~JennaBradford

I found out the results were basically locked in around 2AM this morning. I spent the next 2 hours switching between fits of anger and fits of crushing despair. Around 4AM, I had managed to compose myself so that the worst of it was spent slowly and quietly crying for the next 2 hours while I did anything to distract myself.

I'm reminded how my year began this year. I haven't discussed this much, or even openly, but my year started in the darkest place. Years and years of bad coping habits, long years of suppressing deep seated traumas, a complete loss of self-value, and constantly spending all my time in a state of just barely surviving all took a toll. I very nearly ended it all through Asphyxiation. I won't say how but just know I had practiced it a lot, learned quite a bit, and knew because of my self-defense training and medical research that it would only take 60 seconds before it was too late to stop it. Before I lost all my strength, I stopped. I didn't want to die. I didn't want to fade away. I just wanted to be seen and live my life. Nothing more, nothing less.

In spite of how this election turned out, my desire to just live cannot and will not be snuffed out. I'm in a state that wants to eliminate me, sees me as a threat or some mental disease without a cure and don't need to be researched. This slide into a fusion of McCarthyism and WW2-era fearmongering doesn't change that. I figure what will be will be. If someone comes to my door and executes me on the spot because I didn't vote for Trump, that's just life. If I am sentence to spend the next X years in a concentration camp, that too is just life. I've even instructed my family to make no efforts to protect me when this kicks off. One of them, a police officer who lives local, was given a second set of direction: He's free to shoot me dead as an alternative. He would never be punished for eliminating the "Enemy" and it would safeguard my sister, him, and my niece from harm if things go the way I feel they will.

I am not going to run. I am not going to hide. I am not going to lock myself away. I intend to live regardless of what the politics of the season decide. It's a stupid and foolish perspective to have, no doubt. However, I have been to death's door once before by my own hand. It was just over 10 months ago. No one can do any greater harm to me than I have done to myself. So, I'm just going to live. That's all I can do. I refuse to bury who I am for the sake of others. As frighteningly scary as the next 4 years are gonna be, I won't stop living. Neither should you.

Don't let anyone tell you not to be yourself. Just be you and do the best you can.