...It tells you what kind of story it will be and usually guarantees whether or not you will hold an interest in finishing it. As my first blog post, I hope this will invite many of you to follow my adventure on turning pink and becoming a Suicide Girl. Instead of posting about a holiday memory like the blog suggests we do, I decided to follow the February post of "Why did you want to become a Suicide Girl" because come on, how many of you know me!?

Growing up, my parents got a divorce and I had two choices to make: my father, who wanted me to do things his way, be his little princess, and stay within the gender norms; or my mother, who swore to always support every decision I make no matter how crazy it may seem, as long as I didn't hurt myself or anyone else. Well, I think it's clear which direction I went!*

It wasn't until high school that I started to really embrace the whole "girly" aspect and start to ditch parts of my tomboyish attitudes. Unfortunately, I chose to do this at the perfect time and became extremely self conscious about my body and how it looked. I was never overweight, but I could always see things that I wanted to change and it wasn't until recently that I could finally look into the mirror and tell myself, "I love you." The only reason I can do that today is because of Suicide Girls.

SG made me realize that all women are beautiful, regardless of what other people on the internet or in person have to say and we should embrace that! When I asked my photographer if he would shoot my set "Stay with Me," the first thing he told me (besides of course) was, "you know you'll have to be naked... right?" Being able to shoot a full set being nothing but myself and completely exposed forced me to see someone who has been there the whole time that I was pushing away.

So to all those Hopefuls I have yet to meet who are worried about people not thinking you're pretty enough... the ladies (and gents) who are just members and worry about people's opinions day in and day out... you're all beautiful. You are all amazing people who not only encourage and inspire me, but inspire other people every day. In case nobody has told you yet, I love you <3

*My mother actually picked the cardigan seen in my set!!
@rambo @missy