A Change in Heart

When you're a young girl, you dream of the fairy tale life and growing up to see your prince charming. It's not the reality of life that comes to your mind as a child, but the dream and the notion that things will turn out to be alright—or at least that's what I thought. At the age of 16, I was raped and the scare still haunts me to this day. I didn't know, one year after, that my past was going to come back and do it again. When I was 17 going on 18, I got pregnant from my attacker. At the time, I was living with one of my older siblings and I did know how I was going to explain to her about the little innocent angel I was carrying. I wasn't sure to keep the child or not, but everything in me said to keep it. Not many women would keep anything, no matter what it may be, that will remind them of the horror and violation they have endured. Instead, they either give it away for adoption or have an abortion. By making this decision, I mustered the courage to notify my sister. With one quick yell and a scream, she told me to get out of her house. Alone and pregnant, I decided to go to my other sister's house. With no hesitation, she took me in and I stayed with her, but that came out to be jumping into the frying pan, but missing it and jumping into the fire. Although my sister was loving and caring enough to take us in, she was dealing with her own issues that caused her children to be taken away.

Dealing with her issues and sinking into depression, my sister left the apartment, and again, I was alone—this time with a roof over my head, but no food, and the lights were going to turn off in a month. My neighbor upstairs made sure I ate and gave me lights once they turned off. Running the extension cord from her place to mine was the only way I was able to see in the apartment. While I stayed there, I met Franky, and I really thought all was going to be well, because I wasn't alone and he protected me. Franky made sure there was food and also plenty of heroin and crack for him to smoke. I was so young and alone that I didn't realize that I was sleeping with an angry, mean, and controlling person. Franky abused me, shot at me, and laced my food with heroin so I would sleep while he went out. I took to the fact that he claimed the angel in my stomach as his own and being naïve to his actions and the way he was treating me. I couldn't go outside unless he was with me, and most of the time he locked me in the apartment. All the friends I did have, he pushed them all away from me.

As time passed, I was in my ninth month and my dad passed away in Brooklyn. That same night, Franky said he was going to kill me and bury me next to my dad. The next day, Franky went out to never come back again. He was shot in the mouth in front of the building. It may sound crazy, but I felt as if chains had fallen away and I was free. I was hurt and confused by his death and it wasn't until I left and went to stay with my mother that I felt the impact of my dad and Franky gone. My mom went to work and the tears could not stop. I screamed and cried as I let all my pain out in my mom's studio apartment. Franky was a big drug dealer and he had more problems than I could count. My dad was sick and I never got a chance to say goodbye. Living with my mother was like living with a stranger, but not so strange. There was a lot of time lost between my mom and I (that's another story). My angel was ready to come and I had her on a stormy, snowy night. My little angel and I had a long road ahead of us, to the point we even had to sleep on a roof to keep warm. Time passed and my angel was taken from me because of an angry family member. I would not see my angel again until she turned 18. There was much time lost and we soaked up each other's time getting to know each other. It wasn't until my angel began to go through life and have her own issues. I began to look in the mirror again through the daughter I call my angel, and she needed my help. I was not going to let her go through what I had been through.

My daughter gave birth to two beautiful girls that have changed the way I see and view life. My daughter is OK, but I have my grandkids until she gets it together. What are moms for? So much has happened in my life that I try my best to do differently for my granddaughters in showing them that God is great and to love yourself. They have changed my life, giving me that extra push every day. I wrote a book about my life because I needed to let my children and grandkids know that, with all that I have been through, I have accomplished much and I didn't let my past dictate my future.

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