My
Story
I didn’t grow up free. I grew up in a world where control was called love, fear often disguised itself as care, and asking questions didn’t feel safe.
As a little girl, I remember feeling confused more than anything else. I was always trying to make sense of the world around me, but so much of what I was taught didn’t seem to fit together. I couldn’t understand why love felt so frightening. I didn’t know why belonging felt so conditional. It didn’t feel safe to ask honest questions. Something just didn’t feel right. And because I couldn’t imagine the adults around me were wrong, I quietly assumed that something was wrong with me.
It was a lonely way to grow up—carrying questions I didn’t know were okay to ask and believing there must be something wrong with me for having them. That belief quietly followed me into adulthood.
I became the good girl. The people pleaser. The one who tried hard, did the right things, and hoped that if I loved enough, believed enough, and worked hard enough, I would finally feel safe.
Then I met Trent. We were high school sweethearts who married young and built a beautiful life together. We raised six children, served in church leadership, taught marriage classes, and genuinely believed we had found the path we were meant to follow.
And in many ways, it was a beautiful life.
Until it wasn’t.
When our fifteen-year-old son, Cole, became critically ill, everything changed. We spent three years fighting for his life while trying to hold onto a faith that no longer made sense of what we were living.
Instead of compassion, we were often met with blame. Instead of comfort, we were given explanations that only deepened our pain.
When Cole died, we didn’t just lose our son. We lost the beliefs that had carried us for so many years. We walked away from the only spiritual home we had ever known—not in rebellion, but in heartbreak.
And then something unexpected happened.
Instead of searching for new answers, we began asking better questions.
Those questions led us on a journey of healing, authenticity, and rediscovering what it means to be fully alive. We began examining everything we had been taught about faith, relationships, our bodies, sexuality, and what it truly means to flourish.
We weren’t chasing novelty.
We were chasing aliveness.
That journey eventually led us into ethical non-monogamy, reality television, writing, public speaking, and conversations we never imagined having. More importantly, it led us back to ourselves.
Today, I don’t claim to have life figured out. I simply know that authenticity has brought me far more freedom than pretending everything made sense.
That’s why I write.
That’s why I speak.
And that’s why I created this space.
Today, I invite people into honest conversations where authenticity is valued, questions are welcomed, and together we become more fully human.
My hope is that wherever you are in your own journey, you’ll discover that you don’t have to have all the answers to begin living authentically.
Sometimes the questions we fear most become the doorway to becoming more fully human.