Here's a little story about my life.

So my mom's from a little farm town

where they make cheese,

and my dad is from Iran,

and I was born when they were in their early twenties.

During an earthquake,

it was bringing down the city of San Francisco actually,

which is where I live now,

but I was being born over in Utah.

When I was 2 years old, we moved our butts to Portland, Oregon.

My mom had a daycare, and one time,

one of these snot-nosed brats that she took care of

decided: "Hey, I can go throw a swing at this little baby's face!"

Until I was 7 or 8, I had black teeth.

I was pretty nerdy growing up,

I really loved libraries, I thought they were like magical castles.

It was always cold and rainy in Portland,

so being inside the library was like this cosy little retreat.

When I was maybe like 10,

I discovered the sex aisle!

I was so fascinated, I couldn't stop myself.

I wanted to know about penises and vaginas.

And then, one Sunday,

a leader of the church asked me if I think about sex.

I was like: "How does he know?!"

And I told him "no", and I felt so bad that I had lied!

So when I was 12, we moved to California for my dad's job,

I had to leave behind all my friends,

and I started spending more time at church actually in California,

because, it felt like I had a community and I felt less alone.

I was very involved. A good little child.

But, as I got older, I was like:

"I don't know about this"

So while I was learning how to cook

and to sow and to craft and to babysit,

my male friends, they were becoming leaders in the church.

So I asked one of my teachers:

"Why can't I be a leader, dude?"

And she told me God wanted me to have a different special job,

having lots of babies,

which I was really unhappy about,

cause I didn't want to have babies.

So I got involved in theater, pretty into that,

singing and dancing and acting,

and my mom had her ownů has her own theater company.

And I was also developing this turbulent relationship with the church

which was a big part of my life.

I started to feel like the church was

actually not what I used to think it was.

And I left and I felt free, and yet I also felt really alone.

So I began to search for my purpose.

Soon I found myself crying all the time.

I felt hopeless, I felt empty,

and I really thought a lot about killing myself,

I cut my arms and I popped pills

and I slept a lot to get away from it all.

My mom and dad were really scared.

They took me to a therapist.

She really coached me through my depression,

she helped my figure out how I could graduate high school early,

and at 15, I got my diploma,

and then I popped my little booty off to college.

College! Woohoo!

Parties and craziness, right?

No, actually, wrong.

I did say I was nerdy,

I didn't really party a lot,

I kinda kept to myself, I lived alone,

and I liked it that way.

College was where I found myself.

I became very politically active,

participated in my first protest,

I became a certified rape and dating violence counselor,

I started a bunch of sexual health programs at alternative high schools,

which is where they send teen moms,

and I was also diligently posting Sex+ every Saturday.

And I was really driven to use the Internet as a platform

to have conversations with people

about the things that I thought were important in the world.

In my senior year, I met my baby.

I can neither confirm nor deny that I fell in love.

I graduated in 2011.

And then I had to do this really scary thing

called being a grown-upů

My first job was working for Planned Parenthood making videos

which, when they offered it to me,

I just felt like I had one life and everything.

I was working on Sex+ and I started speaking at universities

and participating in documentaries

and eventually started working for Discovery as well,

making science videos for them,

and here I am!

I am a happy person and a stable person,

I know what I want in life,

although I'm not really sure how best to get it.

If there's anything I've learned from the past,

it's that you have to hold on to what you believe in,

and that you have to stay flexible,

and just take each day one at a time.

Find what makes you happy,

and just hold on like your life depends on it,

because, at least for me, it did.

So thanks for joining me, guys,

if you made this far, well, you're amazing.

And I hope to have another Sex+ video up for you

as soon as I can.

Love love, bye bye.