The Life I was Dealt.

Growing up, I never really cared about my looks, or ANYTHING. You see all I knew then was, what I was use to. Eating out of dumpsters, living under a railroad track (at one point) and scavengering for food or my next meal or partial meal. I wore clothes that were either too small or too big for me. I don't remember ever owning a brush, or even a tooth brush, those just were not important. I grew up in a sort of survival mode. Taking care of myself, and my younger siblings. Mom and dad, didn't and couldn't the drugs, sex, and alcohol got the best of them. 

Going into the foster care system at eight years old, I weighed about 40 pounds, I was mal nourished, dirty, covered in lice. The firt few years in the system were pretty crucial. I ended up developing a very bad eating habit, due to the lack of food growing up, and the inconsistency of my home life, and not knowing when my next meal would be. I became a food hoarder, not only that I would gorge myself until I made myself sick. My reasonging was because I honestly didn't know if there would be a next meal so I better eat all that I can get now. I would hide food in my room, at a lot of my foster homes, sometimes getting up in the middle of the night to eat it, just in case there wasn't going to be breakfast. It got better as the years passed by, I was able to break the habits to an extent. But, as time wore on, I noticed patterns developing, that I seemed to not be able to control. If I was upset, scared, nervous, depressed I ATE. My coping mechanism was to eat. Food never let me down. In elementary It wasn't so bad to be the odd ball, the "foster child" the child who didn't fit in or belong, or the new kid at school. It was my normal, something I had grown accustomed to. That is what happens when you bounce from home to home, and end up spending your elementary years at 13 different schools. Making friends? that was hard, I made a few, but mostly aquaintences. Once I got close to someone, it was time to move on to a new home and a new school, so I built a shell. I was at school to learn all that I could, not to make friends, besides, everyone already had their groups of friends, no room for new people. No room for the girl with the clothes from good will, and the old sneakers she wore last year. My weight started to be a problem for me when I was in Jr. High. I knew I wasn't "fat" but I also wasn't the skinny cheerleader type. My body was awkward, while most girls were just developing breasts, I had already had them for years. While some girls were just getting their periods, mine had come at the age of nine. I had been sexually abused at a very young age, and growing up as a sexual abuse victim, I often times turned the other way when a boy was walking towards me. I didn't really take interest in boys until late into my high school years, because I had no self esteem what so ever. I hated my entire being, everything about me, so who in their right mind would even look at this in a postive or loving or attractive way. This mind set stuck with me well in to high school. I shyed away from big groups of guys. Fast forward to graduating high achool and starting my life as an adult. I was out on my own by the time I graduated high school. No real family, no one to really teach me the ends and outs of living on my own, money wise, food wise, home essentials. All the good things most kids/ teens take for grantite being able to do, being taught from the time they were little so that when they do grow up and move out on their own they are PREPARED. I mean don't get me wrong, I knew some of the basics, I knew how to cook some things, I knew how to do my own laundry, I knew how to clean, I knew some things. I didn't know how to balance a check book, or anything about credit cards, or money management or budgeting, or buying my first car, or getting a job (which I did right away) or what I would do when somene broke in to my home (which happened when I was 19, and in my VERY first apartment.) I didn't know how scary it would be to live alone, how frightening every little noise was, how terriefied I was that something bad would happen to me, and how convinced I was that if it did, no one would even care or notice.  Imagine going from being surrounded by people your entire life, from foster home to foster home, to being by yourself for the first time in your life. Pretty intimidating, I didn't have a mom or dads house to run to or a grandma and grandpa's house to run to when things weren't going right or when I felt home sick. I felt home sick all the time but home sick for what? Which home? Who? I spent many years just skating through life, doing the necessity to survive.  By the time I was about 26, I knew things needed to change. This was NOT going to be my life. I was NOT going to just live in the shadows of this world, I was not going to just let life slip through my clutched fists. I needed to take a stand not only against the world but against myself. I need to change my mindset, and how I viewed myself. I needed to stop hating the person looking back at me in the mirror. If I didn't learn to love me how could I possibly think someone else could. So that is what I did.

Always, 
Becka 

My Story from the beginning...

On June 11, 1988 Two twin girls were born. Weighing in at a whopping 2 lbs 4 ounces and 2 lbs 3 ounces. A couple of months early, but from the beginning they were survivors, they were fighters. Little did they know this was not going to be the biggest fight of their life. My name is Rebecca, I was the first born twin of the two. My twin sister is Pauline. We have one older brother who is thirteen months older then us his name is Joshua

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        Rebecca @ about 2 years old

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                                                          Pauline @ about 2 years old

We were born in California, but soon after our birth our family moved to Arkansas. We lived there until we were about four years old. In the process we welcomed a brother to the family, he was thirteen months younger then us, his name is Daniel. During the four years we lived in Arkansa, we were put in the foster care system from the age of 2-4.   We moved to Bakersfield, California right before our fifth birthday.

My parents, if you can call them that were not meant to be parents. They were abusive to us children; mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually abusive. The were also drug addicts and alcoholics. I remember a lot from my childhood. I remember, a few good times with my family, but mostly I remember the bad and the ugly. I remember the times we had nowhere to sleep at night, I remember the times we had to sleep in the tunnel under the rail road tracks. I remember the times we had to scrounge the garbage cans for food. It was hard but you know what, it is the very thing that made me strong and made me who I am today.

By 1997, I was seven going on eight years old, and there was now nine of us children. Joshua being the oldest, then Me, Pauline, Daniel, Billy, Samuel, Noah, Joseph, and Jessie. In September of 1997, the county came in and took all of us children away from our parents and placed us in the Foster Care system.

                                                 Rebecca & Pauline at about 8 years old

I remember the first night we spent in Jamison Center, formally known as the Shalimar Center. They took all nine of us there in various vehicles including cop cars. When we entered the building they had us all together in a little room, and I remember sitting there and watching one by one as they took each and everyone of my brothers out of there. Because they were so young they were not allowed to spend the night at the center. I remember them coming and taking my sister and I into the back where all the other children were housed, my older brother Joshua and my younger brother Daniel were there and we were reunited. Little did we know this would be our last night together for many many years to come. The boys left to separate foster homes the next day, and all that was left there was me and Pauline. We were terrified, we were sad, and we were lost. We were there for a little over a month before we were placed in our first foster home. It didn't last long and for the next two years we were bounced around fourteen different times. By 2000 we no longer had contact with any of our siblings or our parents. Most of my brothers had been adopted in the first year or so that we were placed in the system. By the age of ten we were placed in a long term foster home, We stayed there for six years, it was good in the beginning but we soon found out that it was going to be one of the worst places we had ever been. (More about that in a future blog) We moved around a few more times before we turned eighteen and then eventually graduated high school. It took us eleven years to get into contact with our older brother and it seemed that it was a battle for the next few years to find the rest, to this day there are still two out there that we have not found. By the way my mother gave birth to her tenth child a little boy in June of 2000. That makes a total of ten of us. All from the same mother and father. 

So that is just a little of my story, I didn't go into great detail because i'm not blogging this for sympathy I'm blogging this because I am a survivor and a fighter and I have seen, done, and been through the unthinkable, and I have come out on top. I want to be an inspiration, an encouragement and a person of motivation for someone who may have or is going through something similar to what I've gone through. If I reach one person, and change at least one person, then I know that there is a reason I am writing this.

Last but not least, I know in my heart and soul that I would not be where I am today if it weren't for my amazing and faithful God, watching, guiding, loving, and supporting me through this journey called life.

Jeremiah 29:11- For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.