For a while now, I have come to accept my body and all of its flaws and beauty. However, my constant body dysphoria and crippling anxiety/depression has made it difficult throughout my life to accept who I am. So, with the addition of environmental factors such as prejudice because of my skin color and the norms or role I must conform to because I am a woman, there is the question of whether or not it is okay to accept myself the way I am now or act in a way that conforms to societal expectations placed upon me. At a young age, I lived in a predominantly hispanic community, but around the time I attended high school my family moved to Maryland. The difference between where I had lived as a child and here was shocking: there were definitely noticeable differences between how minorities were treated and the way in which we had to perform in order to not be judged. At some point, it felt as if I was not even myself because of the crushing expectations thrust upon everything I knew. There were choices I didn’t know I had at the time due to my youth, therefore I most certainly did conform to the toxic norms that were forced on me, such as staying quiet and making myself have a small presence in the company of others. Now that I am older, reflecting on my behavior and attitude in the past has been enlightening; I’ve become stronger in the sense of knowing that my opinion matters and I can be confident in my opinions because they matter. Because of the strong support system surrounding me throughout the years, they have helped me built up the little confidence and self-love I had before, since they have consistently validated my beliefs and opinions. Thus, at the present moment I no longer care about toxic stereotypes nor roles I am ”supposed” to follow, and have found much autonomy and independence from the experiences I have gone through. On a side note, usually when I have these thought of myself and reflecting on life, they are kept within my mind and not expressed much since I do not really talk about myself so much. So, having an outlet such as this blog has been wonderful; being able to share my experiences and life with others, in the hopes of someone understanding or relating to what I’ve gone through, is my hope. If anyone does read this and would like to talk about experiencing similar events, feel free to comment!