There was a little boy inside of me who spent much of his childhood waiting for someone to save him.
Someone who would understand his pain. Someone who would believe in him. Someone who would look beyond everything he had experienced and see a child who simply wanted to be loved.
That little boy was me.
Growing up in foster homes, I experienced moments that taught me lessons no child should have to learn so early in life.
I knew what loneliness felt like. I knew what it meant to want somebody to stand beside me. And I knew how painful it could be when the people I hoped would be there simply weren't.
There were many times I just wanted someone to believe in me. Someone to invest in and someone to be there for me. When I needed the most
Sometimes, that was all I wanted.
Not money. Not expensive gifts. Not somebody who could make every problem disappear.
I wanted someone to understand my pain. I wanted someone to hold me in their hands and I wanted someone to love me for who I am
But life doesn't always give a child what that child needs.
And sometimes, the lessons we learn through disappointment stay with us long after the moment has passed.
The Birthday Party Nobody Came To
One of the most heartbreaking experiences of my childhood was a birthday party.
I invited people because I wanted to celebrate. More importantly, I wanted to experience what it felt like to have people show up for me.
But nobody came.
The only one I felt was there was God.
That experience broke my heart.
I wasn't looking for presents. I wasn't expecting anything extravagant. I just wanted somebody to care enough to be there.
I told myself that I was on my own.
I started alone. I cried alone. I tried to heal alone, so I'll just be alone.
That was how I began looking at life during those childhood years.
I will never understand how people could be so cold. When all I ask was not a gift just a warm heart.
In a kind soul.
Those feelings didn't disappear simply because the birthday party was over.
They became part of the emotional weight I carried.
And I learned to carry much of that weight quietly.
The Tears Nobody Saw
As a child, I learned that showing my emotions could have consequences.
Crying wasn't always something I felt safe doing around other people. I had learned at an early age that there could be backlash.
So I kept my feelings inside.
In my younger years, I had my imaginary friend. I also turned to God for comfort.
Those relationships gave me somewhere to take feelings I couldn't always share with the people around me.
Sometimes I felt as though I was living on an island of my own.
I had God with me, and in that sense, I felt like I had a home.
But even with that comfort, I still dreamed and wondered whether someone would come and save me.
That hope stayed inside me.
I wanted somebody to recognize the child behind the pain.
Somebody who would understand that being quiet didn't mean I wasn't hurting.
Somebody who would understand that learning to survive wasn't the same thing as feeling loved.
Learning to Fight My Own Battles
As I moved through school, I experienced bullying.
There were times when other students made life difficult, and I began realizing that I needed to learn how to stand up for myself.
I remember being in eighth grade when a senior put me inside a locker.
I fought back as best I could.
I didn't win that fight.
But winning wasn't the only thing that mattered.
I had shown the courage to stand up for myself, even against someone older.
That experience became part of a much larger lesson.
Life wasn't going to present me with just one difficult situation. There would be other challenges, other decisions, and other moments when I would have to determine how to respond.
I learned that sometimes I needed to speak up.
Other times, I needed to remain quiet.
I needed to understand when to react and how to handle whatever was happening around me.
Slowly, I began developing a different understanding of myself.
I wasn't always going to control what other people did.
But I could learn how to respond.
And that realization began changing the way I approached life.
Becoming My Own Hero
When I learned to stand up for myself, I learned one valuable lesson in life. No one's going to save you. You have to save yourself. So be your own hero, and heal your own wounds, because no one's going to save you. And that's the honest truth.
That became one of the most important lessons I carried from childhood.
It wasn't because I had stopped wanting love.
It wasn't because I no longer wished somebody would stand beside me.
It was because I was learning that I couldn't spend my entire life waiting for somebody else to make my decisions or solve every problem.
I had to begin believing in myself.
When times became difficult, I learned to look back at the battles I had already made it through.
Those experiences reminded me that I had faced challenges before.
I began appreciating the things I had at that moment instead of constantly worrying about things I couldn't control.
And I discovered something else.
When I learned what to do when to do it? And how to do it? Then, my life started to become easier. That was a new formula for me
It didn't mean every problem disappeared.
It meant I was beginning to understand how to approach those problems.
The Mindset That Began Changing Me
I also began recognizing the importance of my mindset.
Yes, I learned mindset was very important. If you want something positive to come in your life, you have to stay positive. And when you speak to people, you speak in a positive manner, because there's the reaction to every action
Those lessons helped me begin looking at life differently.
I was learning to make decisions with greater confidence.
I was learning that my reactions mattered.
And I was beginning to understand that the way I treated other people was important, too.
I learned to believe in myself. I learned to take control of myself
And I learned there's more to life than just thinking of myself
That was a significant change for the little boy who had spent so much time feeling alone.
The same child who had once dreamed of being rescued was beginning to discover his own strength.
But there was still more to learn.
The Little Boy I Would Never Forget
Looking back, I understand how much those childhood experiences shaped the person I was becoming.
I remember the loneliness.
I remember wanting someone to believe in me.
I remember the birthday party and the disappointment of nobody showing up.
And I remember learning that courage didn't always mean winning.
Sometimes courage meant standing up, even when you knew you might lose.
If I could go back and speak to that little boy, there is something I would want him to understand.
First of all, tell him, sometimes in life. You have to be stronger than what you think. You are
And when you're lost, oh, let's go back to yourself. And find yourself again
Because that little boy still had a journey ahead of him.
He had begun discovering his strength, but he hadn't experienced everything life would eventually place in front of him.
There would be more roads to travel.
More decisions to make.
And more moments that would test the lessons he was learning.
The little boy who had learned to stand up for himself was still discovering who he could become.
And the next chapter of his life would bring another opportunity to find out.
To be continued…