My mother is disabled. She has a broken back and can't always be walking or standing up throughout the day, so showing her love is one of the most important things I can do. It is only my mom and I that live in my house, so we have to make sure that love is shown often. Writing cards is my favorite thing to do to show anyone that I love them. I love to write down the specific things that I love about them and why they make me happy. I have noticed that a simple phone call makes me and my family members feel loved. Since we all don't live together, calling just to say hi and that I love you is very important. All of my siblings have children, so one way I show my siblings love is babysitting their children so that they can have some alone time with their spouses and show them love too.

When I was a child, everything seemed normal to me. When my dad was mad at me, it was normal. The fear I had when I was a child came from bees outside or monsters in my closet, but when I grew up, I realized I had more to be afraid of. I was afraid of the man that I had spent ten years of my life with. He never spent time lurking in my closet to burst out and yell, "Boo!" He wasn't furry with sharp teeth. He was just my dad. When I was eleven, a social worker came to the house that my mom and I lived in. She knocked on the door and introduced herself. Since I was only in the fifth grade, I didn't know anything about social work at this point. This woman looked at me with eyes that showed care and compassion. I didn't know why she was there or why I needed to travel down the street to go to the family center, but I wasn't afraid of this woman. She sat me down on a couch and asked me about the experiences I had with my father. After I told her all that I could, my mother and I went back home. Two women came to my school to talk to me about how I was doing and if I was okay. Later, I found out that I could only communicate with my father once a month while someone watched us talk to each other. I only cried in these moments, but never spoke to him. I know many children go through experiences close to mine or very different than mine, but since I met the woman who came to my house that day, I wanted to be her. I want to help the little girl that has no clue what is going on and why her mother is crying on the phone every other day. Helping people, especially children, is something I have wanted to do ever since I found out what social work is. Nobody could take care of my father the way he needed to be taken care of when he was a child, which is what led up to me being treated the way I was treated. I want to show these children that they are not broken and nothing is wrong with them because of what someone else did to them. I want to be someone they can look up to for help in a time of need and confusion. Addiction is an issue with 21 million Americans, as of December 18, 2019. Many people turn to substances like opioids, alcohol, and other types of drugs to feel emotion or to not feel anything at all. Children with a horrible past grow up and don't want to think about what they had to see or live through as a child, so they turn to drugs so that they don't have to think about it anymore. Addiction is a symptom of a hurting child or person who is looking for anything to feel a warmth inside of them that they haven't been able to find for years.