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    Your Life

    Your Life

  • Recovering from an abusive relationship: 'I felt like it branded me'

    In this series, Your Life features personal accounts by Singaporeans detailing their respective trials in life and their courage to face them. A Singaporean gives her personal account about her experiences being in an abusive relationship.

  • Living with alopecia: Losing all my hair, eyebrows and all, was a huge blow to my confidence

    In mid-2014, I started losing hair from the top of my head, and within a year, I lost all my body hair due to alopecia [a condition where the immune system mistakenly attacks hair follicles]. At first, I only told my then-girlfriend (now my wife) about my hair loss.

  • Not just a phase: A Singaporean opens up about being a transgender

    I was raised in a Catholic family, and attended an all-girls, convent primary school where strict grooming regulations were in place. I couldn’t stand having long hair, but a certain length was required for school.

  • Going blind while still in school: 'I was unwilling to face disability'

    I’d known since I was 7 years old that my vision would one day succumb to glaucoma – an eye condition where the high fluid pressure within the eye eventually damages the optic nerve fibers. It was gradual, and happened at a pace I didn’t pay much attention to when I was younger.

  • Struggling with eating disorders as a teen: 'We skipped meals together'

    When I was in secondary 3, my desire to become thin grew into an obsession after realising that the weight loss tips I acquired online were working on me.

  • Living with brain injury: 'Memories from my childhood were wiped clean'

    The day of the accident was also the day of my father’s wake. I was 24 years old, and on my way back from driving some of my relatives home when I lost control of the car. Two of my cousins were with me when the car skidded and crashed into a tree. They were relatively unharmed, but it took an SCDF crew to extract me from the driver’s side, which was completely smashed.

  • Living with schizophrenia: 'I thought I had developed superpowers'

    When I was 24, I thought I had developed superpowers.I was watching the news when I heard a voice in my head telling me of accidents that were going to happen. I would think that the television was talking to me, and that I could talk back to it if I tried.

  • Confessions of a Singaporean male stripper

    When I strip, anything is possible. I am here to entertain and I'm happy as long as my clients have a good time.

  • How I went through two painful miscarriages

    My name is Daphne, and I had my first miscarriage at 21. Being young and fresh out of polytechnic, it was an experience I could not understand.

  • Living as a drug addict: ‘Did I try to kick the habit? Of course'

    Growing up, I never knew what it was like to take drugs. I was a decent girl who did well in primary school. However, I lost interest in my studies after Secondary 3, and dropped out.

  • Singaporean orphan raised by nuns: 'I didn't think people would understand'

    YOUR LIFE: Every human being has a story to tell. In this series, Your Life features personal accounts by Singaporeans detailing their respective trials in life and their courage to face them. My name is Fam Jun Yong and I am 23 years old. When I was born in 1994, my biological parents left me to two Buddhist nuns. The nuns were already in their mid-fifties when they adopted me, and behaved more as mere guardians than foster parents. As a result, there was very little affection in the relationship. The generation gap might have also contributed to the sense of detachment I have with them. ...

  • Living with drug addicts: 'I still remember when plainclothes officers raided'

    YOUR LIFE: Every human being has a story to tell. In this series, Your Life features personal accounts by Singaporeans detailing their respective trials in life and their courage to face them. I still remember the day plainclothes narcotics officers raided our rental house and took my parents away. I was only six, my siblings a few years younger, and all we could do was scream and cry as we watched our mother and father get locked up for drug abuse. With our relatives unable to take care of us, we spent the formative years of our lives trapped in the rigid confines of a children’s home. ...