@writerjordanohalloran @oneturbobenz @algonzalez @jordanwalker @jordynjacobson @ciarapray @emdissocool @lulli101 @elizalila123 @dburtz @janetbanks @janettesegura @japarker1962
–
To The Unsealed Community ,

I usually say my childhood dream was to be a sportscaster, and while that’s true, it was only part of the dream. The vision, the goal, has always been much bigger.

Since I was a little- four or five years old, I would tell my parents, “One day, I am going to change the world.”

It’s cheesy and cliche, I know. But it’s also true. I had so much ambition. At eight years old, I would stay up all night worrying and thinking about my career.

When I would tell my mom, she would respond, “What career? You’re eight!”

She totally didn’t get it, and both my parents did what they could to try and convince me to take some pressure off myself, which I never did.

I have no idea where this desire to succeed on a monumental scale came from, but it’s always been there for as long as I can remember. The drive. The hunger. The desire. And, unfortunately, the constant worrying about how or if I could make this happen.

While I have checked off a few boxes regarding my goals, including attending an ivy league college and becoming a sportscaster, there is still so much more I want to do. And I certainly thought by my 30’s, I’d have this whole changing-the-world career path all figured out. While I have made progress, I am still trying to piece it all together.

In pursuit of my goal, I started The Unsealed, a platform for people to share their truth in the form of open letters. Through these letters, I hope to amplify voices and inspire people around the globe but I have made so many mistakes. Every day, I am still learning about entrepreneurship, marketing, and online communities.

Every second I am scared. I’m afraid I won’t figure this out. I am scared I will make a wrong decision, making what feels like this Jinga tower I am building come crashing down. I know that applying for a job with a designated set of tasks, “normal” hours, and a consistent paycheck would be much easier. But that’s not my dream.

So,I keep pushing and do my best to lean away from my fears and into my confidence. And with each challenge that arises (and there are many), I draw motivation from several different places.

Many of you have shared with me that The Unsealed has changed your life. It’s made some of you feel seen. It’s made some of you feel heard. It’s influenced at least one of you not to take your own life. On the days I am tired, and in the moments I am scared, I think of all of you.

Then, there are my parents. They have poured their time, their heart, their soul, and their money into my dream and my happiness without ever asking me for so much as a penny in return. They read all of our stories. They come to every single zoom. They share all of my posts. My mom has spent hours helping me email schools and writing programs. I so desperately want my parents to see my company take over the world because I know their wishes are for mine to come true. On the days I am tired, and in the moments I am scared, I think of my parents.

Lastly, I have worked so hard. I have sacrificed relationships, time with my friends, the opportunity to make more money faster, and who knows what else to pursue this crazy dream. I want this. I work every day – seven days a week, often typing away until I fall asleep fully dressed with my computer by my side. I love what I do. I love my mission. I love what we have already accomplished and what I hope my company will one day achieve. I owe it to myself to keep going – to not give up on the days I am tired, and in the moments I am scared.

Dreams don’t come true quickly or easily for most people. And that’s why for most people, their dreams will always be just a dream. But every day, I am glad that I haven’t given up on you, my parents, or myself because even if I don’t change the whole damn world, my work, my heart, my passion, and my resilience is already changing many lives, including mine.

Thanks for being here on this scary but beautiful journey. This is just the beginning.

