Basically, they thought the unemployed were bad, despite it being their job to help the unemployed.

Work Placements Helped Me Adjust to the Workforce and Find a Temporary Job

As part of my unemployment benefits, I had to commit to a work placement. The jobs there are similar to, if not the same as, the jobs for those on parole or working on a community corrections order. They include warehousing, telemarketing and working in soup kitchens, as well as reception or computer work. You’re practically punished for being unemployed.I ended up getting lucky. The placement allowed me to get the confidence of working with others again and acquire some references. After a month, I got a job teaching adults. I had the qualifications, the employer was desperate, and I was the only qualified candidate—but a majority of the other unemployed people were not as lucky, surviving on their third or fourth round of placement. During one work placement, I sat in a 41-degree warehouse, dismantling machines, surrounded by everyone from homeless people to Ph.D. candidates. Each of them had a story, but for whatever reason (mental health issues, flooded markets, non-English backgrounds, zero qualifications or experience), they had been unsuccessful at landing a gig for at least a year. One person had escaped an abusive relationship and raised their kids alone—they couldn’t find a job because they had no “relevant experience.”Another had worked in an industry for 25 years. His company had gone bankrupt and let him go, leaving him with a very specific job experience. Another had a psychiatric illness and was unable to stay in one work environment for more than a month before it became too overwhelming. Some had been in prison; others had dealt with substance abuse issues. Even when you’re employed, you don’t know if the person next to you shoots up before work or if they just have to have a few bottles of wine when they get home.During work placements, I would hear supervisors call other people “fucktards” and “useless cunts” and tell somebody they were too fat to work. When some supervisors would comment about a woman’s breasts, they shrugged off complaints as good old-fashioned “boys will be boys” culture, demoralizing a vulnerable person because of a natural occurrence. Again, these were supervisors, apparently trying to prepare and show us how to behave in a workplace.

I’m scared, as I know that eventually, the payments will stop and I will have nothing.

It’s Easy to Lose Confidence When You Keep Facing Rejection

The unemployed are not less than you—they may be depressed, bent, spent or broken. But don’t assume that they sit at home watching TV, taking advantage of taxpayers. Sometimes, circumstances happen completely out of our control (like a pandemic). And looking for work is hard—each knockback makes you feel a little less heard, a little less important, lowering your confidence one rejection at a time.When you do get an interview and an employer asks for references, well, that kind of breaks your heart. Because there are no references. I’ve spent hours on one job application and one cover letter addressing each key performance criteria, and I heard nothing from the potential employer. After working for another few years teaching English to adults and preparing seniors for tertiary studies, I lost my job at the end of 2020 due to the pandemic. Now I receive benefits for setting up a writing business, but I’m scared, as I know that eventually, the payments will stop and I will have nothing. I may apply to go on benefits again, but then the stigma will resurface. The choices between being able to pay rent or eating are not easy. I feel like I’m back to square one; I don’t have references or recent experience. So I’m not asking for a raise. I’m asking to be seen and heard and not be judged. To be assessed on my accomplishments, not my lack of references.

I was maybe 7 or 8 when I was first caught masturbating. I wasn’t old enough to be aware of the taboos or that I probably shouldn’t have been doing it on the living room sofa. I wasn’t trying to be disgusting or perverse, but from my mum’s expression, that’s exactly what I was doing. “Stop that, it’s dirty,” she snapped and then stalked off, evidently too mortified to be near me a moment longer. Back then, I only knew she was angry, that I must be wrong. By the time I was 11, I’d started to realize I had an appetite for something that, by most accounts, I shouldn’t have wanted so young. I’m still trying to make sense of how and why the need arose in me. I have a theory: that even then, I nurtured a blossoming hunger for sexual pleasure that is often attributed to masculinity.

Transitioning Transformed My Sexuality

When I came out as a trans man at 29, it set me free to explore myself sexually, as well as socially and spiritually. As much as it feels like a binary-gendered convenience to say that I started masturbating early because I was a buried boy, that’s what makes the most sense to me. I didn’t have a father who was present in my life; I had no brothers I could aspire to or confide in—even my grandfather died when I was young. In a Freudian sort of way, it all lines up. While I was content with presenting as a girl, putting on all the right clothes and demure floral graces, exploring more private pleasures was fertile ground for my subconscious gender identity to assert itself. So when it was brought to light, my transness started to bring with it sexual freedom, allowing me to see myself as someone who deserved my sexual gratification to be guilt-free. This should be the case for anyone who enjoys sex, of course, but it turned out a lot of my guilty feelings were wrapped up in being perceived as feminine by myself and others. My libido always felt like a filthy secret consigned to pages in my diary. While the straight boys around me growing up had bragging rights over their supposed sexual conquests, I saw girls ridiculed and slut-shamed for trying to have the same conversations. We were the ones who had to seek each other out, as I did, to confide crushes and the delicious power they had over our fantasies and physical responses. Sometimes, as an outlet, this became a kind of spoken-word porn. Back then, I never would have drawn a parallel between those talks and actual porn videos. Of course, I knew they existed—boys my age talked enough about them—but I felt, deep down, they were wrong for me to access. That self-imposed barrier between verbal and visual exchanges of erotic information was a safety buffer between myself and “dangerous” male sexuality.I was acutely aware of the potency of masculinity. I always idolized and feared it in this way. I’d sometimes explicitly wish myself male in my teen journals, but it felt beyond me when I saw my school crush walking around assured in his sheer size, radiant exuberance and natural weight of presence, always looming larger in my mind. As greedily as I undressed him in my imaginings, fixated on his physicality while wishing I could emulate it, I was disgusted with myself. In the fury of my unrequited urges, I wanted to devour him, tear through and know what he’d feel like under my tongue.

I feared that creature lingering in me, just beneath the surface.

Was My Porn Consumption Problematic?

I feared that creature lingering in me, just beneath the surface. It made me think things I wished I wouldn’t, about throwing people against furniture, straddling them and taking what I wanted. This was my masculinity, a feral dog driven by instinct up to the brink of fear. My own fear of myself was like a chain-link fence I’d run up against with tooth and claw probing every opening, unable to gnaw through. After realizing it was my gender identity making me feel this way, I gave myself permission to meet my beast on neutral territory and get clear on a few things—like how the things I feared might work out to be good for me. By my mid-20s, I’d already started watching porn on sites like Beautiful Agony, essentially a library of self-uploaded masturbation videos. Because I could only see the subjects from the torso up, I could step clear of the discomfort I felt watching something that brazenly bared all. I could almost convince myself I wasn’t watching porn, despite how much it turned me on and the fact I always went to these videos with the intention of masturbating. This was comfortable for me, until suddenly, it wasn’t enough, and I knew I wasn’t having all my needs met. Four months into hormone replacement therapy, testosterone was sending my sexual imagination into overdrive. As I felt sexier in my own body, I wanted to experience the full bodily pleasure of other transmasculine people. As a queer man, I wanted to watch other queer men getting off on each other, almost as a fantasy where I could insert myself in the action. Discovering my gender identity also opened the way toward accepting that I’m polyamorous. I hungered for a way to express that while continuing to enjoy my monogamous relationship, which laid down the loving foundations for my sexual freedom. The limited gratis access to Beautiful Agony, with my equally limited financial means, wasn’t going to cut it anymore.So I found myself at an impasse. I couldn’t afford the subscriptions that would assure me I was watching ethically made material, but I worried what I’d uncover when delving into the murky waters of Pornhub et al. I had a few tips on hand, like going in with an idea of what I wanted and searching for that instead of scrolling through landing pages. But as I started with an oiled and sensual cult ritual here, a gay threesome there, I still felt the fear of stumbling across something that would pollute my mind and make me want something abhorrent. I wasn’t even sure what that something might be or why I’d manage to trip onto it somehow, only that the threat was there, a lingering effect of being taught as an adolescent to beware of pornography. I was taking from those lessons for my own safety, but behind that, the first barrier was still lurking—the embedded suspicion that my pleasure was something dirty.

I watch in gorgeous orgasmic bliss as they commit one of my favorite debauched acts: making themselves squirt.

Watching Porn Has Been Healing

I’ve been surprised to find myself watching one or two porn videos every few days or at least on a weekly basis. I feel the desire for it more often than I would ever have given myself permission to before coming out and starting hormone replacement therapy. Beyond wanting it just for the pleasure, I need it for my own self-compassion. It feels strange to know it as a need, but it has become absolutely necessary in accepting that I fear my sex drive, that it wasn’t my fault and that things can change now. As a mirror to that, I find myself feeling tenderness for the transmasc people I watch in gorgeous orgasmic bliss as they commit one of my favorite debauched acts: making themselves squirt. There are times I feel such love for the fact that they are empowered to share their own pleasure that any idea of filthiness drops away and I realize it’s all just love.I’ve noticed I’m more inclined to watch women and femme people for the same feeling recently, whereas before, I was mostly interested in masculine bodies. I think this shift might mean I’m beginning to accept my old femme-presenting self as someone who was justified in wanting sex, even in the gray area of my tweens and early teens. I wasn’t expecting anything like this depth of emotional connection I’ve found with porn and the people who create it for themselves and others. But whether the performers entertained it as a possibility or not, they are helping me on my way to knowing and loving myself better.Even several weeks into my explorations in the wildwood of hardcore porn, I still sit with my finger hovering over the search bar or play button and feel shame and disgust with myself. It’s a barrier I have to push myself over, allowing myself the enjoyment of my body I was denied as a kid. I used to be convinced that porn was where dirty people went to weasel their shameful way out of an unfulfilling life. But conversely, I begin to connect with myself deeply when engaging with it. I’m considering what I want for myself (finally!) when I’m searching for the right video. I’m learning to build language and deep, gut-wrenching feeling for what I find aesthetically, emotionally and soulfully pleasing. It’s a way I was too afraid to think when the need to touch myself, soothe the roiling ache for sensual contact with another body, was something to be ashamed of. I’m pushing beyond the pain of feeling my deep interest in sex, something I’m learning to admire in myself, was wrong, to an ebb and flow of mindful self-loving thought and release. I connect as I press play, push myself over the obstacle of my own guilt, then just let go.

Each one of us is a puzzle, assembled from pieces of those who come and go from our lives. Who you are is shaped by the family you’ve known your whole life, loyal friends, fleeting bonds with acquaintances. But what happens if one of the puzzle pieces is missing? This is true in my case, as well, of course. I am the product of my mother’s resilience, my grandmother’s patience and my grandfather’s proactiveness, blended well with a sprinkle of my own personality—resourcefulness, impatience and a short temper. With both good qualities and bad, I should be a complete person with fulfilling relationships with those around me. Yet a piece of me remains missing.

The man who is responsible for my existence was never actually around to shape me beyond bringing me into this existence.

