Life-changing events.

Highlight some events, realisations and experiences which you have felt to have impacted you in such a way that you'd consider them to be life-changing. They can be positive or negative events with positive or negative effects, so go wild! How do you think these events have shaped you as a person today?

First one that popped to my head was back in sophomore year, when a classmate died. I wasn't exactly close to her, but that's probably the closest death ever got to me, while at the same time I was old enough to understand what it meant. It really freaked me out and I came to realize that death doesn't differentiate between people. Young or old, happy or sad, doesn't matter. After that, I held on to my friends and family a lot closer.

My life changing event was around 6 years ago when I moved from my dad's to live with my mum.
When I lived with my dad, while I can't fault him for raising me and my brother single handedly, it was a somewhat limited childhood and I wasn't allowed to truly be myself.
Once I moved in with my mum, I was allowed more freedom and that really helped me to discover more about myself and therefore become more "free". Ever since then, I've been a much happier person as I've become more outgoing and now only reveal the true me wherever I am.

The biggest life changer I've been through was watching my mom go through breast cancer. It happened when I was about 14/15 (so I was an angsty teenager, that didn't want anything to do with my parents) and when she was diagnosed, it made me realize just how much I love my mom and how quickly she could be taken away.
It made me grow up, I think. I now cherish every day/moment we have together and she's my bestfriend. I love my momma :p

Car wreck when I was 7, broke my right leg because I had it between door and seat while a UPS truck ran into the side of our car. It changed my life and left real scars on my hands, leg and in my hair line.

Several different events (most of which pertained to each other) resulted in my realization that most emotions just cause problems and are best ignored.

It was on November 29th last year when I'm making comment of reporting bugs of a certain game, and the game maker notices and fixed that. Feeling that I'm answered, it is the first point for me to decide to finally enter my first forum, which is in here, and started to active more since then.

My major life changing events
- Death of my grandmother
- Death of my mom
- Death of my grandfather
- Foreclosure of childhood home
- College
- Bought my first car
- Death of high school friend
- Eviction from apartment
- Moved out on my own

Unfortunately, I have more bad life changing moments right now than positive ones, but I like to think that the bad ones shaped me as a person a lot more, so I don't get bumbed out looking at that list. I also like to delude myself into thinking that I've had enough bad events in my life up until this point, that the rest if going to be mostly positive.

One important thing is my first relationship, it changed me, though Im not nessesarily sure if it was for the best as it made me want things I am not sure are really for me, and before I wasnt like that and didnt feel I needed those things. Overall it made me feel more dependent on another person, and sometimes I dont think that's such a great thing.

My grandpa died last week and that was HUGE life changing experience for me. I still haven't adjusted to him not being here and it will take a while for me to.

It was during a charity event where I get to sit in a Ferrari for the first time. It made me realized how much hard work I must do to experience such fun.