With love, hope, and faith,

As babies we are programed with nursery rhythms, “1st comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in the baby carriage.” Then as children we go to school and are given unrealistic goals to meet with minimal help. Told that we need to get it all done in preparation for college and the work field. If you want to have children, as your programmed too, then you must go to college. However, in order to go to college, you have to work yourself to the bone studying to guarantee a scholarship, have loaded parents or work and take out loans. Don’t worry once you’ve gotten your degree in your desired field you will have enough debt to owe the government until you die. Good luck staying afloat with all that debt, plus your responsibility to be a spouse and parent. You see in my hometown, the hood if you will, we weren’t the richest and our community had very little funding. So you learn how to survive in school like you do in the outside world.
Where I come from, mental health was “all in your head,” so people didn’t know how to cope. We just learned how to survive, alone and as a community. I’m grateful for my home community, for without them I wouldn’t be where I am today. This action, learning to survive, in the mental health world is a coping mechanism; this helps us adapt to our circumstances, just to go through the motions in life and do what we need to do. To the outside world, this may look like a older sibling stealing food to feed their family, or impulsive behaviors, and it is 100%, adaptability.
As I stated before, I learned how to survive in school. This started after a very traumatizing event happened in second grade. We were instructed to read aloud during reading group time, and I was the 6th student out of 6 students to read. While, my 5 classmates read ahead of me, I focused on ensuring my sentence was perfect, because I wasn’t at a 2nd grade reading level yet. My time came, I read my line and there was a single line left. What I didn’t take into account was that Ms. Grossi was going to demand I read the next sentence too. I began to have, what I now know to be a, panic attack. I slowly and extremely softly began to read the words, sounding them out one by one. I could hear my classmates now making fun of the fact that I couldn’t read. My teacher is standing over me, tapping her foot on the ground, all I can do is try to block out everything and continue. I can feel Ms. Grossi’s impatience growing large enough to fill the room. “Louder please!,” Ms. Grossi shouts just as I get myself out of my own head. I begin reading louder and I’m actually really proud of myself. Until, boom, I’ve hit a word I must sound out.The immense amount of self embarrassment hits me like a 10 foot high wave crashes down on a surfer. Funny thing is, still to this day my brain wont reveal that word to me.
The amount of embarrassment in this moment, makes sounding the word out, out loud, debilitating. Here I am, back under the pressure, trying to get it together; sounding out in my head, over and over and just not getting it. Just then, Ms. Grossi, throws her hands in the air slamming one on the desk as she screams, “Come on Antoinette! My hair isn’t gunna get any grayer!,” it was then that I completely shattered. Even though my mom stood up for me when I told her, it just wasn’t enough. That incident severed a nerve and the damage was unrepairable. This triggered my survival mode in the school world. I managed to even get into all honors classes in 7th grade, by surviving. Do not get me wrong, I had some phenomenal teachers along the way that truly loved and poured into me. They’re apart of that community I expressed gratitude for earlier.
As so many people know, academics are not the only thing children have to survive in the school world. You also have people to survive, and I wasn’t very good at fitting in. I don’t see things like the rest of the world. I see the good in even the most evil. I think the world would be a happier, healthier place if we all loved everything and everybody. I absolutely despise cliques, and everyone whose been to high school knows that is clique central. I was the biggest social butterfly you would have known, I was friends with at least 1 person in every “clique” in high school. But with this care free nature comes an abundance of negative energy or evil eye. I was always bullied in school, someone convinced me to go to a soccer game after school when I was in 6th grade. I went and had a blast but had to be home by a certain time, so I left before the game was even over. As I was leaving, I was jumped by 4 girls and 2 boys. Pinned on the floor, face down being kicked a punched. I ended up with a concussion, a restraining order against the main girl and short a few friends, since they set me up.
In high school, a girl use to follow me home. One day she found out where I worked and showed up to fight me. Of course, I was in uniform and I needed my job to eat and provide for myself, so I couldn’t do anything to her. Then she walked up to me and hit me, if it was not for my manager that may have ended very differently. So you see, between surviving academics, I was on a 1st grade reading level in 9th grade, and surviving bullies, I was done. At 16, after completing my 9th grade year, I decided I was an adult and didn’t have to deal with school anymore. I enrolled and very quickly dropped out of GED classes. However, I did enroll and complete my certification for nail technician and I even got licensed. Didn’t matter though, I didn’t like it and didn’t pursue it. I managed to do all of this before I even turning 17, ha.
At 17, I found out I was pregnant with my oldest daughter. This was everything I ever wanted, to be a mom. I was about 6 months pregnant, on my lunch break, when my hormone enraged brain had an “Oh, crap!,” moment. I dropped out at 16 years old, after completing my 9th grade year, leaving school at a 1st grade reading level. My daughters father whose about 6 years older than myself, dropped out at 15 years old after retaining 7th grade 3 times. I knew for an absolute fact my daughters father couldn’t read, plus I could not read. We are bringing a child into this world, and our job is to teach and guide her. How can we do this if neither of us are even literate enough to read a report card? My neighbor was having a yard sale, she had a box of children’s books. I asked the priced and she said that I could have them for my daughter. Little does this woman know, I bought them to teach myself how to read. Every single night, from that day forward I read. I read out loud, I stumbled and had to search the internet and dictionary for meanings and pronunciations of words, but I read. And every night and even during the day my daughter heard her mommy read to her. My daughter will forever be the blessing of teaching me my strength and endurance to want something. I had never wanted to read nor learn to read, let alone self learn, but I knew she deserved better than that!
In the end, it has really been an essential tool for my life, my growth and my family. Learning to read has been an absolute blessing. I know this was my journey and how it was supposed to play out. Realistically, if I didn’t experience where I came from I wouldn’t know how to be better for the future. And if I didn’t have my experience with this world and my own struggles I wouldn’t be well equip to fight the same system, for my children, that let me slip through the cracks. I can say proudly because I experienced what I experienced in life, I was well over equip for the battles my children have and will continue to face.
I’ve always wanted to be a change, what I didn’t realize is the change would be in me. I didn’t realize 14 years ago, when I became a mother, that what I am here to do is break generational curses within my family. Maybe even help a few people along the way. Don’t let anybody, including yourself, dim the light of your dreams. And always remember; our dreams aren’t always what we expect them to be, rather they are what we are meant to be.

