I was born Oct. 5, 1969, to a 50 year old father and a mother who had been told she went through menopause 7 years earlier. It was only a month before I was born that the doctor conceded that my mother was indeed pregnant. The only thing that consoled my mother was that she was sure she would finally get the son she always wanted. In those years and under those conditions, it was unlikely that I would live, and even if I did, the doctors warned that I would probably be retarded. Always wanting to be the center of attention, my mother rather liked the idea that she would get to be the mother of a special needs child. Much to my mother's dismay, not only was I born alive and well, I was female. To her further chagrin, it was later discovered that not only was I not retarded, but that my IQ actually landed in the genius range. My mother, the epitome of all the vile things said about femininity, always blamed others for her plight. She never forgave my father for getting her pregnant or not standing up to my grandmothers (who I was named after) so that I could be given away for adoption.

Let me interrupt myself a moment to clarify that I believe that true femininity is nothing like what my mother displayed. There are some good characteristics and some bad characteristics more common to each gender. There is nothing wrong with whatever internal or external gender or blend that we are born as, so long as we function rationally. Furthermore, in my opinion, being rational is not identical to being robotically unemotional. Now back to the bio...

My mother divorced her first husband shortly after the birth of her first child, then her ex died, denying her both support and widow's benefits. She worked as a court reporter at the Pentagon, and sent checks to her mother to raise her daughter for her. My grandmother always reported how wonderful my sister was, in hopes that my mother would one day see fit to take her back. My father, veteran of WWII and the Korean War, originally in the Army Air Corps and later one of the first people in the newly formed Air Force, had no idea that his first marriage was in trouble until he came home from maneuvers one day to find an MP on his doorstep with all of his stuff and papers informing him of his divorce. Prior to that, he would only see his children for 3 months, and then be gone for 3 months. He was unreasonably strict and his punishments unreasonably harsh, so his first wife only reported good things about the children, and during the times he was home, my brothers and sister remained very quiet. Thus, I had 4 "perfect" older siblings to live up to. When my mother's daughter was a teenager, our mother was forced to take her back. My sister only stayed briefly before running away from home a year before I was born - and had no contact with the family for about 17 years. My father's children felt abandoned as he had virtually no contact with them after the divorce, so when they grew, they also did not contact him much. In this way, I was also an only child.

My mother did not regard me as her daughter, but as an instrument of God's punishment - and felt no reason to treat me as if I were human. At least in part as a result of this, I was picked on mercilessly by other children. A result was the seemingly contradictory characteristics of being oversensitive and having a level of maturity that many adults never achieve. Perhaps as a result of having a closer relationship with dogs than humans as I grew, I developed an unconditional love of everyone. This strange combination led many adults to tell me I was destined to do something great for this world - but when I started to believe it, I was dubbed as having delusions of grandeur. I recognized that whatever I could do for the world, I could not do on my own, and prayed for others like me to help.

In my late teens, I recognized that all that is, is God. Every one of us and beyond are all bits of God. I explained my beliefs to others, and was regarded as crazy. It took about 20 years to discover that I was not the only one who viewed God as I did. Meanwhile, I learned a great deal about people the hard way. I was overwhelmed by the lack of ethics amongst people, but I did not find any right answers "out there" about how to deal with that. When I divorced, I dropped my married surname and did not return to my maiden name because I am not, nor will I ever again be, the property of any man (and did not want to wear a man's name as if I were some kind of branded cow). The more I stood up for the right thing, the more vicious the rejection by many others. Because of the brutal punishment life has given me, I have complex PTSD, and I can not give control of my life to the unethical likes of other people.

Diogenes used a lantern during the day to search for an honest man, but to no avail. I seek out ethical people. My biggest shortcoming is that I automatically do right by other people even if I get hurt in the process, and that is not ethical either. I am working on my ability to look out for myself though. Meanwhile I do what I can, which tends to be more for others than for myself, and hope that the Universe will provide for me in response to my deeds.