I was told that I ruined my life. That having a child at sixteen reduced me to being a statistic. I believed it for a while. Then, one day, while sitting on my front porch waiting on the mailman to bring my welfare check, I thought to myself: they can't pay me enough money to give my life away. I found my way to a training program that lead to a job and eight years later, I had saved enough to start community college. After I graduated, I received a scholarship to University of Michigan and Florida A&M University (FAMU). I choose FAMU because it was a historical black college.

What really motivated me was the fact that it had always been hard for our people. They had children and obstacles and look what they accomplished. My great uncle often talked about how my grandmother came to Detroit from Alabama and scrubbed floors and sent for anyone that wanted to come. She died when my mother was fifteen. My mother always told my siblings and me that we only needed each other. That's not true. You need to know whose shoulders you are standing on. Please help me find out!