2024/Cali-

As a military child, I don’t have as much experience as some of my peers. However, I do have the basics down of the challenges of being a military child. Originally, I lived in the city of Yuma, and I had everything I wanted. At the time, while I knew my father was in the military, I wasn’t aware of what being a military child meant. When I was around 9, my father told my family that we could possibly move to Japan.

I was extremely frustrated and wanted to just live with my abuela, so I didn't have to say goodbye. It was rough and I could hardly bear to leave my family and planned life in general. When I began to leave Yuma, it was frightening without any knowledge of my return. The journey was exhausting, long, and overall depressing. This resulted in me closing myself off from everyone no matter who.

Arriving in Japan was a culture shock. Obviously, the language, currency, and people were different for me. It was hard to adjust as I didn’t know how to translate everything. Going into the TLF was a major problem. I lived there for a couple months and had to share a room with six of my other family members.

My confidence and social skills dropped immensely as everyone in school already had their own group. I made the decision to not attempt to make any friends. I felt really lonely for almost two straight years. But I've now opened up and I’m far better off as I have my own friend group and started to interact with everyone around me. Engaging in social activities and outings are more common than before.

In due time, everything will get better if you just try rather than focusing on licking old wounds.