My name is Taylor, and I am reaching out because I am in urgent need of support to escape a cycle of trauma and find safety. I have been very unique and treated as someone who is different since I was very small, and while it is not all there is to me, it is enough to bring me great trouble. It took me quite some time before I realized I was transgender, and I had been battling with societal norms and expectations that, with all due respect, just were not right for me. The confusion of being unseen, unheard, and misunderstood made growing up sharp and painful, when combined with the fact that I had people around me who, despite being adults, were not at peace with themselves either, and projected this onto me. For decades, I have suffered excruciating torment from my family system and early life, which has left me with formal diagnosis of severe CPTSD long before my most recent struggles began. I am living with someone who is both a bad influence and very hostile to me. Throughout my life, I have never been permitted to embrace the wholeness of myself. Intense outside forces have left me feeling fragmented and held hostage. I am forced to keep my inner world a secret just to have a roof over my head. After being forced out from my family by physical abuse, I endured sexual harassment and unsafe conditions from landlords and roommates, upheaving my life and constraining my options, so that in dire straits I've had to temporarily accept arrangements that are nothing if not detrimental to my well-being. Each step of the way, new challenges have compounded my trauma and left me feeling isolated and deeply distressed. Maintaining a sense of normality for decades while being under intense fear has been a tremendous balancing act, draining my energy and keeping me quite stuck.

Despite everything, I worked tirelessly to support myself, holding down a few jobs over the years while adapting to the cruelty. Eventually, a 4-year workplace became a source of intense hostility as well, both from coworkers and customers, and for my health and safety, I was forced to flee. This hostility only intensified with recent political changes. Needless to say, my rights and comfort at work are not as important as the bosses' bottom line, and were not exactly a priority. Not being protected but vulnerable is something I unfortunately know too well. My local community is volatile and intolerant, and I have been menaced by strangers while trying to mind my own business. Every part of my life—family, work, housing, and even the community—has become dangerous. This cycle of trauma, homelessness, fear, and deprivation has repeated itself throughout my entire life, with many chapters just like this one. For almost a decade, I have been glued to medications to manage my PTSD and keep my mental health as stable as possible, even though it often feels fragile. The comorbid nature of these forces—family abuse, sexual harassment, fragile mental health, unsafe housing, workplace hostility, emotional repression, and community danger—has made my situation intensely distressing and left me without a support system, and susceptible to very unhealthy arrangements. Resource failures in particular have hurt me, as I already exhausted all local domestic violence shelters and support networks when I faced eminent harm from my father, which none of them took seriously. This has been especially confusing for me, a person who only needs love and support, to seek it and receive malice instead. Poor community ethics and social turmoil has been devastatingly detrimental to me. There are people who love me, who I am separated from, but they are powerless to help me any more than just to write me and keep my spirits up. I know I can grow to so much more than what I am, I am intelligent and rich with beautiful things to share. I want to be happy and whole more than anything in the world. I shouldn't have to die or rot away in my circumstances. I want to break free.

The funds I am asking for will help me move to a safer city, pay for a year's rent, and cover essential needs like medical treatment for my conditions. Maybe fix my vehicle to get ready for the move, some funds for planning, some runway, some longevity. I am not asking for more than I need, though I am asking for a lot—just a chance to live on my own terms without selling my body, sucking up to others, and build a happy and whole life my family didn't want me to have. If you are able to help, your support could make me believe in life again. I want to believe that kindness and community are real, and that I am worthy of a future where I am safe and whole. I've spent my whole life in pain, I've been working for my whole life towards what feels like nothing. I've seen what God and humanity has done for other people, and I want that so much for me. Thank you for reading my story and considering a donation.