Growing Up Unfiltered

When I was fifteen, I wasn’t in the hallways swapping jokes with friends. I wasn’t at football games or study sessions or birthday sleepovers.

I was at home.

Too sick to attend school, I was placed on “homebound.” My connection to education shrank to scheduled phone calls with teachers and the fat manila envelopes of homework I mailed in for grading.

This was before Zoom. Before Google Docs. Before text threads made it easy to check in with a friend at 11 p.m. when the loneliness crept in.

Back then, my classmates were worlds away. The only glimpses I had of them came in brief, awkward hand-offs at the front door when someone dropped off assignments. They laughed together in the cafeteria while I typed alone on a rattling old typewriter in my room.

I pounded the keys so hard, trying to make my characters come alive, that I ended up with carpal tunnel in both arms.

But even through the pain, I kept writing—because writing was connection.

What I Needed Then

When I think back on those months, I realize what I was hungry for.

I didn’t need stories about perfect kids with perfect lives. I didn’t want the glossy versions of adolescence where the biggest conflict was who went with who to the dance.

I wanted messy characters. Moody characters. Characters who were sick, isolated, unseen—but still alive, still trying, still worth rooting for.

The books I had didn’t show me that.

So I wrote my own.

Today’s Teens, Different Filters

Fast forward to today. Teens aren’t mailing homework like I did. They’re logging into Zoom classes, DMing friends, scrolling through TikTok. Connection looks different.

But in some ways, the hunger is the same.

Teens still crave stories that reflect their complicated truths. Because even with all the filters, the FYP dances, the curated Instagram feeds—underneath, there are kids hiding illness, anxiety, grief, or just the everyday mess of growing up.

And too often, they still don’t see themselves in the books handed to them.

The Unfiltered Lives Series

That’s why I write the Unfiltered Lives series: short YA/NA stories about illness, identity, and being seen.

They’re not long, sprawling novels—most can be read in a coffee break. But they’re real. They’re raw. And they’re exactly the kind of stories I wish fifteen-year-old me could have held in her hands.

In Filter, Lily looks perfect on TikTok until her kidneys fail—and a viral video forces her to decide whether to keep pretending or show the truth.

In In-Between Beats, Beck hides his dialysis from his music students until a duet calls him out online.

In Grateful for the Mess, Marisol tries to survive Thanksgiving with a renal diet while titas whisper about her future.

In Needlepoint Dreams, Mrs. Lin stitches love into embroidered gifts that outlast her.

Each character is flawed. Each is human. Each is unfiltered.

Why Short Reads?

People sometimes ask: why not write a “big” novel?

Because when you’re sick—or just overwhelmed—time and energy are limited. At fifteen, I couldn’t always hold focus for 300 pages. But a short, sharp story? I could handle that.

And I think teens today, juggling endless notifications and pressures, feel the same.

Short stories meet them where they are. They give them intensity without obligation. They prove that sometimes the truest things don’t need a thousand pages—they just need honesty.

What I’d Tell My Fifteen-Year-Old Self

If I could sit down beside the version of me hunched over that typewriter, wrists aching, eyes straining, I’d hand her these stories.

I’d tell her:

“You don’t have to be perfect to be worthy of a story.”

“You’re not invisible.”

“You can be messy, moody, flawed—and still loved.”

And I’d remind her that stories are more than escape. They’re mirrors. And sometimes, the right story can make you feel seen for the first time.

The Last Word

I didn’t have books like Filter when I was fifteen. But now, teens do.

And that’s why I keep writing: to give them what I wish I’d had back then.

Because growing up is hard enough. Growing up unseen is harder.

The Unfiltered Lives series exists to make sure no one has to do it completely alone.

✨ Filter: A YA Short Story About Illness, Identity, and Going Viral is available soon on Kindle. Part of the Unfiltered Lives series—YA/NA short reads that are messy, moody, and real.