A Teacher With Endless Tears and a Warm Hug
As I recall, I was probably seven years old.
I was in another foster home at the time. The foster parents were very abusive.
For the record, I want people to understand something about a child going through things like this. Those memories and scars can last forever. It's like putting an imprint on a person's heart, mind and soul.
The reason I'm telling these real, true experiences isn't because I want sympathy.
When I write them, it releases some of the pain from my heart, mind and soul. And maybe when some of that pain is released, the seed of love can continue to flow within my heart, mind and soul.
I was a seven-year-old foster child who had already gone through multiple foster homes, trying to find somebody who was going to love me and accept me.
Instead, I found terror.
I found a dark world.
I remember one morning going to school. I went into the bathroom and sat inside one of the stalls crying.
School was starting. I was supposed to be in my classroom when the bell rang, but I didn't have the courage to go in.
I was ashamed.
I had bruises all over me.
So I sat there in that bathroom stall crying, trying to figure out what was going on in my life.
Then I heard a warm voice.
“Is there anybody in here?”
I was shaken.
She walked into the bathroom. Nobody else was there.
She saw me sitting there, shaking and crying.
The first thing she did was hold me in her arms.
It was a warm hug.
Then tears started running down her face.
She asked me what was wrong.
That hug felt like relief.
The best way I can describe it is like you're stranded somewhere, wondering if anybody is ever going to save you. You're alone on an island, and then all of a sudden an angel appears and helps you get to land.
Throughout my life, I've always felt like I was on an island of my own.
I had to learn how to adapt to situations.
I learned it was better to stay quiet. Don't say anything, because there are consequences to every action and reaction that goes on in your life.
That teacher took me out of the bathroom and brought me to the office.
That's when the questions started.
Why is this happening?
Why do you have bruises all over you?
I told them I fell down the stairs.
They kept asking me questions.
They told me I could tell the truth.
Eventually, I told them.
I told them I had abusive foster parents. Alcohol was involved. If I did something wrong, I could get hit or slapped or be locked in a dark room.
I had kept everything to myself because I didn't know what else to do.
I don't remember everything that happened that day, and I'm not going to pretend that I do.
What I remember is that probably within two or three weeks, I was moved to another foster home.
It was another farm.
Not the farm from one of my other stories. This was a different farm, and I stayed there until I was getting close to becoming a teenager.
I never saw that teacher again.
But I will always remember that moment.
I will always remember that feeling.
And I will always remember the love that a total stranger could give to a scared foster child.
If that teacher were standing in front of me today, I would tell her:
Thank you for that warm hug.
It felt like a security blanket when I was going through a dark storm.
Throughout my timeline in life, I've met some mean people. I've met some kind people. I've met some loving people.
There were people I could never understand.
I could never understand why somebody would do certain things to a child when that child isn't able to defend themselves the way an adult can.
And sometimes I wondered:
What was their childhood like?
As I tell these stories today, I think about something I told myself when I was that child.
Someday, I'm going to get out of this dark room.
Someday, I'm going to show the world, humbly and silently, who I am instead of allowing the world to tell me who I am.
Because I know who I was meant to be.
I believe everybody in this world has a special, unique gift to offer this world in their own unique way.
And throughout my life and my experiences as a foster child, I got to experience beautiful gifts, unwanted gifts and priceless gifts from the people who entered my life.
Some stayed.
Some hurt me.
Some helped me.
And some I never saw again.
I want people to remember something when they're reading this story.
The outside of a person doesn't define who they really are.
The real, true person is on the inside.
And all these years later, I still remember a teacher who walked into a school bathroom and found a seven-year-old foster child crying alone.
She didn't know that little boy would remember her for the rest of his life.
She didn't know what that hug would mean decades later.
I never saw her again.
But I never forgot her.
A teacher gave me hope.
