Testimony of my Life

I grew up in a single parent home with a sister. My father had been put into prison when I was two years old. My mother had just turned 15 years old when I was born, and was just 17 when all responsibility of parenthood was placed on her shoulders. It was not long before she developed a major drug addiction. Continually moving from house to house due to eviction after eviction. As you may have guessed, this put my family in sever danger on several occasions. We lived in a small 400 sq. ft. apartment on the South Side of Saginaw in Michigan. There was a lot of gang activity in the area and due to the drug addiction, my sister and I were left home alone often. I started staying home alone with her when I was 8 years old. By the time we lived in Saginaw, I was 10-11 and the addiction had gotten so bad that we would be left there for upwards of three weeks at a time.

There is one time during a particularly long absence of my mother that a man tried to break into the apartment while we were there. Fortunately, the deadbolt and door were brand new and the window that was just off of the staircase was a bit too far to access easily. Although, that did not stop the assailant from attempting to get in through the window. He was ultimately unsuccessful at gaining access to the inside of the apartment.

One of the more pressing issues we continually ran into is the fact that with the drug problem, there was no way for my mother to hold down a job, let alone one that would have paid a high enough salary to live off. That being said, we only got groceries once a month, and that was when food stamps were issued. The biggest problem with getting food in the house was that this time of the month always led to an upcoming absence of my mother. We would regularly run out of food to eat in the house. When there is no adult in the house, and no food, what should a child do? I remember one time, my sister and I found fifty cents in the couch cushions. We lived only four or five blocks from a party store. We took the change and went to the store to buy little Debbie cake snacks because we knew they were only 25 cents each. One the walk to the store we past a house with about 14 gang members hanging out on the front porch. They all had their gang color displayed for all to see. When we walked past, they all continually hollered at my little sister saying crude and vulgar things. She was only 8 years old. They said a few things to me as well, about hurting me but honestly I cant remember what they were because I was more afraid for her safety. Ultimately, this never turned into anything but it was a traumatic event because if anything happened, there was no one either of us could go and tell. We would have been gone.

Eventually, we moved from there into a type of Foster care where my sister and I were split up. We did get reunited a year later, back with my mother at my grandfathers house.

There is a lot more to this story, but I really just wanted to say this. I believe God was with me the entire time. He had to have been. There were so many things that should have equated to me being dead, or in prison, or addicted to drugs, or all of the above. To not only come out of this virtually unscathed leads me to believe He has a plan for my life. I did not starve to death, and no one was ever able to get into any of the houses we occupied while we were home alone. There is no doubt in my mind He is real and watching over me.

I plan to add more to this in the future.