My Father's Suicide Has Left a Hole in Me

I have never known my father. With only a number of photographs to remember, passing mentions and the knowledge that he took his own life when I was an infant, the man who is responsible for my existence was never actually around to shape me beyond bringing me into this existence. Having never been present in my life, his influence—for better or worse—should have had no impact on me. However, my nonexistent relationship with my father and his absence from my life has become the roots of several of my bonds as I’ve grown up. This missing puzzle piece has swallowed me whole. I’ve subconsciously sought to fill the chasm he left in my life with every other connection I’ve made. Armed with mourning for a man I never knew and the tidbits I’ve learned of him through others, I am always desperately seeking to fill the empty space in my heart, which my father left vacant just six months after I was born. From descriptions of my father, via my mother, I know him as an introverted, intelligent, at times moody man, with alcoholic abuse issues and slight tendencies toward violence. With everyone I meet, I am seeking out the father I never met—searching for the security and warmth I never knew, yet also hoping never to find someone with his flaws.Perhaps due to the contradictory nature of what I’m seeking, or maybe just a subconscious urge to “fix” or help someone in a way I never had the chance to do with my father, I often end up attracting the very kind of people I hope not to—those with addictions and mental health difficulties beyond the ability of my fragile mind and heart to handle. What starts as relationships filled with hope ends with the same abandonment I always feared—if not by death then by them simply walking away from me. The contradictions don’t stop here. They also rear their ugly heads when it comes to how I perceive these new relationships between the people filling my father’s space and me. If one part of me finds myself being drawn into relationship dynamics—three separate relationships, one after the other, crashing into empty promises, addiction and anger issues—that I always tried to avoid, the other part fears that I am the broken link in it all. Maybe it’s not them but me who takes on the role of my father in these destructive relationships? Spiraling out of control into an abyss of prescribed pills to numb my emotional pain, finding momentary peace in hurting myself, withdrawing into the darkness of my mind, moving at breakneck speed toward my own doom, reflecting that of my father. When each of my fragile relationships inevitably fizzles out, mourning returns. People often brush aside the notion of me mourning someone I never knew, just as they do when I speak of feeling abandoned by him. With every new person who makes a space in my heart and then leaves it behind, trampled and shattered as they walk through a revolving door of broken bonds, I mourn not just that lost relationship but the loss of my father, over and over again.

This missing puzzle piece has swallowed me whole.

Accepting My Father’s Death Will Hopefully Put Me on a Path to Healing

I mourn his death. I mourn not knowing him. Most of all, I mourn every bond I’ve lost trying to achieve another bond I never had to begin with. I will never get closure from the absence he left in my life, but the first step to healing is probably accepting this fact. That will in itself may become the closure I seek. I will never quite be a complete puzzle, one piece of me lost even before I could be put together. But maybe what I need to realize is that there’s no one quite in the shape of my father to complete me—there might be another person or people, slightly misshapen but doing their best to fit into the aching chasm within me. The gaps they can’t fill will always ooze with emptiness and hurt, but embracing the parts they fill may be the way to go.

The last time I felt I was in love was in 2016—at least, I think I was in love. I felt excited every time I would see my then-partner. He was the person I wanted to tell everything to, and I couldn’t imagine my life without him. We discussed what kind of furniture we would have when we moved in together, brainstormed names for our children and had those grown-up conversations I imagined people in love would have.But then, out of nowhere and without an explanation, he broke up with me. It wasn’t a gradual erosion of the relationship where I had time to prepare. It was simply, “I don’t want to do this anymore.” I couldn’t understand at first, and I went through some of those stages you hear about. There was definitely denial, bargaining (with a bit of begging sprinkled here and there), lots of anger and then, finally, sadness. I felt like my whole world collapsed, and I couldn’t visualize my future anymore.After a while, I decided to just accept that people’s feelings can magically change and that love can suddenly run dry from one day to another. And just like that, I tried to move on. Although I never really had another serious relationship after that, I have dated almost nonstop over the past six years. I want company but not commitment. I might even go as far as calling myself a serial dater. I love meeting someone new, going on dates, and having superficial and casual fun. The issue is, I haven’t been able to fall in love again. It’s as if my “fall in love” switch has been turned off or is out of service, and I don’t know how to fix it.

It’s as if my “fall in love” switch has been turned off or is out of service, and I don’t know how to fix it.

My Relationships All End Through Self-Sabotage

I’ve become extremely savvy and comfortable in the early stages of an almost-relationship, when everything is exciting and new. But then, with each day that passes, I grow more anxious. I begin a twisted mental countdown of when things will end and even daydream about how it will happen. If there isn’t a good reason yet to break up, I visualize starting a dramatic fight about something petty, even though I am very much the opposite kind of person. During the fight, I yell and say things I know I can’t come back from, and I imagine my partner just walking away, leaving me there, sad but secretly relieved. Other times, I daydream I’m the victim, and I catch him doing something that merits an instant and justified breakup, and I’m the one walking away, guilt-free. I have not been able to figure out what is wrong with me because surely it can’t be that I haven’t fully moved on from my breakup six years ago. There is no way I haven’t gotten over that, because I genuinely feel I have. And yet.It’s like a very deep, hidden and mysterious defense mechanism kicks in whenever things start to get more serious with the person I’m dating, and my brain starts to send warning signals. I will either get annoyed by something random, get bored or become cold. And so I convince myself to run away because running away to a “safe place” and starting from scratch again and again feels like the right thing to do. I don’t realize I’m doing it, but looking back, it’s definitely a pattern.

How do you go about falling in love with someone?

I’m Worried I Won't Be Able to Fall in Love Again

In my mid-30s, it seems that everyone in my social circle is either married, living with their partner or in a happy, stable relationship. And the honest truth is that I don’t envy them at all; I feel grateful that I’m single and independent. I can’t picture myself in their shoes anymore. The person I was six years ago—younger and in love—is not the same person I am today. I don’t miss being in a relationship; I feel happy as I am right now. The very idea of living with someone seems suffocating. I don’t know if this is extremely selfish—if I am genuinely not ready for a new relationship or if something else entirely is wrong with me, but I do get worried. I worry that I am a woman whose biological clock is ticking. I don’t feel pressure to have babies, but I know I don’t have forever to make this choice. But even if I wanted to try, how do you go about falling in love with someone? When I date someone, it’s because I like them. There is all the potential in the world to fall in love, but something holds me back. It might be because the last time I fell, I fell hard. I was genuinely content, trusting and unexpectedly all in. But for months (even years) after the breakup, I didn’t feel like myself. I felt like my own shadow. It reminded me of when I lost my sense of taste and smell from COVID-19. Life goes on—you still eat, but you don’t enjoy it that much. The breakup was the anti-love virus that robbed me of that happy, bouncy sense of life that everything was going to be OK.The very idea of “falling” in love seems scary and risky. It’s dangerous, but we do it because we hope and trust love will catch us. Can we not “float” in love instead? That sounds much better, like clouds gently moving along in the sky. I think I would like to find love again someday and walk hand-in-hand, without the fear of throwing myself into the vast unknown. And I hope that whatever net love is made of, it’s strong enough to support me.

Going to secondary school in Pakistan, I never had much of an idea of what LGBTQ meant. The topic was taboo, and discussing it openly was frowned upon. I inadvertently found out what LGBTQ meant when I made a new friend in eighth grade.Her family had just moved back to Pakistan from Houston. She had spent the majority of her life in Texas, barring a few summer vacations in Pakistan. She was quiet and had a somewhat brooding nature, so no one would really talk to her because she was “weird” and mysterious. I have always made friends with oddballs and anomalies, and she definitely checked all the usual boxes. My curiosity got the better of me, and I really wanted to figure her out. It helped that she was neighbors with one of my closest friends, and I took it as a challenge to get to know her.Pretty soon, however, I realized she had deep-seated issues related to substance abuse and depression. I am a psychologist now, but even then, I had this obsession with fixing people, so I tried to help her out. Our friendship quickly escalated because of the time we were spending together, and we were soon inseparable. But, in hushed whispers at school, I began hearing rumors about her taking an unusual interest in me. Initially, I ignored it.

Because my first encounter with an LGBTQ person was so problematic, I became homophobic.

Our Friendship Became an Obsession

We would talk for hours in school and, later on, over the phone. This was standard practice for all my friends, so I didn’t find it strange. But I did notice that time and again, she would find reasons to bump into me or "accidentally" touch me. She also started doing things that made me hesitant, like parking her car in my apartment building and keeping tabs on where I was going with my family over the weekends. I cut her some slack since she didn’t have many friends, so I thought maybe she didn’t really understand how friendships worked. She was also friendly with my younger sister, who studied at the same school.Years later, my sister told me that she’d once asked her to film me while in the shower, which I obviously found concerning. However, at the time, I was in the dark about her unusual demands and kept my friendship with her afloat. She also had a habit of giving me expensive gifts, like branded perfumes, an iPhone and a digital camera. Of course, I politely refused all these gifts.After two years of living in Pakistan, she moved back to Houston. She then wrote me a long email to confess that she was a lesbian and had romantic feelings for me the entire time we’d been friends. This made me see a lot of the strange incidents during our friendship in a different light, like how she would constantly bump into me or pull me into the water during swimming classes just to “accidentally” touch me.I felt betrayed and harassed. To make things worse, I learned that she’d been stalking me while she was here. I immediately cut off all ties with her, which was easy since she was now on a different continent. Because my first encounter with an LGBTQ person was so problematic, I became homophobic. Specifically, I developed a deep mistrust of lesbians.

My view on the LGBTQ community radically changed.

A New Friend Changed My Perspective

Cut to four years later. During my A-levels, I made a best friend who was also a tomboy. We bonded over similar interests, like Harry Potter and basketball. I had told her about my unpleasant experience with my childhood friend, and she had expressed her sympathy. A few years later, she moved to the U.K. That’s when she, too, decided to come out to me. My initial reaction was feeling betrayed.For a while, our friendship was rocky. I told her I needed space while she, having a history of abandonment issues, begged me to not let this affect our friendship. After about six months, my rage subsided. I realized that the issue I’d had with my old friend was not so much her sexuality but how she chose to hide it while harboring romantic feelings for me. It felt sneaky. In this situation with my new best friend, I realized I was mostly projecting that old betrayal and anger that I hadn’t gotten a chance to express before. I finally realized that I was letting my past affect my present. My friend was generous enough to forgive me after I explained how the exchange had stirred up old emotions. She educated me on how difficult it was for her to muster up the courage to come out to me because she knew my history. My reaction was exactly the one she was dreading. I felt awful, but after many apologies, we decided to work on our friendship and give each other space to learn and to grow.

I Realized My Aversion Was to a Person, Not Their Sexual Preference

Once I saw her struggles up close and realized our friendship didn’t have to suffer, my view on the LGBTQ community radically changed. It took some soul-searching, but I knew that my negativity was not toward all LGBTQ people—just the one person who had chosen to manipulate me. Even then, I hated her actions, not her sexual preference.Having to relive my first LGBTQ friendship experience, but this time with someone who was kind and patient and mature, allowed me the space to grow. I learned to separate my personal history from my present experiences, and I am a different—and more accepting—person because of that.

The contention that Black people are a monolith is a problematic and unfair descriptor that conflates individual experiences as the Universal Black Experience. In spite of this, there are some cultural similarities across the shores and the diaspora that seemingly bind us.One such cultural phenomenon is the Black tax.Originating from South Africa, the Black tax refers to the sometimes unspoken obligations thrust upon successful family members to support other family members financially. It isn't a stretch to say that this is the bane of most African and African American people’s existence and a major stressor in our lives. And I am no different.

Like a man possessed, he felt morally obligated to ensure the family was well taken care of.

