Through the Fire and Onto the Backroads: My Journey
I was ten years old the first time my life changed forever. I didn’t know it then, but that pain in my stomach, the weight loss, the constant fatigue—it all had a name: Crohn’s disease. At the time, I was the youngest patient the doctors had ever seen with it. I spent years on heavy medication—50mg of prednisone, four times a day—which made me gain weight, swell up, and feel even more out of place. It stole my childhood, isolated me from my peers, and made school a battlefield I didn’t want to return to.
Eventually, I didn’t. I started skipping school, pretending to be sick, or crazy, doing anything to escape. I was tired of the pain, the shame, the bullying. My mom tried everything she could. And through it all, she took me to church, almost every Sunday. Even when I didn’t want to go, she’d load us up and make sure we were there. I didn’t realize it at the time, but those quiet moments sitting in a pew, hearing about grace, about second chances — they planted seeds that would one day save my life.
In sixth grade, I moved in with my dad on the farm, where I’d spend mornings feeding cows before school, learning the rhythm of hard work and quiet land.
But by then, something inside me had already started to unravel.
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Down the Wrong Road
At 16, I tried marijuana for the first time. At 17, I found meth. It didn’t just numb the pain—it made me feel like I could finally breathe. Like I could talk, connect, function. But that illusion came at a cost. I spent the next five years chasing a high that took everything from me—my health, my home, my dignity. I ended up homeless, broken, lost in a world of shadows.
In 2000, Crohn’s nearly killed me. I collapsed in a bathroom, bled out, and woke up surrounded by paramedics. They told me I was minutes from death. It should have been a wake-up call, but addiction doesn’t loosen its grip that easily.
Still, even in the darkest corners of those years, I remember looking up at the Oklahoma sky and feeling something. A whisper. A flicker. A reminder that the world still held beauty, that maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t too far gone.
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Christmas Eve and a Second Chance
Then came Christmas Eve, 2004. Strung out, exhausted, and completely empty, I fell to my knees and screamed at God. “Why did You leave me?” But in that moment, I realized something I’ll never forget: He never had. I just stopped looking.
That morning, I walked into my dad’s house and slept through the family Christmas gathering. I went to my mom’s that night. Neither of them really wanted me around, but glad I was there, and I didn’t blame them. But a few days later, my sister Tina opened her door—and her heart—and told me to come stay with her. She gave me a home when I had none. She helped me enroll for college. She believed in me before I believed in myself.
Her love was the beginning of everything good that followed.
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Rebuilding a Life
I moved into a little RV on my dad’s land, just a camper parked by the fields. But to me, it was peace. Every morning I’d wake up and sip coffee as the Oklahoma sun broke across the sky. I had nothing, but I had hope. And for the first time in years, that was enough.
Then, in December 2005, I got the call that shattered me. Tina was gone—sudden, unexpected, and cruel. I hit the floor screaming, the kind of grief that punches the breath out of your chest. The person who helped save my life was gone, and I couldn’t save hers.
I still carry that pain.
But I also carry her love.
I stayed sober. I went back to school. I built a life—slowly, imperfectly, but with heart. Crohn’s never left me, but I learned how to manage it. I found a love that gave me new strength. I picked up a camera. And somewhere along the way, the backroads of Oklahoma began to heal me.
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The Right Love at the Right Time
And then, at just the right moment in my journey—when I had finally become the version of myself that could love and be loved in return—I met Jenny.
If it had been any earlier, we would’ve missed each other completely. But we met right when we were both ready. The timing was divine, and somehow, she became the steady light in a world I’d once only seen through storms. Jenny is the kind of person you can laugh with on backroads, sit in silence with under the stars, and build a life with rooted in love, gratitude, and grace. She doesn’t just walk beside me—she believes in the journey we’re on together.
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Oklahoma Backroad Explorer
Oklahoma Backroad Explorer was born not out of success, but out of survival. Out of long drives down dusty roads. Out of sunsets that reminded me I was still alive. Out of the stillness that lets you hear God whisper through the wind.
This isn’t just photography. It’s not just another project or side hustle. This is the reflection of a soul that’s seen the fire and still gets up to chase the light.
This isn’t just a brand.
It’s redemption.
It’s faith.
It’s Oklahoma.
And it’s the backroads that brought me home.