Growing up in an ordinary middle class family from Chicago with two married parents and an identical twin sister named Monica, 25 year-old Maron was trying to find her place in the world through making a difference and inspiring others. Throughout childhood, Maron and Monica participated in the same activities, made the same friends, and were basically attached at the hip. Unfortunately for whatever reason, Maron had been bullied since age 3 in early childhood school; the bullying traveled with her through the beginning of her senior year in college. Trying to keep her mental health afloat with all of the bullying, she started seeing a counselor in third grade. To top it off, Maron’s relationship with her parents was extremely rocky. Searching for solace and happiness, tragedy ended up striking.
Maron was diagnosed with depression at age 12 when her dad was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer, causing her to ponder about a permanent escape. She was also diagnosed with anxiety attributed to a hormone imbalance at age 16 and had infrequent panic attacks. After a slew of begging her parents to transfer schools during freshman year of high school, the failed begging and loneliness drew Maron to pursue writing. Maron and Monica were best friends with Kyle from elementary school through sophomore year of high school until he passed away of a drug overdose; Maron wishes she could have expressed her worry to Kyle before it was too late. This unfortunately caused the depression to grow worse, especially because neither Maron nor Monica had many other friends. Kyle had been a major influence on Maron and Monica, promoting the beauty of web development and prompting them to pursue a technology degree in college. However, Monica had wanted to break free from Maron to establish her own identity and did everything in her power to shove Maron out of the way.
College was quite the rough transition for Maron as well. She had marching band as a starting place to make some friends and establish herself. Marching band was also off to a rough start because the section leaders yelled at Maron prior to the very first scrimmage game, thus, giving Maron a sour taste in her mouth for the remainder of her time in Marching Band. Later during freshman year of college, Maron joined the Sisterhood of the Purple Flower. This group helped Maron find a lot of her code of ethics and helped her find her passion for volunteerism, but she was unfortunately bullied out of that towards the end of her college career. College classes were a struggle for Maron as she pounded energy drinks and unhealthy snack food to take her through the grind of late night studying and library ventures. The unhealthy eating came with its consequences and Maron ballooned about 60 pounds. Luckily, in an IT class, Maron ended up meeting a man named Mike, who later became her college best friend. By the time junior year of college rolled around, Maron’s mental health continued to decline.
One day, Maron stumbled into the campus Rabbi’s office of Rabbi Brown. After a deep conversation with Rabbi Brown, he told her about the trip of a lifetime, called the “Divine Passage”, where participants travel to Israel for 12 days and explore the Holy land and culture. This would be the first time Maron would begin separating herself from Monica, on January 1, 2020, enabling Maron to finally begin finding her identity. Once college was over, Maron was introduced to a community known as “Destiny’s Reach”. From that point forward, Maron was finally in a safe place where she could be herself. With each day of the Divine Passage trip symbolizing a pivotal point in Maron’s life, Maron was finally able to find happiness, spread joy to others, and inspire others to follow their dreams!