I Noticed My Family Taking Advantage of My Father

Growing up, this psychosocial ideology was ingrained in me. I instinctively knew that should I become financially successful, I was obligated to support my siblings, parents and/or extended family if need be. The aim of this monetary assistance is to create an environment that is conducive to imminent success for those who rely on it.In essence, you never turn your back on your family members, especially when you can lend a hand financially. This was the norm in my family, with my father serving as an example. I watched as he, the most financially successful of his siblings, footed the bills of his parents, brothers and sisters. And he did so diligently, going as far as building homes for them, funding their business ideas and their children’s education. My father worked tirelessly to make sure his family would never go hungry or homeless at the expense of his physical and mental health. Whenever confronted about scaling back or stopping, he would stubbornly refuse. Like a man possessed, he felt morally obligated to ensure the family was well taken care of. Strangely enough, though a heavy burden, it was an obligation he took great pride in. While honorable and empowering in many ways, his decision to be the financial cushion for the extended family caused deep resentment and a sense of entitlement in my uncles, aunts and me. It didn’t take long to begin noticing the uncomfortable entitlement that comes when you are at the beck and call of people constantly in need. I watched as his siblings took advantage of this kindness—asking, expecting more and, in extreme cases, vying for his assets. With no shame or pride, they expected my father to always be there for them financially while not bothering to improve their circumstances.Witnessing this hastened my decision to separate myself from the world of the Black tax. Call it selfish but I didn’t want any part of it; not as a benefactor nor a beneficiary. I was determined to stand on my own. My greatest fear was ending up like my uncles and aunts, who were, by all intents and purposes, comfortable leeches. But life had other plans.

I Felt Like a Burden When I Relied on Financial Support

Now I benefit from the Black tax I once despised.Between losing my job and experiencing debilitating depressive episodes before and during the pandemic, keeping a stable job was an almost impossible feat. In this void of hopelessness, the Black tax became my saving grace. I found myself at the mercy of my successful siblings, who provided financial assistance with the rent and the piling bills. I became wholly dependent on them. And as happy as they were to help, it still didn’t take away from the immense guilt and shame I felt. My temporary inability to stand on my own made me fully aware of the unfair balance of power and the immense responsibility placed on their shoulders.I saw their wealth and capacity to grow their finances diminish and felt their frustration at the situation. In a way, I was robbing them of their ability to build wealth. Slowly, it felt like our once-close familial relationship was being reduced to a transactional one.I knew deep down that I had a responsibility to get better to ease the burdens off them. And I did, with time and patience.

Now I benefit from the Black tax I once despised.

The Black Tax Is Loaded With Pros and Cons

As much as I loathe the Black tax, without the financial support of my family, I would be in a precarious situation. Their financial support meant I had a roof over my head and I didn’t go hungry. Most importantly, I was able to get back on my feet. Despite my personal prejudice, there is no denying that the Black tax can be a powerful and necessary investment in uplifting people who may not have the opportunity to do so. Having experienced the gift of the Black tax, I am encouraged to be open to the possibilities of offering financial help to my family back home who do not have the opportunities that I have. It isn’t a decision that comes easily. By taking on this responsibility, I am keenly aware of the additional stress I will be adding to my plate. With that said, I believe it is a worthwhile decision. In my own way, I am uplifting other people like I was uplifted.While I can't control the variables that would most likely lead to their quick success, I can ensure that I am not taken advantage of as my father was. I know better than to put my mental and physical health at risk.

This is part one of a two-part series. Read the second piece here.Nothing can prepare you for an active war, especially the constant threat of missile airstrikes. Even the most seasoned war reporters will tell you this much. This was my third time going into an active conflict. The first was in Sri Lanka back in 2001, then 20 years later in Armenia during the border clashes in 2021 and then this year in Ukraine.“Now you can tell people you’ve been in an air war,” one of my Ukrainian fixers said to me whilst we took cover in a frigid hotel basement in Kyiv on the second night of the war. We began to count the missiles exploding one after another, interspersed with the occasional echoes of small arms fire ringing out in the distance.One of the more shocking stories my senior Ukrainian fixer told me that night was that in the weeks leading up to the invasion, Russian agents operating out of Ukraine had tricked and paid Ukrainian teenagers into marking an “X” with infrared paint on designated buildings that the Russian military would then later strike.It was now about 3 a.m., and I decided if I was to make any attempt at sleeping, I’d need to grab a blanket from one of the empty hotel rooms. I asked for permission from one of the hotel staff, who told me to be quick and not turn on any of the lights. After psyching myself up for the mission, I bolted up the stairs to the third floor. The floor was eerily dark and empty with room doors wide open, bedsheets strewn across the floor and in one room, a TV was still on, flickering with the volume turned down. To me, it looked like a scene out of The Shining, but this wasn’t a movie. This was the real world, and whoever had been in these rooms had clearly fled in a hurry during one of the many air raids.I walked into the room with the TV still on, and it was playing BBC World News. I sat on the bed for just a moment until…BANG! Another loud explosion that didn't seem that far from the window. I could see a red flash, the tail of the missile in the corner of my eye appearing less than two kilometers away, if I were to guess. Tempted to get closer to the window to watch, my survival instincts told me to run instead. As I left the room, heart-pumping, I skidded along the dark hallway, blanket in tow, looking for the tiny light at the end of the hallway with the exit sign to the stairs. A robotic voice in English came over the loudspeaker: “This is an emergency. There is a military attack. Go down to the basement.”As I headed back down the stairs, other journalists, fixers and some hotel guests were still awake. Some journalists were doing live on-air reports back to their media channels’ studios. One international worker from WHO was frantically texting his staff whom he was trying to locate, and I could see his hands were shaking. One British journalist arrived through a back entrance to the hotel basement in full body armor, shook his head and opened his backpack. He then pulled out his laptop and a paper bag with a bottle of whiskey. “Would you like a swig?” “Why not?” I said, knowing it was probably the best one could do to calm the nerves. After placing his laptop on a small table, we all gathered around to watch Zelenskyy give his first live address since the war had begun.“He’s not just an actor; he’s a smart guy, and he’s got balls,” said the British journalist.This was the beginning of my dark days in Ukraine. But let’s go back a bit.

I Traveled to Ukraine Three Weeks Before the Invasion Began

Like many other journalists and observers, I had been monitoring the Russian aggression building up in Ukraine since the end of 2021 and was mentally preparing myself to go. Certain intel reports were suggesting the war would happen straight after the Winter Olympics in China, which, for once, turned out to be true.I sent out my usual set of pitches to clients and managed to get a few bites from a publication in the U.K. and another in Canada. Within days of arriving in Kyiv, I received an email from ABC TV in Australia asking me to work for them on an exclusive contract that consisted of mainly shooting raw video pieces of events, interviews with Ukrainians and shots of Ukrainians going about their daily lives. I agreed and dropped my other clients or offloaded them to a couple of younger journalists I was traveling with. The first assignment we covered was an anti-Russian propaganda protest out the front of a pro-Russian TV channel in the center of Kyiv on a snowy night in early February. There were probably a hundred or more protesters chanting slogans out the front of the TV channel’s headquarters. As the main protest organizer finished speaking to the crowd, he put down his mic, and the song “Sure Shot” by Beastie Boys segued out of the sound system and signaled that the protest was winding down and had transformed into a pop-up block party. When the protest calmed down, I approached a handful of locals for interviews to gauge people’s opinions about the current situation.“We are protesting about this channel that is Russian…we don’t want this channel to broadcast propaganda inside Ukraine,” said Masha, a young Ukrainian protester.Masha went on to tell me that she hoped that the war would end and that her husband and friends would come home and that Ukraine would have a peaceful future with a good economy and be a part of the European Union. Toward the end of our conversation, her voice began to crack and tears started to roll down her pale cheeks. For the rest of that week, I carried out multiple interviews with other Ukrainians who all voiced similar hopes, especially when it came to talking with the younger generation.

Her voice began to crack and tears started to roll down her pale cheeks.

I Was Given a Backstage Pass to Ukrainian Fashion Week

The next weekend, my colleagues and I were invited to cover Ukrainian Fashion Week (UFW). UFW included all the normal fanfare of an international Fashion Week. It featured supermodels strutting the catwalks, fashion designers cheering them on, big-name artists, an endless flow of Prosecco being served and so on. This would be the last assignment in Kyiv we would cover before Russian troops invaded. The event going ahead was in and of itself an act of defiance against Russian aggression and sent a clear message to the world that Ukraine’s capital would carry on with its normal entertainment program undeterred by the warring ways of its neighbor.“We need to get ready for the invasion. We need to work hard. We need our economy to be strong. What Putin has wanted for the last eight years is for Ukraine’s economy to collapse, for its society to collapse, and he is trying with all his power to make this country disappear from the world map,” said Vivy, who is the founder of a Ukrainian fashion start-up, among other things.It is widely believed that Putin has always wanted to bring Ukraine back into the sphere of his influence, and he has proved that he isn't afraid to obtain it militarily.Now, in retrospect, and to some extent at the time, it felt somewhat surreal walking around the backstage area of UFW with models swanning about giggling and having fun posing for photos and taking selfies, given what was in store for the country soon after.

They then ran down the stairs to the bunker bar and grabbed my backpack and ran away into the night. The whole thing happened in less than 30 seconds.

On the final night of Ukrainian Fashion Week, I was invited to a bunker bar to film in the center of Kyiv. These bunker bars are quite common in this part of the world and were real World War II bunkers that have since been converted into bars or strip clubs. I wandered downstairs and sat next to a British pilot, who flies private jets for VIPs, and struck up a conversation. I left my bag downstairs next to him with my camera gear inside to take a break up on the street level. He then left shortly after, and as he waved goodbye, a group of three or four men appeared, walking toward me. One opened his arms, gesturing to hug me, while another man went around behind me and snatched my wallet from my back pocket. They then ran down the stairs to the bunker bar and grabbed my backpack and ran away into the night. The whole thing happened in less than 30 seconds.I’ve been in hostile environments before, and I’ve been injured in the field, but I’ve always been lucky to not have anything stolen. I was told by a variety of people that there was no point in reporting it, as naturally, the local authorities would have too many bigger problems on their hands. The mugging was to remain a mystery. Some people told me it was probably a Russian gang. Others said it might have been the Security Service of Ukraine in a case of mistaken identity for being a Russian spy. Whoever they were, they had been watching me for a while to know that I had a backpack downstairs. Moreover, it was most likely that the material on my camera was what they were most interested in and the wallet theft was only to make it look like a simple robbery. Apart from muggings, another pain point for journalists in Ukraine is the constant threat of cyberattacks. In the days leading up to the assault on Ukraine, I noticed periodically I couldn’t get a keystroke in Microsoft Word and my photo and video editing apps didn’t always function as they should. Google Maps became less accurate during the invasion, although this was likely to have been instigated by the Ukrainian authorities so as to mislead the Russian military advancing from inside the country. Other journalists I spoke to shared similar struggles, particularly with map accuracy on their devices. It isn’t just journalists who are targeted by cyberattacks; the Ukrainian government has also had to contend with this issue for some time now.It goes without saying that many journalists in Ukraine are having an extremely difficult time. As of May 2022, at least 23 journalists have been killed in the field since the Russian invasion began. Aside from the risk of dying or being seriously injured in the field, cyberattacks, harassment and robbery are actually common occurrences and go with the territory. One of my colleagues later informed me that he and one other journalist had guns pointed at them by the police and a camera was ripped off them in a similar case of mistaken identity for being Russian agents. What was to happen over the following weeks was a kaleidoscopic matrix of psychological warfare and impending hell.All images were provided by the author to The Doe.

