Events/Moments that changed your life

God, I am so old now there are a ton.

My parents divorce when I was 6.

Getting pneumonia and a collapsed lung when I was 16 and spending an entire month in the hospital.

My dad sabotaging my high school and college career my junior year by forcing me to re-locate.

My mom having a stroke when I was 17 and me being on my own after that.

Going to college.

9/11 changed a lot of my view of the world around me.

My first marriage and subsequent divorce.

Meeting my current wife and realizing how good marriage can be.

Death of my grandfather who was more like my actual father.

Moving out of Atlanta into Athens getting away from the craziness of being in the city.

A friend of mine killing herself.

Developing severe anxiety last summer and becoming a
complete wreck, causing me to eventually drop out of high school.

I've basically gotten over it now and I have a job. I feel like I'm a better person for that.

I have so many of those in my life. One of the more recent events happened on Christmas Day 2013. Around 5 PM, I developed a severe pain in my abdomen. After six long hours of dealing with this pain, I got dressed on my own, and told my mom to take me to the ER. I was in the ER well into the wee hours of the morning. From 7 AM the 26th, to the afternoon of the 28th, I was in a medically induced coma. When I woke up, I was in the intensive care unit. Later that Saturday night, I was transferred to another room a floor above from me. Had to undergo emergency surgery the following day.

The cause of all this was I had gallstones in my pancreas that my body couldn't flush out. I ended up getting my gallbladder removed. After the surgery, I woke back up and just relaxed with a team of specialists taking care and monitoring me during the recovery process. I remained in that room till January 1st, 2014. Seeing the ball drop and ringing in 2014 from a hospital bed was no laughing matter. The afternoon of the first, I was transferred to another room six floors above. I stood there until I was discharged on January 7th, 2014. When I got home, I got really emotional because of the whole ordeal. If I had not rushed to the hospital, I would have died. One of the first things I did when I was finally able to lay in my own bed was watch the first NXT episode of 2014. I didn't care about the world around me at that point. Just wanted to watch NXT.

Since then, I now have the scars on my stomach as a reminder of coming close to death.

While not so recent, would be the September 11th terrorist attacks. I remember hearing and feeling both towers getting hit. I remember one of my classmates asking "what the **** was that" and even my homeromm teacher getting a phone call and in a low voice, "oh ****." I remember the hysteria of people in my school trying to figure out what happened. My mom came to get me out of school moments after the north tower collapsed. A lot of parents came to pick up their kids. After my mom came to pick me up, I ended up going to my aunt's apartment just staring at the TV, trying to comprehend what happened. I didn't make my way back home till 2:30 PM. Everytime I look at the names of the people on the memorial pools, I ask myself why. When I see a woman's name on those pools and their unborn child, it really gets to me. Those women who were pregnant at the time, their child would have been in high school now.

If anybody here visits the 9/11 Memorial & Museum, prepared to be moved and touched emotionally. Hell, one thing that is changing my life now is seeing the Transit Hub nearing completion and the new Three World Trade Center rising.

Those are a small fraction of the moments/events in my life that is/has changed who I am.

My first few sex Ed classes years ago.

I know how you feel here. I can explain my viewpoints but I haven't met many people who understands 100%. Long story short, meeting a woman who I first had chemistry with ended up rejecting me. I haven't seen and spoken to her since 2012. This event played a part why I'd rather be single. I lost a lot of trust in women as a result.

Here are just a few of mine in no particular order:

Growing up with a father who suffered from paranoid schizophrenia and PTSD from his service in Vietnam.

Discovering wrestling when I was two years old.

Getting an NES for my 6th birthday.

Discovering drugs. This, obviously, was not a good thing but the lessons I learned from that whole situation has shaped me more than almost anything. And for any of the younger members reading this, I know that you all have to find your own way but PLEASE believe me when I tell you that they are not worth it. What little good you think you are getting from drugs is fleeting and far, far outweighed by the bad.

Seeing a counselor.

Finding both religion and Buddhism (which, despite popular belief is not a religion. It's a philosophy).

ing Shenmue!

My first comic book.

My childhood friends.


I could go on and on...

Moving from Michigan to Oklahoma when I was 10.

Getting a job. I've always worked for people to make money for as long as I can remember, usually helping a guy on a ranch with his cattle, stuff like that. But having an actual job where I need to be there at a specific time is a lot different. I like it though, so far at least.

Another thing I'm thinking about is, what would my life be without professional wrestling? 90% of anything I've ever done has had some sort of influence from wrestling. Hell, anytime I could use wrestling in my school papers I did. When I had a report I would think of a wrestler and use their style of speaking to do the report. I spent my entire year of speech class in high school cutting promos. If wrestling wasn't in my life I would be a 100% different person.

-Getting my second job because it turned me from a snobby, entitled borderline alcoholic into a more goal oriented person with a better work ethic and attitude
-Buying my first car and paying for the insurance and everybody on my own
-Finally going out with my girlfriend after a lot of back and forth


I haven't done it yet but I'm hoping going back to school in the fall can be added to this list in time.

When I was in first grade I met a kid named nick. He was awesome, funny and really nice. He always traveled, and told me he was going on a trip to Egypt and I think France the summer after 1st grade. Then second grade began and he never came back. I never found out where he went. The only vivid memory I have of him was that when I walked into my classroom the first day of 1st grade he was talking with his mom and the teacher with a coat and a black/blue spiderman hat on.