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Ms.West Coast 2026 -

PTSD AWARENESS MONTH

When people see me today, they may see a mother, a businesswoman, an artist, or someone who smiles and keeps going. What they don't always see is the journey it took to get here.

I grew up without stability. My childhood was filled with uncertainty, fear, and trauma. I spent time in the CPS system, moving through situations where I often felt unseen, unheard, and unprotected. Instead of experiencing the safety every child deserves, I endured mental, physical, sexual, and in**st abuse throughout my childhood.

As a young person, I learned how to survive long before I ever learned how to live.

At sixteen years old, while living in a group home, I was kidnapped and trafficked. A moment that could have completely destroyed my future became another chapter in a story I never asked to write. Later, I found myself in a marriage marked by domestic abuse, repeating cycles of pain I had known for most of my life.

There were countless moments when giving up would have seemed easier.

There were moments when I questioned my worth.

Moments when I questioned whether healing was even possible.

Moments when I wondered if I would ever be more than the things that happened to me.

But today, I stand before you as proof that our circumstances do not get the final say.

I am not defined by the abuse.

I am not defined by the trafficking.

I am not defined by the violence.

I am not defined by the instability.

I am defined by my resilience.

Every time life knocked me down, I found a reason to get back up. Sometimes that reason was my children. Sometimes it was a dream. Sometimes it was simply the belief that there had to be something better waiting for me on the other side of my pain.

Healing is not a straight line. It is messy. It is painful. It is uncomfortable. Some days it feels like you're making progress, and other days it feels like you're right back where you started.

But healing happens.

Growth happens.

Freedom happens.

The strongest thing I ever did was stop measuring myself by what I survived and start believing in what I could become.

Today, I choose to become.

I choose to build.

I choose to love.

I choose to create.

I choose to break generational cycles.

I choose to show my children that our past does not have to become our future.

To anyone listening who has experienced trauma, abuse, abandonment, trafficking, domestic violence, or hardship of any kind, I want you to hear this:

Your story is not over.

The chapters you've lived through may explain your scars, but they do not determine your destiny.

You are stronger than the things that tried to break you.

You are worthy of peace.

You are worthy of love.

You are worthy of success.

And most importantly, you are worthy of a future that looks nothing like your past.

I spent years surviving.

Now I am learning how to thrive.

And if I can rise from everything I've been through, then hope is possible for anyone.