To
start I wasn’t exactly handed the best hand of cards to begin
with, given most people aren’t but I think it’s important
to know what my own personal challenges were so this is where I’m
going to bring those up. When I was younger I didn’t realize
how strange my family was, having a father who was in his late
sixties and a mother so obese she had to be in a wheelchair, I didn’t
even realize we were poor until entering college. Besides that my
childhood was pretty good, I had a great relationship with my family
and though I didn’t end up making friends until middle school I
was happy. That is of course until I was placed in foster care, I
think was about seven when it happened, from what I understand the
reasoning was my household wasn’t good for raising a child so
until my parents met certain conditions I’d be put in the
system. Now I didn’t really understand this when it happened, I
kinda saw it as camp and I’d still get to see my family, which
I did, every weekend which looking back I am so grateful for.
The
first foster care house I was placed in seemed like it’d be
fine but soon turned sour. There were a total of four other girls
there, all sisters and all colored and almost immediately three out
of four seemed to dislike me. So much so that they did some stuff
that I’d rather not write about….Anyway, I tried to tell
the parents about how they were treating but I was simply written off
as a liar and soon enough they were done with me and I was sent off
to another foster home, this is the home I still live in today. Not
long after arriving at this new home my father ended up dying, I
distinctly remember standing in the hospital room with the rest of my
family watching the heart monitor, it was silent and the air heavy. I
don’t quite remember how I got there besides entering the car
in tears and being handed an oatmeal cream pie, a snack my father and
I would always grab after finishing a paper route. It hurt but I
pressed on, I went to school, kept my grades up, and fell into my
drawing and reading more.
The
family that had taken me in this time was a young couple, Nicole and
Ken who had a baby daughter named Abby who was maybe a year old when
I first arrived. At first they were very kind, I could tell Nicole
was trying to make me feel welcome and Ken tried but didn’t
really seem to understand some of my actions, to this day we still
don’t see eye to eye, I don’t think he’s a bad
person just not very compatible because of conflicting ideologies. As
years went by however things got more tense as they began to expect
more of me and while I admit I was lazy some of the comments made
really hurt, I don’t think I realized how much they hurt.
Eventually, I came to the conclusion that the easiest way to get
through the day was to simply stay in my room, be quiet and not try
to defend myself or else they’ll see me as a burden and get rid
of me, this of course didn’t do anything to help my dwindling
self-esteem and already low self-confidence.
Then
not long after I turned thirteen my mother died as well which led to
me officially staying with Nicole and Ken since I had nowhere else to
go. Similar to my father’s death it hurt but there was such a
chaos after her death. She had recently bought a house so midst
mourning we had to help move everything to the new house, I had to
wrap my head around the idea of never being able to return home, my
brother Jeremy left for Missouri days after her funeral, the only
blood family I really had left at that point was my brother Justin
who moved into the new house. Honestly, despite the tears I was
really just moving through the motions, I went to school the day
after finding out my mother died because “I have tests and
quizzes tomorrow.” I was required to see a counselor because of
her death and honestly it didn’t do much, not because they
weren’t trying but because I had already come to terms with it,
even the counselor agreed that she really didn’t need to be
there. I acknowledged my pain, admitted that it hurt sometimes but
also that my parents would want me to be happy and to continue doing
my best, so I did.
High
School was when I really began to start finding myself, I made some
true friends and joined a total of three clubs: literary, drama and
interact. I stayed a member of all these clubs all throughout
highschool and even helped start an art club during my senior year. I
became treasurer of interact club, despite the teacher in charge
urging me to run for president. Like usual I managed to do pretty
well in school, all A’s and B’s even if I did struggle I
managed to make it through. My emotional health was also starting to
get better as I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and had friends
who I could really trust and rely on. Up until then I never really
had people I could open up to besides my blood family but after my
mother’s death I was left alone, I tried to open up to Nicole
and Ken but it also seemed to backfire so I quickly stopped doing
that. It was during these years that I was sort of forced to become
independent, I realized I couldn’t always rely on others and
the ones I could rely on was very scarce, I had to try to do
everything myself and only when I got desperate ask for help, I’m
still kinda that way but I’m working on it. When it came to
looking at colleges I had a lot of voices telling me to apply but no
one to really help me in the process, that is until I started talking
to my guidance counselor. She gave me basically a checklist of things
to do and well I did them, I’d occasionally for advice or she’d
double check something but everything looked good. When my family,
what I’ve been calling Nicole, Ken and Abby, found out they
panicked a bit thinking I must have done something wrong and had me
talk to Ken’s father-in-law to double check only for him to say
it all looked fine too.
In
the end I ended up graduating from my highschool with honors, a few
scholarships and one of the top students in my shop, because I went
to a technical high school studying IT, which got me a new laptop.
When it was time to finally move into college I was excited, it was a
place full of new faces, I’d be living on my own and studying
something I cared about. Two of my best friends from high school even
ended up going to the same college! Fall 2017 I found myself a
freshman at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth majoring in
computer science. I honestly adjusted to college life pretty well,
got myself a work study and began to check out clubs. It did take me
some time to make friends besides the ones I came with but by
sophomore year I did, that is also the year I realized how much I
hated programming and that I really wanted to help people. So, after
about a semester of internal debates in my head I switched majors
from computer science to sociology, which of course many people
thought I was crazy for doing but I didn’t care. This was my
life and I was going to follow my heart, sure I didn’t know
exactly what I wanted to do but even with just a few classes I could
tell it was a subject I cared about, and didn’t regret my
decision.
College
is also when I finally decided that maybe I didn’t want to die
alone and started to give dating a shot. I had been asked about
before by guy friends but I always rejected because I simply wasn’t
ready for a relationship. So when one of my guy friends asked me out
during this exact time frame I accepted, with a warning that this was
an experiment and he shouldn’t get his hopes up. It started off
fine and I did grow to like him but started to become clear that we
had very different plans for the future and ended up breaking up.
We’re still great friends and the experience allowed me to
learn a lot about myself, such as the fact that I’m asexual.
Apparently, the thought of me being ace didn’t come as a
surprise to many of my friends who had already guessed it, I have
casually avoided the topic with my family believing that they
wouldn’t take me seriously even if I did tell them. But as
stated before by being in a relationship I learned a lot and in
future endeavors I’m going to make it clear to the person what
to expect and what not to expect hoping that neither one of us has to
face that kind of heartbreak.
And
with that we have reached the present day, currently I am in Boston
doing an internship at the Cambridge Women’s Center with a
program called Semester in the City and well I’m loving it.
I’ve gotten to work on so many of my professional skills, make
new friends, explore Boston and well, do even more soul searching.
During my time here I’ve started to really think about what I
want to do with myself when I graduate and I think I’ve found
an answer, to become an academic advisor. It’s a career that
would allow me to help students navigate the chaos that is college,
help direct them towards their own career goals and just in general
have the chance to make a difference in someone’s life.
Offering that support that I wish I had and being able to use the
skills I’ve developed to help others. If I can say I’ve
made a positive change within just one person’s life, then I
can die happy and fulfilled. But that’s just me and my story,
I’m sure all of you reading this have faced your own share of
challenges and I want you to know that you're strong and you’ll
be okay. Life can be cruel and cold, but it can also be bright and
full of joy. Whatever it is you're going through now things will get
better, things will always get better.
Serinah
is currently a junior at UMass Dartmouth majoring in Sociology.
Although she's had no professional writing done it has been a hobby
and passion of hers since she was little. In recent years her desire
to improve her writing (and hopefully get something published) has
been rekindled by her experiences during her time at college.
