My mother had me when she was just sixteen—a child raising a child. We didn’t have much, but what we did have was resilience. Survival came first, but even then, I learned to dream.

When I was six, my mother married a newly commissioned Air Force officer, my dad. From that moment on, the military became our way of life. We moved from base to base, coast to coast, and with every move, I learned discipline, consistency, persistence, and the ability to adapt to whatever environment we landed in.

Like any family, ours had challenges, the kind that leave quiet scars. Childhood was not always gentle, and life did not hesitate to test me early. Cancer came not once but twice, teaching me how fragile and fierce life can be. And in between those storms, there were seasons when freedom was something I had to imagine rather than experience.

What I have learned is that forgiveness is not about erasing the past; it's about letting go of the past. It is about reclaiming yourself from it. It is the quiet act of unlocking the doors you built inside to survive, stepping out, and learning to breathe again. It is how you stop being defined by what broke you and start being guided by who you were born to become.

Much of my adult life was spent learning, not just in classrooms or boardrooms but in the deeper curriculum of endurance. Childhood trauma taught me how to withstand what should have destroyed me. Cancer stripped life down to its essence. And my own choices, at times, forced me to sit still long enough to face myself honestly.

Those experiences not only shaped me, but also forged me.
They gave me the grit to keep moving when the road disappeared, the perspective to lead with empathy, and the courage to reinvent myself, not out of ambition but out of necessity, faith, and grace.