I’m 62 and I’m trans. I've always felt that something was up, but I grew up in the ’60s and ’70s, so there was no trans path. There weren't resources, and there weren't doctors, and there wasn't information. I would read in Life magazine about somebody going to Germany to have a surgery or something, but really, for me, it just didn't exist. It wasn't like I had trans friends or we had someone in the family like that. There were no role models. As far as I knew, there were just the two paths, where you were either a heterosexual man who likes women or you were gay and you like men. And that was it. I kept wondering if I was gay, and I kept going no. Being gay never fit for me. I just never felt that way. But I was lucky enough to have gone through a lot of therapy and human development and done enough internal work that once I realized I was trans, I was able to be OK with myself.There wasn't a specific moment for me when I realized it. There was a five-year buildup, and then suddenly, there was this crescendo of things that happened. It had to do with my doctor saying my testosterone levels were too low and he had to boost those up. It had to do with a couple of things going on in my life. I'm sure COVID had something to do with it, just being inside and being with yourself so much.

I just wasn't comfortable with me.

I Wasn’t Comfortable With Myself, and I Needed to Do Something About It

I started transitioning in December of 2020. It was the weekend after Thanksgiving, right after the election. It was a very tumultuous, kind of horrific time for everybody. We were all locked in the house. The virus was running rampant. I knew something was going on with me, and I knew that I needed to get to the bottom of it. I never was comfortable with taking pictures of myself. I wasn't comfortable with my voice (and I’m still not that comfortable with it). I just wasn't comfortable with me. I was proud of myself before. I was smart, I'd accomplished a lot, but I was putting forward this name and image of someone who truly wasn't in alignment with my deeper sense of self, even though I didn’t realize it.I started taking a deep dive into myself. It’s like I went into a dressing room, and I was trying on clothes, trying to find the identity that fit. Was I gay? I had tried on that suit, and it just never felt right to me. Then, I put on the trans outfit, in my mind's eye, and I just knew instantly. This has been it for all these years, and it was something I never even considered.It was a revelation. I stayed up all night, not sleeping, typing away on my iPad. I start going back in my life and typing out incidents that I couldn't explain, things I had done, things I had thought, things that had happened, incidents from my life that just didn't really fit. It was pages and pages, going all the way back to college, to roommates, to being a kid trying on my mom's clothes. Everything I looked at, it was like, “Oh my god, this is what it's been all along.”After that night, it wasn't a question of whether I was trans or not. I saw two pathways going forward: one that I had been living and the other that I could move to that felt more authentic to who I really was. It was a kind of a no-brainer, as long as my wife was OK with it. If I could go through it and not just pick up and leave, I was going to do it.My wife and I sat down and I disclosed to her what was going on for me. And she looked at me and she said, “Oh, well, I guess that's what we're doing now.” She had no clue what being trans was or what it meant to have a husband transition. And I actually didn't know anything about it either, other than maybe things you hear from Caitlyn Jenner.

I Didn’t Know Anything About Transitioning When I Started

So I started transitioning. I was pretty much determined to be on the fast track because I didn't want to be in the awkward early stage for very long. There are trans people who go in a variety of different pathways. Everybody has their reasons for choosing theirs, and none of them are any better than the others. For me, I wanted to get through the uncomfortable part fast. So it took me a year to get to a place where I felt comfortable. Now I live as a woman all the time, and this is just who I am.The process of transitioning is hard. I’ve had facial feminization surgery and breast augmentation. I've lost weight and learned how to take care of my skin and do my eyebrows and nails and just the million things that women do. I’ve spent a fortune, and we spend time and pain and emotional turmoil, just to be approved of and accepted. But now that I feel I'm on the other side, I wake up and live one thousand percent full-time female. When I go out into the world, I don't think twice about it anymore. Ever since I've been transitioning, there's been a joy and a comfort and a satisfaction with who I am that I'd never had before.Regret is the one thing that’s been really tough. I wish I had transitioned when I was in my teenage years. I think about that all the time. You think about how you'd look and how you'd feel and just going through those years of my life that way, as my authentic self, would have been great. I see stunning trans women, and, of course, I want to get as close to that as I can. The older you are when you transition, the more surgeries you need to sort of counteract the puberty and all of the testosterone that's driven your body to build in a certain way. But I also know that if I had transitioned earlier, I wouldn't have the relationships I have now. It is what it is. And what I need to do is make the rest of this super exciting and successful for me. My wife and I have always had this soulmate-like relationship. When I told her that I wanted to transition, she knew nothing about it. I had a number of conversations with people on Reddit about how to talk about it with her because it’s this self-centered understanding that I'm going through. This is my journey. It’s been exciting for me to transition with her, but every moment that’s been exciting for me was another moment where the old person that I was, was being pulled away from her. My wins were her losses. And all of our friends, because I was going through the transition, rallied around me, and she didn't get a lot of support because you don't think that the partner needs attention too. But they're going through deep, deep work. They've got to decide, do I still want to be with this person? Do I still want to have this relationship? In her case, she had to ask, can I be with a woman? This isn’t what she signed up for. Attractive, to her, is Cary Grant, and all of a sudden, I'm wearing bras, and I'm wearing dresses, and I'm going shopping, and all of that stuff that happens starts to eat away at what she knew.

Now I live as a woman all the time, and this is just who I am.

Transitioning Made My Marriage More Complicated but More Satisfying

So we've had to really create a new kind of relationship, and it's been very difficult. There's been a grieving process on her end, over losing her husband. She had to go through all the stages of grief. Now we're at the stage of acceptance. One of the best things that she's done is she found a therapist who specializes in spouses of trans people. She needed to go through the same level of work as I did, just in a different way. And the more she did, the better our relationship became.It takes a while for people to come to terms with their loved ones’ transitions. They’re dealing with their own stuff, right? I think people who are transitioning need to allow their significant others time to come to the table and accept them, in a sense, not that it's my responsibility that my wife accepts me, but I have to give her time and space to go through her process and not expect her to be there immediately. My father was a perfect example. He was never gonna say “she” and “her'' and call me by my new name ever. And now he does. I was like “OK, so listen, you've known me my whole life as a certain thing, and you're welcome to continue to use that if you want to. But as I transition, I don't look like that person anymore. I don't really act like that person too much anymore.” So now it doesn't line up anymore for him to call me that, and he just automatically is now moving to my preferred pronouns rather than me forcing that. It felt very natural. A therapist told my wife, “Well, you have a 17-year-old girl on your hands now,” because transitioning is so like a second puberty. I don’t feel 17, exactly. But maybe 27. I’m always like, “Let's go out. Let's go do this. Let's go do that.” And she's like, “Really? I don't want to do any of that.” But to me, it's all new and exciting and fun. I'm looking for those experiences that she's done a million times. Like New Year’s Eve. When you're in your 20s, you're like, “Yeah, let's go crazy.” And then eventually, you realize how terrible New Year's Eve is, and you're like, “I’d rather go to sleep before the ball even drops.” But now it's a little different. It's like, “Can I go someplace with a ball gown on? Can I wear this? Can I wear that? Can I do this? Can I do that?” There are so many things I’ve done a million times before and now it's all new and fresh and exciting.

I’d never heard of Father’s Day. Not until I was asked in junior school what I did for my dad on his special day. For fuck’s sake, I didn’t even know when his birthday was. My father loathed such “petty” celebrations. Christmas and birthdays were miserable affairs. My mom would secretly give me a card and a little money and books—always books. For that, I am truly grateful. I couldn’t get enough of encyclopedias, along with the delightful, if dated, works of Enid Blyton, who created worlds I could lose myself in. Around 1970, just before we left London for the miserable but spectacular vistas of North Wales (think Seattle with hills surrounded by beaches), my form teacher asked what I wanted to make or paint for a Father’s Day present. Teachers should think this shit through. Life is not all fluffy bunnies and rainbow-covered fields. Some kids live in frightening conditions and, in my estimation, the most frightening experience for a child still trying to find their way in the world is living with an aggressive, cold and indifferent father. My mom fought my dad for 22 years before garnering the courage and opportunity to finally divorce him. In all those years of marriage, my father had not once taken her out for a meal or a dance or a movie. He turned birthdays into anxious and depressing occasions; the same went for Christmas. In the midst of all this Father’s Day business was something I learned in school—how “normal” families celebrated their love and affection for the archetypal father.

The thing I missed was the pat on my back from my father, one that I realized later in life would never come.

My Father’s Lack of Support Drove Me into Dark Thoughts

Two years later, I attended an incredible school set in a beautiful valley called Croesor, full of myths, legends and fairy tales. At break times, we could fish for trout sitting on the school wall, casting our hopeful lines into the crystal clear water of the river that gave the valley its name. The school had 22 pupils, and for all my inner turmoil and aggressive outbursts, we all thrived because there were three teachers, a dinner lady who played piano and taught us music, and an eminent biologist who came in once a week and taught us everything she could about the life that ebbed and flowed—the microscopic cyclops, the formidable-looking larvae of dragonflies, leeches and eels. Yet, for all this input from fabulous teachers, the thing I missed was the pat on my back from my father, one that I realized later in life would never come.As a result, my behavior had deteriorated, though I still earned straight As. I received pats on the head and compliments about how amazingly clever I was; the future was mine for the taking. I’d smile, but inside I was already experiencing suicidal thoughts. They kicked in at around age 10 or 11. There were two main triggers. Firstly, I was terrified of moving into a bigger Welsh school that had a reputation for a lot of fighting. It reached the point where I was seen by a child psychologist who looked at my handwriting and asked me fairly tame questions about school and home. Of course, I lied and said my dad was superman and my mom an angel (she was that for sure). I was also afraid of my temper and what I might do if I lost it—so a couple of years later, I started smoking hash and weed. I drank a fair amount, too, and had my first experiences with psychedelics. Not ideal for a still-developing child’s mind which had already been subjected to serious trauma via an accident that cost me half a lung. I was enjoying the punk rock scene and various substances. It was much later in life I came to understand I was masking my true self through reckless, dangerous and suicidal intensity in almost everything I did.

My Father Regularly Crushed My Spirit, Triggering My Contempt for the World

On Father’s Day of 1972, Mrs. Jones, the headmistress, got me to make a piece of pottery for my dad. It was a colorful ashtray (he smoked quite heavily)—painted blue, green and red with the words “Happy Father’s Day” in English and Welsh—and I was pleased with my efforts. I took it home, nervous of his response. He did actually have his jovial moments but they were few and far between. I remember walking into the kitchen where he would sit with his books and a pile of paperwork surrounded by a haze of Old Holborn tobacco smoke. To this day, if I catch a whiff of that tobacco, I’m back in that cold, frightening kitchen. “Go on, say, ‘Happy Father’s Day’ and tell him you love him,” my mom and grandma said. I rehearsed the lines in my head—I was shitting myself. His disappointment in me was always on show; I held out the ashtray. He examined it, ran his fingers over the glaze and said, “Yes, they’ve been telling me you’re clever, so forget about that love stuff and think about what damaged goods like you might be able to do in life.” I said I wanted to join the army. He said they’d never take me because of my eyesight and the accident that cost me half a lung. By the age of 29, I was fighting the biggest and toughest guys, not in the army but in a prison. In that moment, and many others I could recount, he crushed my spirit, and from then on I was at war with the world, a war that led to amazing experiences as a musician—touring, making records, living my “Fuck you, Dad” dream. Then heroin hit London like a tidal wave in 1983, and I was someone who couldn’t stop using. Was my dad right? Was I destined to become a failure, a nobody low-life criminal?