XOXO

Dear me, thank you.

I remember when you were starting school in third grade; transitioning from being home-schooled to public school, the same year that you bawled your eyes out because the doctor said needed eyeglasses. I mean, once you realized you were allowed to pick out your own frames, your tears cleared right up and those round, dark pink frames quickly became yours! Being excited about the new element added to your style, Dad didn’t have a hard time convincing you to get a super short haircut…but don’t worry, you never, ever did that again! However, I do admire the confidence that you had going into that school- knowing you didn’t have any familiar faces in class, but still having no problem being your authentic, weird self. I’m proud to say we do have that confidence today, but that unfortunately we did lose it a bit in-between.

Getting through middle school wasn’t bad. You did well in school and you got along with your classmates, but what you lived for was hanging out with your best friends back at the apartments that you grew up in your whole life. Having friends in the apartment complex made it easy to say that home was such a fun place to be, even though deep down you knew that inside that two-bedroom apartment, any happiness was gone after 6pm. You were lucky in a way, it’s not like your parents were leaving you with random sitters while they went out to the bars like your neighbor friends dealt with, instead your parents would just drink at home, and you had to be witness. Your parents seemed to care more than the other parents because they were always helicoptering around and trying to keep you safe, but that started to bother you more and more as you grew older.

When it was time for high school you started to feel suffocated. When you observed the younger neighbor friends having more freedom than you, it felt unfair! They could take their bikes to the store down the street before you could, and they’d all talk about their Facebook accounts while your parents were telling you that you couldn’t have one for another few years. The anger inside only grew as you finally got more freedom, because that only came with constant texts and calls asking for pictures to prove where you were. You weren’t out doing drugs or partying, you had good grades, but you were treated as if you were not trust-worthy or responsible. It didn’t help that your parents’ anxiety of the world worsened, as well as their anger towards each other. At home, you unfortunately had to hear all of it, and it had more of an effect on you than you knew.

As you overheard the loud, explicit sluts being spat back and forth, your body was coregulating with their anger and angst. As you overheard horrific truths of family pasts, your brain processed these things in an unhealthy, self-limiting way. As you started to join in on arguments trying to mediate or defend, you fed into your already developed control issues. There is a reason that psychologists tell parents not to involve their children in adult issues. This was in no way your fault, but when you finally were able to escape, you quickly learned that it was your responsibility. Although it feels easy to blame your parents for your anxiety and depression, it feels so much better once you realized that they were doing the best they could with what they knew, and it feels even better when you realized that you were the one in control of your life.

