My wheels are a chariot to freedom rather than a temporary crutch to prop me up from the harsh aspects of society...

Those early years were rough on my mother as she was battling demons in the early stages of her alcoholism and drug addiction...

“We have to move, baby,” my mom’s voice was tense. “Get packing.” I did as I was told; it was routine...

My childhood was not sweet, to say the least. Instead of love and security, it was filled with mockery and humiliation...

I was born with a rare genetic disorder that wasn’t properly diagnosed until I was two years old. The doctors discovered...

I received no further explanation, just a request to pack up and leave the premises. It didn’t feel real. I had so much riding on this job..

We would grow up, and things from our childhood would start making sense. But some things are always going to be beyond our comprehension...

When one of them disappears, it threatens the whole system, and in my case, my entire being. I was forced to rebuild my life and myself...

I’m sure my mother didn’t like being away from me, but at the time, the northern region of the country was the only place a woman of color..

But no matter where we lived, I was a smart high achiever. No kidding. We were a family of hard-workers and I loved going to school...

Good, no one had robbed me of my pain pills. I pulled out my trusty relievers and tossed a handful back. I could be without a home...

I was born in 1982, grew up in and around Raleigh, North Carolina, and was raised by a mother who lived and breathed drugs...

I shouldn’t have taken all those pills, I didn’t want to die. I needed to get to a phone to call 911, but it was so hard to move...

I know she loved me, deep down, but she loved drugs more. When I was little, she tried selling me for $1,000 to fund her addiction...

I lay in the hospital bed, pain racking my body as chemicals and super-science ran through my blood...

That’s when she married my stepfather who served in the US Military. Because of his job, we moved to the US...

My dad was an engineer for a federal contractor and my mom was a homemaker. We ended up having to move around a lot, but eventually...

Girls married right out of high school at 18 in my neighborhood, like an unspoken tradition. I thought I’d follow the same path...

That year, there was a massacre in an eastern village. Nearly 600 were killed with sprays of bullets and machetes...

Being the fourth of fourteen children, there was little love or food to go around in our household, and from an early age, I wanted out...