Was my dad right? Was I destined to become a failure, a nobody low-life criminal?

I’m Hoping to Reset the Way I Think About My Father

It’s a painful exercise to revisit my memories of Father’s Day celebrations and an article like this can do no more than recount the bare fragments of memory. Years later, as I sit to rework the bones of this article I am struck by the potential for me to manipulate memory to feel a little better about myself and my tendency not to celebrate special days. But I also feel a deep and genuine sadness for myself as a child. At the beginning of my personal journey of recovery, I had a brilliant counselor who did a little exercise with me, asking if I could revisit the day I gave my father the ashtray I’d crafted to rework my father’s response in a visualization. In this version, he smiled and simply said, “Wow, that’s fantastic. Thank you, son. And what’s more, I love you very much.” It’s pretty much the way I relate to my own adult daughter.In playing out a healthy interaction, I reset my relationship with myself and let go of my now long-dead dad. A cautionary tale or simple therapeutic anecdote? I guess that’s for the reader to decide. I would like to close with a request: Remember that special days like Father’s Day can matter far more than we know, so celebrate. Let your pa know that you love him and be ready to accept whatever clumsy response he may have. Happy Father’s Day to dads everywhere.

This is part two of a two-part series. Read the first piece here.Dusting myself off from the robbery, I packed up a bag with my backup camera gear and headed to the eastern frontline city of Mariupol on the train. I initially stayed in a hotel with correspondents from the BBC, ITV, Radio France, TRT World and others. We shared stories at night of what we had been covering and waited to see if the invasion would go ahead as predicted. Mariupol is a port city and therefore highly strategic for Putin. It was understood that this would be one of the first cities he would want to occupy. On my first day there, I shot raw video clips of ordinary street life, people getting on with their daily lives: buskers, young people ice skating, elderly folks feeding pigeons in parks and so forth. Even now, I get shivers thinking about how normal life in Mariupol felt before the invasion and how quickly the situation deteriorated. Now Ukrainian mothers are giving birth in maternity wards under Russian bombs, and people have been massacred in what is being described as one of the worst war crimes of the last century.Back at the hotel in Mariupol, I befriended Vika, a Ukrainian fixer and intelligence officer who would end up saving my life on at least one occasion. In the evenings, we chatted about the potential oncoming invasion, the disinformation campaign Putin was goading Russians and Ukrainians into believing, Russian double agents and the vigilance one needs to maintain in the field as either a journalist or an intelligence officer.From talking with locals in Mariupol, it was evident that the majority of people didn’t want their territory to be occupied by the Russians. In 2014, Mariupol had taken the brunt of pro-Russian separatist attacks, and we visited a police station that was heavily bombarded by shelling and gunfire that year, and the building was still pockmarked with scars from the attack.On my walk back to my hotel on my last night in Mariupol, I heard what I thought was the sound of shelling not far off in the distance. The next day, locals confirmed it was a missile strike, and I was advised to take a train back up to the capital immediately. My unofficial Ukrainian fixer Vika was also up there, and so I met with her for dinner at a Georgian restaurant on Wednesday the 23rd of February. We sat down and ordered a couple of glasses of red wine and an entree of borscht soup. She looked paler and less jovial than usual. “It’s about to get real,” she said in a stern, James Bond-like voice. “It’s going down tomorrow. There is strong U.S. intelligence suggesting that the full invasion will begin tomorrow.”Vika had told me in the past that she had some low-level U.S. intelligence clearance, so I knew she was probably right. We decided to end the evening early and return to our hotel rooms.

I get shivers thinking about how normal life in Mariupol felt before the invasion and how quickly the situation deteriorated.

I Was on the Ground for Putin’s Invasion

Sure enough, the next evening, the sound of air raid sirens followed by multiple missile strikes on Kyiv had begun. It would last for days. The hotel I was in at the time didn’t have a basement to shelter in, and so I spent most of the day in a subway station, filming and thinking about my next move. Everything had shut down, bar one or two cafes, pharmacies and a few minimarts that had long queues out the front. I called Vika and she said I should change hotels and take cover in a hotel basement with other journalists in the north of the city—this is where I took shelter while the Russian military bombarded Kyiv throughout the second night of the invasion with missiles.After a rough night on the second day of the war in the hotel basement, I was awoken by another international journalist and colleague of Vika’s. “We need to go now, right now. We need to evacuate. Quickly pack your things!”We walked out onto the street, and a driver pulled up to the hotel entrance and scooped us up in his van. Being the tallest, I climbed into the shotgun seat and turned to look at the driver. He passed me a cat in a carrier bag and said, “That’s my cat. Hold it.” As the car swerved through the city at speed and the cat meowed in my lap, I looked through the front windscreen to see smoke billowing out from a building on the city skyline, evidence of the missile strikes from the night before.We arrived at the train station, along with hordes of other people all trying to escape. It looked like a scene out of the fall of Saigon. Fortunately, at this point, nobody required a ticket, and we managed to board a train later in the afternoon. The train’s lights were all turned off—I assumed so as not to be seen from above—and we rattled off to Lviv, our destination in the west of the country and closer to the Polish border. Along the way, we heard an almighty noise that, at first, I thought was a missile but which turned out to be a low flying Ukrainian fighter jet speeding past the train window. After the initial shock, a sense of relief and feeling protected kicked in. I decided to stretch my legs and walk through the train carriages. I stopped at one carriage’s exit and stared out of the window at the sprawling countryside in front of me. I looked down at the stairs inside the train that were below me and noticed a mysterious pool of blood—that I assumed was human. I shot a few seconds of video of it and then returned to my seat, somewhat shaken by what I’d seen.

I Visited Lviv, a Western City in Ukraine

The train arrived at a packed Lviv station early the next morning, and we headed to a hotel. The architecture and atmosphere in Lviv felt more like Vienna than a post-Soviet town.It seemed unusually calm and normal and carried a different vibe than both Kyiv and Mariupol. However, every night for my entire one-week stay there, air raid sirens would wake us early in the morning, and we would take cover in the hotel’s basement. “Stay away from the windows,” a hotel guest said to me after I sat at a table close to a window.This routine of sleepless nights and early morning air raid sirens became a new normal and something that we all tried to get used to.Vika called me to say she would arrange a driver to take me to the Polish border and to be ready early in the morning. She also asked me if I could take her passport out for her and FedEx it to her to a location outside of Ukraine. Sure enough, the driver handed me her passport and two envelopes on the car journey out to the border. It took me a while to realize what was going on, and later, I suspected that she was probably on a hit list and afraid of being captured by the Russians. I opened the envelopes, and inside was a significant amount of cash in two different currencies, which I later wired to her bank account after posting her passport back to her from Poland.After getting stopped along the way a couple of times at military checkpoints by soldiers carrying Kalashnikov rifles, where I showed my press pass and passport, the driver eventually dropped me as close to the border as he could.I got out of the car and walked with my luggage toward the customs booth. Along the road, there were hundreds of abandoned suitcases that had been stacked up on top of each other in a massive pile. It looked like some type of graveyard—but for luggage. I assumed that people must have been rushing to get out of the country and were no longer able to carry all their belongings. I noticed a young man in a Ukrainian military uniform crying at the crossing whilst he said goodbye to his young partner and their child, who were also both in tears. All Ukrainian men aged 18 to 60 were now banned from leaving Ukraine. The young woman and child walked ahead of me and crossed over to the Polish side. It was nothing short of a scene out of a World War II movie, only this was real and happening in the year 2022. A young, smiling Polish customs woman walked over to the Ukrainian woman and instantly put her arm around her and comforted her. The true human cost of this war had well and truly sunk in by this stage.The Polish response to the influx of refugees (one of the largest exoduses since World War II) coming across the border was astonishing. The Poles were well organized and ready to assist their neighboring country with all the resources they had. One got a sense that the Poles, in some ways, are suffering from a kind of survivor’s guilt and are rightly concerned that they, too, may become a target of Putin’s aggression one day.

During my time in both Ukraine and Poland, I saw the best and worst of humanity.

I Stayed on the Ukrainian-Polish Border for Ten Days

The Ukrainian refugees were all given a free SIM card as soon as they crossed over into the refugee camp on the border, and hot food and drinks were also being handed out by volunteers from World Central Kitchen. I decided to work with Dave, a Polish documentary filmmaker and a journalist friend of mine, for the next 10 days on the border filming and doing interviews with aid workers and refugees.On our first night, we got to witness a Ukrainian woman reunited with her elderly mother after they had become separated in the chaos of the first week of the war. “It's mother’s birthday today. We got separated during the war, and I am waiting for her to cross through tonight,” she said to me pensively whilst we hovered around one of the fires burning in the camp to keep warm.For the next few days and nights, Dave and I would witness many more highly emotional moments in that cold border town. The adage that war brings out the best and worst in people is true, and I know that today. During my time in both Ukraine and Poland, I saw the best and worst of humanity. I went from covering the glamorous catwalks of Ukrainian Fashion Week to becoming a war refugee myself in the space of a few weeks. The resilience and sheer determination of the Ukrainian people’s willingness to defend their country under extraordinarily difficult circumstances is something I can’t nor will I ever forget.All images were provided by the author to The Doe.

When I was 13 years old, I signed a billion-year contract to commit my life to the principles of Scientology.I don’t think I really decided to join the Sea Organization as much as I thought it was my only choice. And I don’t remember if I fully, without any doubt, believed I would be a member for a billion years. That number was inconceivable to me at the time, but I signed it anyway because I believed it to be the only path forward. Scientologists ultimately seek a higher state of being by helping to “clear” the world of the reactive mind, which is believed to be the source of irrational behavior and fears. To do this, members work with an internal auditor to help them achieve a personal state of Clear—the first major goal for all Scientologists. Past the state of Clear lie the bonus levels—Operating Thetan (OT1 through OT8). After a lot of additional auditing to reach these levels, it’s said that Scientology’s ultimate truths will be revealed to you. In our world, this was analogous to being superhuman.We were taught that the only way to get rid of your reactive mind, the part that holds all the painful and unconscious memories from this and all previous lives, was to continually visit an auditor. So, at 13, that’s what I wanted to become.I believed my service to the church was the only way to save the planet. But auditing was very expensive, and Scientologists would spend thousands or millions over their lifetime if they stayed with the church.

I believed my service to the church was the only way to save the planet.

