I am a 34 year old single mother of 5. I come from a rough childhood. My father died of a heart attack at 33 years old. I was only 6. My mother struggled with his death and raising 3 small children. She developed severe mental illness and drug abuse. My siblings and I were neglected and abused throughout the years following. When I was 9 years old, my mother crashed her car while driving on a mountain side. It flipped 8 times and she was thrown from the vehicle. She survived miraculously, but was diagnosed with severe brain damage, compound fractures in both legs, with many other smaller breaks throughout her body. She was in a coma for 4 months. After my mother woke, she lived in a rehab facility for a year. She learned how to walk and talk again. She had a new lease on life. So we thought. After she was well enough, we moved back with her. It had a been almost 2 years since we had even seen her. After about a year, she had made a full recovery. The joy was short lived. Soon after, she began with the drug abuse again. By now, I am 12, a very impressionable time of my life. By 14, I was pregnant and wanted better for me and my son. So, after his delivery, feeling desperate and terrified, I told the nurse I could not go home. We were put into foster care. By 16, I was emancipated. I walked with my class at graduation, with my son in the audience. He is 19 now, and attending college with me! I've struggled to make a good life for us, but it was all worth it.