It dawned on me that I am undertaking a new venture and have not given anyone any insight into why, and that piece – the why – is critical. In the beginning, I was a tiny baby and never hit the growth spurt family members promised me. My mother worked during the day and went to school at night, and my father also worked a lot. Going through school proved to be a strength for me as I excelled at reading, writing, and was even good at math at some point. Through all of those strengths, I suffered several mental issues that remained taboo, and I kept them a secret for years, well into adulthood. These included depression, anxiety, and nightmares. I had my kiddos, and life got complicated. I welcomed the challenge and love being a mother. Many issues arose along the way, which caused the problems I already struggled with to deepen and grow harder to cope with. Cue the tech field. My first job in tech was answering the phones at Rackspace. My technical background was minimal, and I didn't let that stop me from growing professionally. I used a free Linux Academy subscription and utilized Learning Linux the Hard Way – an MIT online challenge. I paired that with a ton of annoying questions when transferring calls to some very patient Linux admins. Through it all, there was a terrible secret I was hiding. After leaving for the day from Rackspace, I entered a secret hell in a house I now refer to as our prison. My kiddos and I endured several years of multiple kinds of abuse. My goal in entering the tech field was one of survival: to make enough money to escape with the kids. So, I set out on the hardest few years of our lives. During that time, what was left of my self-worth, self-esteem, and self-confidence was robbed of me and my children with various kinds of sadistic abuse. Finally, the day came when we could leave, and we did. We started talking about what went on in there and started therapy to begin healing together. It felt like Mount Everest lay ahead, and in a way, it did. Just when I was exhausted and ready to lay down and give in to the hopelessness, several beacons of light entered my life with a fiery vengeance and kept me afloat. They renewed my sense of self and helped me to see my worth. I started the long, hard road to fixing my biggest issue: the monster in my head. Several therapy tools have helped me calm the seas in my head and rid me of that awful monster tearing me down from the inside. Working many years in the tech field in different roles at various levels left me grinding away day in and day out with no passion left in me. I was burnt out really badly. I took punch after punch and kept getting up for more – after all, I am a fighter. It became clear that tech is not my primary passion but a talent I have developed instead. Watching my partner, who has a passion in the tech realm, helped to show me what passion looks like, which helped me shift my focus and expand into what my love really is. As I continue therapy and discuss navigating this new, complex world, I set goals that better fulfill me. I have found that my passions include content creation, mental health, and helping others navigate their world and reach their goals. As a young girl, I wanted to be Clarice Starling from Silence of the Lambs. I wanted to find and stop bad people from harming others. As I grew, that morphed into helping others and meeting them where they were to keep them moving forward. I feel a great deal of responsibility to the next generation to show that anyone can be successful, whether broken or not. I want to become a beacon of light to others, helping them navigate their own secret storms. I continue to make progress and will finish my degrees, get licensed as a life coach, and look for volunteer opportunities to work with youth to turn my passion into action. Step 1 is telling my story so others understand why I started this venture. Many other steps lay ahead of me, and if any part of my story resonates with you, I encourage you to reach out so we can grow together. AWS Cloud Practitioner, Solutions Architect - Associate, and SysOps - Associate certified. AWS Community Builder 2023. Soon to have AWS AI Practitioner.