AS TOLD TO BC PIRES

My name is Jesica Elizabeth Neisha Sadler and I have been chronically vomiting every single day of the last 12 years.

My mum gave my dad very specific instructions for my birth certificate: Jessica, Elisabeth with an ess, Nisha without an e. He got every name wrong. Except Sadler. Which is his name. So my name is Jesica with one ess, Elizabeth with a zee and Neisha with an e. But he’s very proud I’m different because he named me.

I told my friend Rosie that, one day, the sun and I are going to get married. I really feel the sun is the source of all my powers.

The University of Tampa wasn’t for me. After A LOT of parental convincing, I actually saved my parents some money by moving to London to do my photojournalism BA. Cause the fees in Tampa were WAY more. I made two charts comparing Tampa and London costs, down to the price of milk. Losing the sun by leaving Florida was the convincing part. Thank God for my stepfather.

I believe that, when the time comes and I fall in love, one day, I would be sitting with my partner and I’d want to extend the love that we have. I’d be, like, “There could be a mini-me AND a mini-you walking around!” And I think we need to do it for the sake of the universe.

It’s just me and my elder brother, Joseph, but my dad is one of seven siblings and I have two stepparents. So our really extensive extended family is extended even farther.

I couldn’t be who I am today without [it] so I’ve never regretted my suffering. Even though I’m not very Catholic. My family is Catholic and I believe in their love of religion works for them. But I’m not very religious.

I believe we are everywhere in the world. We are part of the sea, part of the sky.

I don’t know if there’s an afterlife and I don’t want to know. But it’s trickier to say whether I care.

My parents split up when I was two or three. A picture of them together is pretty strange. But they’ve both been settled in other relationships for a long time. We’ve had one stepdad Uncle Derwin Howell and one stepmom. My mother is Charlene Sadler. My father is Brian Sadler.

I only recently realised how influential my stepmother Auntie Roxanne Mohammed has been. [After] a stroke when she was 11, she doesn’t have much control over the left side of her body. And she’s the most independent person on the planet. To watch her put up her hair using just one hand is mesmerising. When I was 12, I developed a very rare gastrointestinal disorder called superior mesenteric artery syndrome, although I didn’t know what it was until nine years later. I also had gastroparesis. So, since I’m 12 years old, I’ve been chronically vomiting. Every day.

My brother Joseph is two years, two months and two days older than me. So we have matching tattoos of interconnected 2s. I would consider him, like, my life partner. He’s always there for me.

Superior mesenteric artery syndr