I Spent My Childhood in Isolation

How did a teenager come to a decision on what to do with their next billion years? I was born into Scientology; a closed-off environment was all I knew. My parents were Sea Org members whose first priority was continuing the mission of the church. Raising children was not of primary concern, so any kid born into Los Angeles’s Sea Org was raised by other Scientology staff. From ages 5 to 13, I went to a boarding school in the mountains of Santa Clara, California, called Canyon Oaks Ranch—about an hour drive north of L.A.The ranch held about 150 kids of various ages in dormitories, and our time there was split into thirds. One-third of the day was spent on our jobs, like cleaning the ranch, cooking and caring for other children. One-third was reserved for schoolwork, but only reading, writing and arithmetic. We had no exposure to outside ideas—no internet, no TV, not even science or history classes. The last third of our time was spent in Scientology studies, where we were taught (and believed) that we were adults in young bodies. After all, we were spiritual beings who had lived billions of lifetimes before, so why shouldn’t we act as mature adults? Since we weren’t allowed to be exposed to many people or ideas outside of Scientology, we had no reason to believe this wasn’t true. We were told this was the best that life could be, and we believed it.We were only allowed family visitors for a few brief hours on Sunday mornings, when most of our parents had off from their own duties. My father worked evening and weekend hours in the Sea Org and studied Scientology the rest of the time, but he had Monday mornings off for personal chores. He would sometimes spend those Monday mornings visiting the ranch, but he could only visit with me during a short class break time.My mother, however, was never able to visit because she was working at the church’s international headquarters, the top-secret Gold Base where David Miscavige currently resides. Some other children had better luck and more frequent visits, but my parents’ roles in the church didn’t offer us that luxury of time.If our productivity levels surpassed expectations and our written requests for approval were signed by two to three higher-ups, the ranch would let us leave for the day on birthdays or major holidays. On these rare occasions, we got to visit some family members outside of Scientology. But any attempt by my family members to convince me that Scientology was wrong would only mean that I would not be allowed to visit them again—and, based on what I’d been taught, I would think they were evil and needed saving.Without anyone from the outside challenging the way we lived as kids, our lives after the ranch were fairly predetermined. Our parents were in the Sea Org, so it was a natural progression for us to follow and sign the now-infamous contract.

I Caught a Glimpse of the Outside World

Once indoctrinated into the Sea Org, I worked at the PAC Base—the blue Scientology building between Fountain Avenue and Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles.When my petitions for a day off were approved, I would often spend time with an uncle on the outside. From this limited exposure to the rest of the world, I realized how much more free time outsiders seemed to have. I learned about weekends and evenings off, which was unbelievable to me after only having a few hours off for family visitations my entire life and having no time to be a kid at the ranch. Seeing how everyone outside of Scientology spent their free time is what made me want to leave, so I started routing out.This decision was completely my own, but I was terrified of what my parents would think. The authorities, of course, tried to change my mind. The routing out process is lengthy and exhaustive, but it’s meant to convince you to stay. They first offered me a more prestigious post and other potential perks, then continued with long auditing sessions analogous to confessionals to admit any spiritual or physical crimes I may have committed.After a few long weeks of routing out, I had started to cause some trouble. Once, a friend and I lit a smoke bomb and threw it into one of the staff dormitories. This behavior, combined with the fact that I had yet to change my mind to stay, pushed the authorities to decide that my time with them was over. They also decided it was time for my parents to route out with me.At that time, my parents were part of the Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF), which is kind of like Sea Org prison for those who have made critical mistakes and require spiritual rehabilitation. My dad’s critical mistake was talking to a Suppressive Person, and my mother’s was looking at online content that was critical of Scientology.We were all upset when we found out they also had to leave—they, because Scientology was all they had ever known, and me because I was the reason they were excommunicated.Only two years after I signed the billion-year contract to join the Sea Org, my parents and I were living on the outside.

Only two years after I signed the billion-year contract to join the Sea Org, my parents and I were living on the outside.

Life After Scientology's Sea Org Means Freedom

Leaving the Sea Org is quite different than simply leaving Scientology. Even though we had exited the organization, we still felt like Scientologists. We wholeheartedly believed that once we had stable jobs and could afford it, we would be the people who went to the Sea Org for auditing. We would be like the people we used to service, like the celebrities often associated with the church.Today, over 20 years after we’ve left, a few of my old friends still consider themselves Scientologists and actively pay for their services. Another friend prefers to stay neutral, not joining in the services but also avoiding any criticism of the church in order to stay in touch with his family who is still on the inside. I lost a few friends along the way, of course. The way that my family had to leave meant many of them weren’t allowed to stay friends with me.Now I’m finally living with my own freedom. I have the ability to make decisions every single day without the influence of the ranch’s upbringing. I am grateful for the ability to make these choices because I know so many others who—like I once was—are not so lucky.

My dad was the epitome of a devoted, servant-hearted father whose unconditional love knew no bounds. As his youngest daughter and the child most like him, I was always considered his “precious little girl,” and the joke was that I was his favorite. But my life shattered before my eyes four years ago when my beloved father suffered an unexpected and fatal heart attack. Dad meant everything to me, and the world felt like a safe place to be because he was in it. Then, in an instant, I was forced to accept a new reality and was confronted with the terrifying prospect that I’d live a lifetime without him. The thought was almost too much to bear. I soon understood what Michelle Obama meant when she once said that her own late father had left a “hole in [her] heart” and his loss would forever be her “scar.” I felt robbed to have only had my dad for the first 23 years of my life, but in the years since his passing, it’s become clear the impact he’s had on me will last a lifetime.

It’s become clear the impact he’s had on me will last a lifetime.

My Father Taught Me to Never Settle in Romantic Relationships

As conventional wisdom goes, girls marry their fathers. Whether you would agree with that statement or not, some researchers argue that girls who have had fulfilling relationships with their fathers and have experienced their approval in abundance from an early age don’t tend to feel compelled to seek validation from men in the future. Many will point out holes in this theory, but I can personally attest that this has been my experience. Ever since I started dating in my early 20s, I realized I was attracted to men who possessed the same qualities as my dad. I was subconsciously looking for humility, kindness and a quiet self-assurance in the guys I was meeting, especially in those who treated me in the same way as my father did. I had been taught enough by my father to know how I deserved to be treated and that I should never settle when it came to romantic relationships. My dad instilled in me such a sense of self-worth that I have never sought this from any man I’ve dated nor have I ever felt the need to be reassured of my value in any relationship. Though the pain of losing him has been excruciating, I’ve been so heartened to realize that in the four years since his passing, my sense of self-worth has never once shifted. My attitude before and after his passing have remained the same. I was in one significant romantic relationship since my dad’s passing, and while I enjoyed the company and presence of another man in my life, he and I both knew he didn’t need to reassure me of anything. The groundwork had already been laid by my father throughout my whole childhood, and I was enjoying partnership with a man as an enhancer of my life, not to fulfill it. I feel so blessed that this was my experience, as I know that so many children go without strong male figures in their lives.“The man you’re going to meet isn’t even born yet,” my dad would often tell me.“Well, I don’t want my husband to be younger than me,” my 12-year-old self replied.“That’s not really what I mean, honey,” he laughed.

He has blessed me with self-assuredness, the greatest gift a person could ask for.

I Will Never Forget the Feeling of Being Treasured by My Father

The week after my dad’s death, my sister and I visited his office to clear out his things. It was one of the saddest days of my life as we gathered up his belongings from his desk. I silently wept as we packed up my dad’s little corner of the world, which was just as he left it, ready for his return that following Monday morning. Through tear-filled eyes, I discovered my university map on his pinboard, along with handwritten notes in his diary with the dates and times of my final exams. “Which one of you girls is studying politics at uni?” my dad’s boss asked, desperately trying to make light conversation. “Your dad always told me so much about it,” he said. “That was me,” I replied.“Oh, and who was it who studied abroad in Europe and did a road trip off the Italian coast?” he went on. “Oh yes, that was also me,” I answered.“Well, your dad thought the world of you and your whole family. He would tell us all about what you were getting up to all the time.”How could anybody feel anything other than adored and treasured and not walk a little taller in the world? My father treated me like the most precious thing to walk the planet, and though he’s not here to see me grow up and live my life, he has blessed me with self-assuredness, the greatest gift a person could ask for.

Near my childhood home was a small park, adjacent to sparsely used train tracks. I loved that park, and my dad knew it. So on his days off, he would break out my bike with my training wheels, and I’d ride it up the street to the park with him not far behind.One day, he decided I didn’t need training wheels anymore, my first foray into riding a bike unassisted. Surprising absolutely no one, I fell off. I ended up with a massive scrape up my left leg, and I started crying in fear and pain. How did my dad react?“Get the fuck up and stop crying. Be a man, or I’ll give you something to cry about.”When I didn’t stop crying, he beat me. I was 5 years old. I barely touched a bike for the next six years.

You Were Never the Man You Thought You Were

My dad has always been an—how do I put this?—interesting person. He never had baseline respect for women, overwhelmingly highlighted by the way he taught me about sex. He sat me down, laid a Playboy magazine in front of me and said, “Here, figure it out.”When my mom was pregnant, they had an agreement that she would name a girl and he would name a boy. As it turned out, I came out with a penis and, as a result, he came up with the bright idea of naming me after himself.Around a week postpartum, my mom was resting with me in bed, and my aunt was resting on the couch after helping my mom out a bit. My dad, wearing only a robe, walked up to my aunt, opened his robe, presented his penis and asked, “So what are you going to do about this?”As I got older, my relationship with him became more and more strained. My parents were divorced, and I took every opportunity I could to avoid him. He started an abusive relationship with alcohol, and I was becoming a man in my own right. It was just that his and my definitions of “man” were recognizably different.To my dad, women were objects centered around his satisfaction. Because he was a man, he was inherently stronger and better than non-men around him. He was a fervent homophobe and often poked fun at my uncle and his wife for only giving birth to girls. He believed that the most important part of a woman was her sexuality and the expression of that, especially when it was directed toward him. This came to a head during one of the worst weekends of my life.

My dad has always been an—how do I put this?—interesting person.

My Dad's Drinking and Abusive Behavior Became Overwhelming

I was about 15 years old and homeless, jumping between friends' couches. My stepdad was going to be in town and was supposed to help me open a bank account that wasn’t connected to my dad since, up to that point, my dad constantly monitored my money when he wasn’t taking it.I was expecting my stepdad to call me about picking me up, so I answered his call with enthusiasm until he said, “You should sit down.”“Your mom just had an aneurysm. I’m coming to get you.”The drive to see my mom in the hospital was about two hours long and was populated by a chilling silence. My stepdad and I were always chatty and joking, but this time, we were just quiet. The hospital was much worse. My mom was situated in the ICU, and when I finally got to her, I could see how much pain she was in. Her screams still ring in my ears around a decade later, but somehow, this wasn’t the worst thing that happened that night.On the ride up to the hospital, I called my paternal grandmother so someone near where I was living knew where I would be. Through my grandma, my dad—already plastered—found out about my mom.My dad called me. “Spend whatever time you can with her. She’s going to wake up retarded or, most likely, she’s going to die,” he slurred. Unbeknownst to me, he was making his way to the hospital, drunk for the two-hour drive.Though I never saw him that night, what I’ve since learned horrifies me.After molesting my mom in the hospital, grabbing her as she was hooked up to the machines in her room, I guess he was so drunk that my mom recommended he didn’t drive home. He still had a connection with my maternal grandmother, so he stayed with her and my cousins for the night.I have a cousin, who at this point was maybe 14 years old. She was awake when my dad came into the house while everyone else was either asleep or avoiding him.I don’t think I really need to explain what happened next: A girl who he held as a baby was at his mercy.“You can use your pussy to rule the world,” he said as he caressed her leg.I tried to forgive him after that. I internalized that I needed a dad, my dad, in my life. Some bullshit about accepting family and their flaws. He even got clean and, to my knowledge, has been for years. But I reached a breaking point.

It wasn’t the first time he threw me out, but it would be the last.

