Michelle shares her story of growing up with two closeted parents, how the family secrets impacted her sense of reality growing up, how she learned manipulation from watching her parents lie and hide to coverup, and how she grew up attracted to closeted men and men who were unable to connect with her emotionally. Learning the truth at age 51 finally gave her access to her own agency and enabled her to end her search for her truth.

Speaking about her childhood Michelle said, “I always knew that something was wrong, and I always knew everything was filled with shame and anger, and I didn’t know why. Things aren’t honest, things are alluded to, things are gaslighted in all kinds of ways. How do you know what’s true when people are lying to you? How can you make healthy choices with lies? There is true harm being done in showing a person a false life, bringing them into a false narrative. I didn’t know how to judge the truth from fiction, which made it very easy for me to be manipulated, because I didn’t have access to my own agency.”