How is all started Part1
I was born and raised in San Fernando, California. It’s a located about 23 miles north of downtown LA. In that environment back in the early to mid 90’s school was a lot easier for a teenage boy if you acted tough and suppressed your feelings. That’s exactly what I did. My friends and I would get into fights and enforce our dominance and so I avoided the feelings that started to come to the surface.
At around 14 years old I started getting debilitating migraine headaches. They just came out of nowhere. My mom was worried and took me to the Doctor. I knew she thought it was serious because we didn’t have medical insurance and my parents would have to pay out of pocket. I thought to myself at the time that this couldn’t be good. All the healing powers of VapoRub (or as we called it Vapo-Ru) had been exhausted and I actually had to go to the doctor. On top of all that my parents had to pay for several tests ordered by the doctor. My kids don’t know how good it feels to have medical insurance but that’s a topic for another time. Good thing was that all the tests came back negative and so the doctor concluded that my migraines were caused by severe stress. At this point you might be thinking that it was just typical teenager stress about friends, girls, and being invited to the most popular parties. That wasn’t the case for me. I was worried about surviving in a Junior High that was infested with gangs and tagging crews. I was also a part of that life and my personal security at school was a real concern. I wouldn’t even go to the bathroom on my own. If I wanted to go pee I would go with at least 3 or 4 other guys.
This is when it all started. The feeling of being uneasy but not being sure what the feeling was. The best way I could describe it at the time was being instantly nervous. When I say describe it, it’s not that I was talking to anyone about it. It’s just how I described it to myself.
I didn’t know it at the time, that I was dealing with a mental health issue and it wasn’t something that was talked about in a Mexican-American household. By all accounts I was a normal teenager. I had a girlfriend, plenty of friends, and played sports but underneath it all was another person. Someone timid, shy, and insecure because I knew I wasn’t dealing with what I was feeling inside.