I’m Making a Name for Myself

The final straw was last July. I was on the edge. My long-term partner ended things with me, and I was in shambles. I was wholeheartedly considering ending my life.I was staying with my dad during that time, giving him another chance since he had stopped drinking and, in my experience, his alcohol addiction was the cause of many of our problems. I wanted him to be sober, and he was doing that.But when my depression became too much to manage and he didn’t want to deal with it anymore, he kicked me out. I was lonely and depressed and confused, and he no longer cared to help.That woke me up, and since then, I’ve cemented my position. It wasn’t the first time he threw me out, but it would be the last.His legacy was no longer going to be my burden. During my life, he’s had multiple felony DUIs—including almost killing my uncle by running a car into him—and whenever I needed a background check, his information would be the first to pop up. It took a lot of time and embarrassment to overcome those issues, especially after being denied jobs because of a background that wasn’t even mine. I went through years of therapy. I worked until I started seeing a life where I didn’t need his acceptance to make me whole.My dad, my namesake, will no longer be a part of my life.

Kids knew I was a queer before I even knew what that meant. These kids would pick their noses while I, Queen Helpless, reigning over the kingdom of PTSD, would wait for the impact of the inevitable booger that would be flicked into my hair and onto my clothes.My dad was no better. He'd catch me playing with my sister's Barbies and call me a plethora of names that the kids at school had already rehearsed and performed. He'd then hit me with the beautifully dressed dolls because he didn't want his gender-assigned son to be a faggot. Coming out as gay in high school in the ’90s wasn't trendy, to say the least. I told one of my friends, and she ended up telling the whole school. Then boom, I was a different person overnight. Bisexuality was a myth back then, and nonbinary/trans folks were a disease.So immediately, I was thrown into a gay man box and was stuck there for a decade and a half. Maybe we had verbiage like gender nonconforming or pansexual back in the ’90s and 2000s, but I never heard it.You probably think that I want you to feel sorry for me, but I'm way beyond that at this point in my life. People tend to develop a very rough exterior when they grow up being called a sissy, a girl, a little bitch, a gaywad, a butt pirate; you name it, I've endured it. Or you take the road less traveled and you kill yourself, like so many of my friends have over the years.I loved when school counselors would tell me, "They're just words. Don't let them get to you."Or the popular, "Stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me."I understand these concepts today being a 39-year-old queer, nonbinary person, but back then, these sayings would just make me feel more stupid and helpless.Why can't I stick up for myself?Why can't I stop these people from calling me names?

You name it, I've endured it.

At First, I Was Uncomfortable Calling Myself Queer

I’m so grateful that out of all the marginalized communities in the world, the LGBTQIA+ is the most willing to accept you, flaws and all. We are open and stay open because we've been through shit sprinkled with more shit. I also believe another part of that is that we accept all races, sexes and sizes in our community, which makes us stronger, more intelligent and the most open-minded.So why did I cringe the first time I heard “queer” being used for comedy value on TV?It was the show Will and Grace, and the notorious Jack McFarland answered someone's question with, "Tom’s queer, dear." I, of course, laughed but also knew I could never say that or wouldn't be confident enough to use a word that's been proven to be daggers in my life.The older I got, the more I heard “queer” being used but not for comedy value. People in our diverse community started to identify as queer. I'd never say anything, but I heard each and every one of you say it. And I felt it.These brave people were taking a weapon and turning it into a peace treaty. It wasn't until a couple years ago that I myself started to identify as queer.When I finally accepted the word “queer” for myself, the scope of how I looked at the world changed. I didn’t have to fit in anymore to one group or theme in life. I never felt like a twink, a jock or a bear, but queer worked.

These brave people were taking a weapon and turning it into a peace treaty.

Identifying as Queer Is a Personal Choice

So why are straight, cisgender people afraid of using the word “queer” to identify their child or their parent or their best friend? Even now, I will tell people I'm queer and I get mixed reactions. Either ’cause they think what I am saying is wrong, I'm using it out of context or they just get offended, which is comical coming from heterosexuals, who typically don't know what it’s like to be marginalized or truly offended.My best friend, who is the most lovely human being and also straight, said she wouldn't call me queer ’cause it's a bad word. It makes her sick when people use any type of derogatory term for anyone, and she doesn't have the heart to say it because she thinks it will cause more pain in the end.Now, while I can agree to some of what she's saying, I'm telling you my singular story. That I want to be called queer, not everyone does. For me, stating that I'm queer is a superpower. I say it for the scared kids with boogers crusted in their hair, for them to know that one day, they will be safe. But that's just my story. Not everyone is the same, and not everyone wants a label. I don't speak for all LGBTQIA+ members. I only speak through my experiences and my story. Just because I want something doesn't mean everyone wants this, and it also doesn't mean people can't change their minds later down the road. I implore different people to know what they want to be identified as and tell your loved ones that. If they don't do it, keep telling them because how will they learn? Now, if they absolutely refuse to do it, slap them across their fucking faces!I'm kidding.I'll let you in on a little secret. Them not fulfilling your wishes is about them, not you. Not many people like change, especially living in such a binary-centric globe.Like my dear friend and drag queen icon Miss Coco Peru says, “If people are making fun of you and laughing, let ’em. That's the only joy they get in their day.”Whenever I'm having a shit day, I say this mantra in my head.Today, I'm me! Whether that's in flats or in stilettos. Today, I'm queer and fabulous and I let people know that that's how I want to be identified.Queer or That Bitch. Whichever you prefer.

Back in the summer of 2017, things were finally looking up for me. I had found the perfect summer job; I was in love; and I was about to embark on my third year of medical school. This meant finally going around the hospital, as we'd start off our clinical rotations and getting to see a little bit of everything. Basically a dream come true for an aspiring surgeon!But as fate would have it, a week before university started, my dad had to be taken to the hospital. He had been suffering through metastatic parotid cancer for four long years and had been going in and out of hospital all summer long; being discharged as soon as he was stable, only to deteriorate after a couple of days or weeks. “What’s the point?” I’d ask myself. I would’ve offed myself the minute it became all about surviving rather than living, if it were me. Why put up a fight if it’s a lost cause anyway? Is it out of fear of death? Is it out of duty to family? Or is it just delusional hope, perhaps? Either way, no reason seems good enough to justify all that suffering to me. And the cold, dark truth? The one that everybody going through something like this always thinks but rarely admits? It’s that death will not only bring relief to the dying but also to their loved ones. His death would end all of this suffering. I hated myself every time that thought crossed my mind. I was wishing the guy who sacrificed his entire life for me was dead. I was where I wanted to be because of him. I had everything I needed to have because of him. And there I was, acting as if none of that even mattered. Any other son would be simply grateful for the opportunity to repay their debts. But me? I wanted out so desperately. I couldn’t take it anymore. Every cough, every yell of pain made me cringe. All of it was a constant reminder of his suffering and my powerlessness. I’d resent him for interrupting my studying. I’d loathe him for taking up so much of my time. But most of all, I’d hate myself. I’d hate myself for even allowing those thoughts to infiltrate my head.

That moment felt like coming up for fresh air after being underwater for so long.

I Didn’t Want to Tell My Friends About My Dad

And the worst part? I felt all alone. I was too proud to ever accept help from anyone. It had taken over six months after he had been diagnosed for me to tell my closest friends. My rationale was that the minute I’d tell them, they’d start looking at me in a different light: one of pity. I still remember the night I told them about him so vividly. We had been drinking all night. Everyone was laughing and having the time of their lives. And I couldn’t even bear to smile that night. It had been a particularly bad day for my dad. It was his second round of chemo, and he had spent the entire day vomiting his guts out, moaning in pain, crying. I had never seen my dad cry before. That was all I could think about. I wanted to get that out of my head, to get away from it all. Instead, I ended up thinking about it all even more. One of my friends knew something was up. It didn’t take much probing for me to break down. I had never cried in front of a peer, and there I was, bathing his shoulders in tears. That moment felt like coming up for fresh air after being underwater for so long. What to him must have been such a trivial moment is, to this day, one of my fondest memories. Of course, the following day, it was like nothing had ever happened. Brave, strong, stoic me was back. Every time my friends would ask me about him, I’d just play it off as if everything was under control. As if I could take care of myself and my dying father. As if my plate wasn’t already full with my personal and academic life. As if everything was fine, as if I were fine. But in hindsight, I can say I really wasn’t. Most of the time, I wouldn’t know it, but then I’d go out and drink, and all those feelings would resurface yet again. But for years, I held it all in.I held it all in, and I persevered. I did everything I could do for him. I kept him company and I was by his side. I’d help him eat and wash up. I’d help him with his meds. I’d help him in and out of bed. I’d rub his sore bones and whatever was left of his muscles; the only thing that would give him relief. Harder still was to make him smile. I’d tell him all about how I was doing with my studies. We’d talk about his beloved plants and our dogs. Anything that would take his mind off the pain. I did everything I could do for him. I might not have done everything he needed of me, but I did everything I could. And looking back, that’s just as much as anyone can do.

I had to tell him all that I couldn’t before.

I Was Able to Tell My Dad How Much He Meant to Me as He Died

The morning after he had been admitted, I got a call from my mother telling me to rush to the hospital. “It’s time” she said in a dramatic, almost movie-like tone. How naive of me to expect relief that his death would put an end to his and my suffering. But it wasn’t sorrow either that I was feeling. It was emptiness. It felt as if that news had deadened every single fiber in my body. Before then, I thought I had done all too well in dealing with grief. I thought I was way over it. Just five stages, no? Denial, check. Anger, check. Bargaining, check. Depression, check. Acceptance, check. Man, was I wrong. Somehow, I managed to drive to the hospital and get to his room. But it wasn’t him I noticed first. Standing right there next to my mother and dad was my uncle. “What the hell is he doing here? Seriously? We don’t get to be alone with him now of all times? And where the hell is my brother?” But I didn’t make a scene. I mustered enough composure to be able to ask them to give me a few minutes alone with him. Up until then, I hadn’t even looked at him. I couldn’t afford to break down right in front of them.They left, and I was alone with him. There he was. His skin yellow, his breathing laborious, his eyes staring at the nothingness in front of him, rattling. You know the expression “there is no dignity in death”? It’s something you’ve got to see in front of your very eyes in order to understand it. I had no idea how much a person could lose. For four years, we had seen him turn from a stallion of a man to something resembling a bag of bones who would constantly moan in pain. I knew that it was too late for me to say goodbye. Whatever life was left in him was definitely not enough for him to listen to what I had to say. But I had to try. I had to tell him all that I couldn’t before. I grabbed the sides of his head, and while sobbing, I told him everything I had been too proud to say before. I thanked him for all he had done for us, for me. I thanked him for never looking back on the extraordinary life he gave up for us. And most of all, I thanked him for being the best dad I could have ever wished for. I told him to go, to get the rest he so deserved. With his last breath, I felt a relief unlike any other. I went outside the hospital, lit a cigarette and for the first time in months, I could feel a smile forming on my face. “You finally get to rest, huh? Goodbye, Dad”

Most people save up for years to visit the Hawaiian islands—but for the past few months, by leveraging my skills and labor, I am able to live here rent-free, bill-free and, for the most part, stress-free. While I have done this in other locations like New York, North Carolina and Tennessee, living in a sought-after tourist destination for free has been a whole new experience. Work-trade is a popular form of alternative travel. Interested work-traders can find opportunities through websites like Workaway, WWOOF and HelpX. The hosts set up a profile page explaining their needs and what they are able to offer, and work-traders initiate a conversation to see if the two are a good fit. Some opportunities are selective and coveted, with months-long waitlists, while other hosts will take in anyone and everyone. I have been participating in programs like Workaway for around four years now. Work-trade allows travel to happen in a more connected, conscious way. Rather than treat the destination as a commodity or something to be taken from and used, I (and my fellow travelers) become part of the culture. We integrate ourselves into the surrounding community and nearly become locals ourselves.Recently, I joined a farm and restaurant in a rural area of one of the Hawaiian islands. The business is booming, so my hosts can afford to provide a unique experience for motivated work-traders. The room and board are nicer than many other places that I’ve visited, and the work is different every day.

