Deborah E [Anderson]

I don't know what I am! No, seriously... Let me back up a few years... decades...

When I was six, and I was told I was chronically ill, I wasn't sure if I would see my seventh birthday, let alone this many decades. So, as far as a title? My goal was to LIVE! My mother told everyone I was going to die when I was a kid.

That is why music became such a part of my life. It was what got me through so much. It got me through the pain, both emotionally and physically. I decided that no chronic illness, no abuse, and no amount of pain was going to hold me back from being everything I could be as a human being. Not just a diabetic but a human being. I wasn't competing with the rest of the world. I was competing with myself to survive. That is what drove me and allowed me to become all-state in music, #1 Jazz singer, #1 in Speech, broadcasting, and the list goes on because I was striving to prove to myself (no one else) that it was possible to be human in spite of a chronic illness and (emotional) pain.

Then, the chronic pain (to an exponential level) set in, and the rules changed yet again... I had learned how to deal with the other stuff, but this stopped me in my tracks... Add to that 120-150 seizures...well...

Thanks to Madalyn Sklar and this newfound community, I have another lease on life, another opportunity to say life might kick you a few times, but you are not out of the game! Keep going... Keep smiling, and keep giving hugs and smiles to others! You are not alone; the world needs your smile and what you have to share with it.