You escaped your parents’ home at age 19 and moved into an apartment with your high school sweetheart. Even though you had never had a boyfriend throughout high school, when you saw him come into your class junior year and you got that feeling that you had to talk to him…you were right to go with your gut. This man has been such a blessing throughout your life, even though at times you didn’t treat him that way. There were times where your anxiety got the best of you, your anger issues were not managed well, and you felt completely out of control. There were times where you found yourself in panic attacks, crying so hard to the point of headaches, but you made it through, and he was there the whole time. He was so patient with you, and although there were rough times during the relationship, he never left your side. Even though you thought you were such a burden and terrible person to be around, he never saw you like that-he saw you for you.

You had a hard time accepting this love for many reasons, but the main one being that you did not love yourself. Your brain absorbed Dad’s constant comments like “You dumba**” or “Stupid b**ch,” even though those were never true. You took on blame and guilt for things that didn’t even involve you, and it aided in the self-loathing patterns. I won’t sit here and say that at age 27 you’re completely healed of all traumas and you float through life with no problems; you still have triggers and definitely some control issues, but you are healing every day. After years of trying different medications and therapists, you’re feeling regulated without prescription drugs, you have a therapist you love, and you are finally feeling like that confident, curly-headed eight-year-old girl with glasses strolling into her first year of public school. Looking at you, I see that you always confidently knew yourself, and you trusted your gut. You tried to stay out of the way of chaos and remain in your own peaceful world, and that is something we still practice today. As I continue to heal my nervous system and work on self-love, I have realized that I truly can trust my gut feelings; and for that, I thank you.

Dear Little Sunshine,

The world might not make much sense to you right now and I know you are just trying your hardest to find a place where you feel seen and heard in the way you see and hear other people. I can’t promise you that people won’t break your heart or mislead you, but I can promise you that every twist and turn you take will be your very own journey into a world that makes sense to you.

You’re going to be known as the helper before you ever truly feel helped. You are going to the big cousin, big sister, best friend, and even the parent sometimes. And you are going to be great at it because you have a natural ability to connect with and care for people. There will be a lot of times where you feel like too much is being expected of you and that you just can’t do it anymore. I want to let you know that for every moment you push through, you grow into a stronger version of yourself and encourage others to do the same.

Little Sunshine, I need you to know that you light up rooms when you walk in. I see the way you bring love and inspiration to people three times your age. I see the way you check in on others to make sure everyone feels included. I see that your mind never stops racing and your body never ceases to move. I see that you are as full of love as you are fearful of it.

I know those around you are impressed by your self-sufficiency because they don’t know it was your only option. I know that you’ve been given too much responsibility at a young age and just want to make mistakes. I know you feel neglected, but still show up for everyone. I know it hurts to think you always have to give more than you can receive, but I want to assure you that your incessant desire for curiosity, connection, and care will motivate you to be a pillar of love and creative expression in the lives of others.

That light you shine because you feel so overlooked, will teach others to unashamedly be themselves. That depth you possess because you’ve seen so much in such a short amount of time, will teach others to take time to learn themselves. That warmth you radiate because the world is just so cold, will teach others to be kinder to themselves.

So, when your heart hurts, don’t turn away from those in your life who never did you wrong, remember to lean into the love that surrounds you and multiply it. All the boys and girls, friends and foes, family members and strangers, who made you question your heart, hold them closely like they couldn’t hold you and I promise you that your life will be so much better because of it. I don’t ask that you stay strong and silent when the world doesn’t give you what you need, I ask that you stay soft and resilient. I ask that you continue to be an example of the shining, permeating, unwavering love you wish to feel. You will change the lives of so many others because of it.

I love you, Little Sunshine and I am so proud of you