It can take weeks before the ever-present spiders become friends rather than foes.

It Takes Time to Adjust From City Life to Living Off the Grid

Manual labor is often thought of as bottom-of-the-barrel work. This may be the case in many locations where wages are low and there is no other option for work. But for a group of young travelers, farm work can present itself as paradise, a drastic difference from the hustle and bustle of city life that most are accustomed to. A typical day in the field might include harvesting and washing lettuce, planting new garden beds and landscaping the property. In addition to farm labor, some work-traders cook in the restaurant or bake in the bakery. These are typical commercial kitchens, equipped with top-of-the-line gear. The success of these businesses allows the farm to continue to run as smoothly as it does—money tends to fix most practical problems on the farm. I enjoy the opportunity to be outside, touch the plants and learn natural skills. Even when I’m working in the on-site restaurant, I’m still outside, as the building is open-air. When chopping vegetables in the morning, I can face one way to look out to the forest, or I can turn around for a view of the ocean. When sunset comes, we often take a break to take in the cotton-candy skies. The experience is a stark contrast to the boxed-in kitchens that I am used to in my past work.The accommodations are not for the faint-hearted. After all, we are living in a Hawaiian jungle with only the essential amenities. Those who come from the comforts of the city often go through a period of shock, and it can take weeks before the ever-present spiders become friends rather than foes. While I’m used to it now, I can recall being stressed out at one of my first off-grid living situations. The bugs, the lack of air-conditioning, the lack of amenities—I was residing in a downtown metropolis just days before, and the forest gave me a scare. However, after just a few days, I became accustomed to the changes. This work-trade opportunity operates on a first-come, first-served basis, with new arrivals starting their residency in a tent. As turnover happens, everyone receives an upgrade to their accommodations—tent-dwellers move into dorm rooms, and dorm residents eventually acquire their own cabin. When I arrived, the farm was short-staffed, so I was in my own cabin within the first week. Yet some have lived in a tent for weeks or months on end. Other work-trade accommodations have ranged from private apartments to 10-bed dorm rooms to a whole house. The housing tends to reflect the skills and effort expected of the work-trader. When I had a nicer residence, I was usually performing skilled work (such as photography or website design, rather than farm labor). One woman set me up on the entire second floor of her home that had just been renovated—a bedroom, a living room, a full kitchen and a large balcony overlooking the Blue Ridge Mountains. I would mow the lawn, build garden beds and plant veggies in the morning, with the rest of my day reserved for lounging and living in the off-grid “penthouse.”

It’s Easier to Eat Healthily With Work-Trade

Being on a Hawaiian farm means that fresh fruits and vegetables abound. The residents’ kitchen is stocked full of just about anything that we request or require: every kind of cooking oil, every vegetable and herb that we can get our hands on, all types of grain (quinoa, rice, couscous, pasta), condiments and toppings and endless fruit (star apples, papayas, bananas, citrus, lilikoi, guava and more). We never have to think twice about eating a healthy meal. Come 12:30 (lunch) and 5:30 (dinner), a fresh, home-cooked meal is waiting for me. No effort needed. I don’t have to choose between McDonald’s or cooking: healthy food just awaits me. There’s no fast food, no deep fryer, no supermarkets—just simple, good food. Living in the city, I always have goals of eating a balanced diet. But convenience foods always seem to find their way to me. But it’s a totally different story here on the farm. If we want an indulgent chocolate cake, we better be prepared to mix the batter, bake it to perfection, frost it ourselves. If we want French fries, we have to slice up the potatoes, fry them ourselves, figure out how to dispose of the oil properly. With that level of effort required to eat unhealthy food, we usually choose more nourishing options. A typical lunch menu might include tofu, quinoa, sauteed broccoli, tzatziki sauce and pasta salad. That night’s dinner might be grilled portabellos, roasted asparagus, honey-glazed carrots and Parmesan kale salad.

Everyone is able to simply be themselves.

Work-Trade Allows Me to Meet New People

With around 20 residents at any given time, there is always a diverse cast of characters. The personnel is dominated by wanderers and travelers and positivity, but there are those who bring the pains and problems of their previous life. Some come without any intentions or goals and fall into alcoholism or other forms of despair. That being said, the general atmosphere is friendly, supportive and communal. The people here have encouraged me to climb more trees here than I have in my whole life. Just yesterday, a friend and I jumped into a star apple tree to access the bounty of fruit that was waiting to be picked. We scored over 40 and had a fruit feast with the rest of the crew. There is a massive banyan tree in the middle of the property, equipped with a ladder to allow access to its branches. I’ve spent hours in this tree, always with others, chatting about our day or just munching away at some fresh fruit from that day. Mushrooms and marijuana flow freely. The clothing is scant, and underwear is sacrilegious. Hippie talk is the norm—astrology, past lives, alternative music. One has endless opportunities to socialize with residents and locals, but there is also the option to retreat and work on yourself and your own goals. Many are childlike, and they influence others to embrace their inner youth—hanging out in trees, smiling and rejoicing over a new species of fruit or splashing and feeling giddy in the waves. Everyone is able to simply be themselves. They no longer need to hide or conform like they might have done in their “normal” lives back on the mainland. My experiences with work-trade and farm life keep bringing me closer to an ideal lifestyle. Until I find that (or even if I never do), I’ll keep livin’ and learnin’, meeting new people and finding some peace.

We have all somehow conformed just to fit into society's ways of living, from the way we talk to what we wear and eat. It has been a way of surviving; there are certain things we have to change about ourselves to make a living. After many years of being told how to wear my hair or being judged by the way I spoke at school (many teachers thought Black students were in gangs because we used slang a lot when we spoke), I decided enough was enough. I was no longer going to conform to society's ways of living, especially as a Black woman.

Even though my parents did their best to teach us about our culture, they still taught us to just try and fit into British customs and ways of living.

I Was Taught to Believe My Natural Hair Wasn’t Neat or Professional

I live in London, the capital city of the U.K. A city that is supposed to be diverse but, deep in the cracks of the pavement, there are microaggressions that make it hard for minorities to navigate the city. For years, the Black community has compromised our culture and heritage to fit into British society. My parents come from Nigeria and Zimbabwe, countries that have been heavily affected by colonialism for many decades. This has affected the way they have raised me and all of my siblings and the first names that they gave us, which are white names, for us to be able to fit well in society. This really made me question the role that colonialism played in my family's lives. Even though my parents did their best to teach us about our culture, they still taught us to just try and fit into British customs and ways of living. We spoke differently when we would make important phone calls to the general practitioner. I used my English name for most of my educational years because I was ashamed when teachers pronounced it wrong and became tired of correcting them. I straightened and permed my hair to make it look “neat.” Since childhood, I have found it fascinating how the conversation about our hair has caused so much controversy, with people debating on major news outlets about what professional hairstyles look like. This affected me in high school, as my school banned all the Black girls from wearing braids to school because it caused a distraction. This was my first encounter with discrimination as a Black woman. I was hurt and confused at how a hairstyle that was always part of my identity growing up was unprofessional and a distraction. They say a woman's hair is her crown, and I felt like mine had been ripped off my head and broken into pieces. When I couldn't wear my crown in the hairstyles that have been passed down to me from my ancestors, I felt their pain, and I, too, had my identity and culture stripped from me. The one thing that allowed me to stay connected to my African roots was no longer allowed in an environment that was supposed to enable me to be my genuine, authentic self.It makes me sad that, seven years later, I still see stories on Twitter of how many Black children in the British education system have been sent home from school because their hair was deemed unprofessional. Still, the education system forces young Black people to conform to British ways of living, stripping them of their identity and culture. This tactic is carried into the workplace, with white-collar jobs refusing to let Black women embrace their Afro-textured hair. I refused to wear my hair in a way deemed “professional” and “neat” and to change the way that I spoke to fit in. A lot of these microaggressions forced me to become self-employed.

I Learned About and Experienced Colorism at a Young Age

It can be difficult to uncondition yourself when, for many years, your ancestors have been taught to hate the skin they were put in. Even in our motherland, our sisters hate the sight of their black skin, so they turn to bleach cream to make them look Eurocentric, as they believe that the lighter their skin, the more the world will accept them as beautiful. I remember, when I was younger, going over to my mum's friend's house and seeing jars of Caro Light, one of the most popular lightening creams in the U.K. I was confused about it, so when we got home, I asked my mum about it, and she told me that many Black women bleach their skin so they can be lighter. She told me to never think of it and that my skin was beautiful the way it is. My mother is from Southern Africa, and she always told us that bleaching your skin or refusing to embrace and wear your Afro-textured hair out was an insult to the ancestors, and she was right. My ancestors didn't know colorism or unprofessional hairstyles until colonialism. They embraced their melanated skin and Afro-textured, kinky hair. They cared for their skin and hair, treating them as if they were royalty.As time went by, I started to hear conversations about colorism and how it affected the Black community. The division that it had caused was visible even to me as a young Black woman. I remember going to school and the boys would only speak to the light-skinned girls because they said they were prettier than dark-skinned girls were; it was devastating that we were seen as unattractive and unworthy of love. But I eventually found out that they were also conditioned because of what they saw on TV, on social media and in music videos. In the entertainment world, light-skinned women are the goddesses of the world, worshipped by all men. They are the idea of 21st-century beauty. Even during my university days, my lighter-skinned sisters got all the attention from men. It took me time to really undo the damage that colorism has had on me. I had to really study my culture and heritage. I began by speaking to my parents about my culture and heritage. My mentors and everyone I work with all create work based on Africa and key female figures in history. My journey into studying my culture and heritage has been aided by everyone around me. Studying the Black Panther movement taught me that moving from permed hair to Afro-textured hair was a sign of rebelliousness. There is a quote from Lori L. Tharps, co-author of Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America, that will forever stick with me. She tells i-D magazine, "The right to wear our hair the way it grows out of our heads. Saying to the establishment: 'Accept us and appreciate us for who we are.' Stop expecting us to assimilate or subjugate ourselves to make you comfortable." This is a quote that I will pass down to my children and grandchildren, making them understand that we didn't come on the earth to fit in but to stand out, to turn heads and be unapologetically Black.

We are warriors, freedom fighters, amazing mothers and intelligent women who deserve to live in luxury and be loved by our significant others.

I Am Proud to Be a Black Woman, in Spite of Colonialism

I refuse to let colonialism continue to define me and tell me as a Black woman how to live my life. I refuse to allow society to control my emotions. For years, Black women have been boxed into stereotypes that the media portrays, painting us as aggressive, whores, lost souls who are not capable of being loved and taking care of our children. We are warriors, freedom fighters, amazing mothers and intelligent women who deserve to live in luxury and be loved by our significant others. We are changemakers and powerful women who have graced the history books for years. From the way we wear our hair to the way we speak and what we eat, we are unapologetically Black forever, embracing our heritage and culture. I am no longer living to please colonial Britain but to only please myself, living life rebelliously one step at a time.