The First Couple Years Of My Life

Facing a reality of my inception into an underprivileged life with small business owners for parents and siblings much older than I am, still struggling to find stability in their lives. I constantly questioned how I would turn out. I understood at a young age the perplexities of my family's struggles, that I lacked all the resources such as financial assistance, lack of insight, and encouragement from my family. Thus, leaving me ill prepared for my future and for the rest of my life to come.

As a child I faced many difficulties that most children at my age would never face, but in order to understand my story you must first understand my background. I was born in Mexico City, Mexico at the age of four my mom made an incredibly important decision that wouldn’t only affect her, but also me as her son. My mom, Rosalia, made the decision to move out of her country that she had grown up in, and the country that I had begun my life in, in order to move to the United States so that her son could not only be with his mother, but also his father. At that age I didn’t think much of it, but today I sit here and respect the decision that my mom made at that time, and appreciate the amount of courage and strength that it took my mother to make

My mother worked day and night so I had to care for my sister and cousins. On some occasions I had to help my mom clean houses to earn money. At the age of thirteen up until I was sixteen I was cleaning houses for the people we longed to be. I got a glimpse of a life I have never known. For the most part my mom’s boss was nice, but her family was ignorant at times. They would ask me where I have traveled and if I’ve been to all these kinds of expensive places. When I answered no they asked why not. I guess they didn’t comprehend the fact that my mom and I were cleaning their dishes and making their beds for less than the minimum wage to be able to barely afford the rent of the small room we all

A fire rose within to burn social economic barriers that imprisoned me from achieving an education. As a member of a low-income household, I continually witnessed my parents struggling to pay for utilities, rent, and groceries. Although we received government assistance, it never seemed to be enough. My father worked long hours at a dairy factory to provide for our family, but his addiction to alcohol took most of his income. My mother depended on government assistance due to her chronic asthma and arthritis. Not being able to rely on my parents for stability, my six older siblings were forced to drop out of high school to become providers of their own.

From a very young age, I contended with countless setbacks, but the vitality placed on our income at home was the leading factor to my family’s problems. I remember when my parents chose to buy me a new pair of running shoes over paying the electricity bill or when they stayed up all night making tamales to sell so they could afford to pay for medical bills. There never went a month without my parents constantly arguing over the monthly rent or not having enough to buy groceries for the family. I grew up with five siblings in addition to two cousins who were sent from Mexico by their parents and placed under the legal guardianship of my parents. Naturally, learning to adapt to unfortunate circumstances was not rare and I quickly understood

Throughout the seventeen years that I’ve been alive I have witnessed all the sacrifices my parents have gone through ensuring I have a better future than they did. I come from immigrant parents that weren’t fortunate enough to continue studying. I myself was brought into the country when I was two years old so I could build a different path than the one my parents had to take due to financial reasons. Short after, my sister was born my mom got remarkably ill with Diabetes. I would watch in terror as my mother would lay in bed barely able to move. I held her hand, wiped her forehead, with a cool wet towel, and longed she would get all better. Being the oldest in the

At only nineteen years old I have been through a lot in life. So much to the point that most people soon realize why I give my all in everything that I do.one thing that will forever stick with me is being homeless as a kid at a young age. Growing up in Mobile, Alabama I grew up with my mother and four siblings. I was next to the youngest out of five kids. My mother had a job at USA medical center where she had worked since she was 21 years old. My mother worked with the house keeping service as basically a janitor. My mother worked six days a week as much as she could to ensure we at least got to school. Even though mom worked so hard sometimes ends were just not met. Some nights she would go to bed hungry so that my siblings and I would have something to eat. Well one day mom came home from a long day’s work to a letter that stated that basically we had a nine days to get our stuff and leave because we were being evicted for not having the money to pay rent. We didn’t have anywhere to go, we couldn’t even afford to go anywhere. This was the first time I had ever seen my mother break down and just cry her eyes out. I didn’t realize at that moment what was going on. Four to five days had passed by with no luck at all. Then by the grace of god we got a phone call from an organization known as family promise. Family promise basically assists with families who are at risk of becoming homeless. They had called after someone had let them know our situation. So we arranged to stay

As a senior, I have experienced many obstacles along the road. I come from a family of five kids where I am the middle child along with my twin sister. Fortunately, I live with both of my parents. However, my parents were not given the opportunity to an education, and because of that, I have experienced the meaning of poverty. My parents come from families who worked for a living, regardless of whether their job consisted of picking onion, strawberries or cutting mangoes.

When I was just 6 months old, my parents left me with my grandparents in India to pursue the "Indian" American dream. I soon realized I would need to "grow up" quicker since my grandparents were old and couldn't expend all of their energy taking care of me. When I was 11, I was fortunate enough to reunite with my parents. Although I was grateful for this, I wasn't able to fully embrace them. My parents quickly found out I wasn't excited with ordinary kid activities, so they started taking me with them to our gas station in the summers. By going to the gas station with my mom in the morning at 5 AM in the struggling town of Crenshaw, MS, I was able to kindle a strong relationship with my mom and learn valuable life lessons in the process. The first year, I learned how to greet people when they were ready to check out; I noticed there

Throughout my life I have gone through more destitution than numerous people expect a teenager to go through. I have gained confidence and an independent spirit from the hardships I have experienced. The rejection I have experienced from my family is the obstacle bearing the greatest impact on my life. After my family left the Amish, we faced rejection and were shunned by the rest of the family. To this day, sixteen years later, this shunning is still occurring. I have not met or even seen most of my extended family as a result of this punishment. While this hardship has caused much suffering, it has also brought out strengths in myself I did not know I had.

My name is Alejandra Cervantes, a student from Brazosport College, who is enrolled in your Learning Framework class. Which I assist every Monday and Wednesday at 9:30 in the morning.

For years, I convinced myself that the story of my life began when I arrived in America at eleven months old. I tumbled through the clichéd white-picket-fence childhood, never realizing how impossible it was to completely discard the first year of my infancy. While I had always known about being adopted from China, I did not fully comprehend the weight of this detail until my late teenage years.

As the sun begins to set and a tiring darkness fills the house, I realize it is that time of day for me to call my parents. I am in a unique situation where I live with my oldest brother in Washington while my parents live in Arizona. A major portion of my young life had been in Arizona; I was born and raised there and had lived in the same house for the first sixteen years of my life. When I think of Arizona, I think of home. In order for a location to be acknowledged by the term “home”, it must be a place that has a great deal of sentimental value. To this day, although I currently live in a house in Washington and I recognize this house as my permanent residence, I will always consider Arizona to be my home.

For the first 13 years of my life I was the prototypical Christian child. I sat quietly in church listening carefully to everything the pastor said, trying hard to follow the guidelines set by my family and the bible, even if it was hard for me to believe what I was being told. Not even knowing what any of it really meant, I went on following anything and everything my ears caught. Blinded by my own fears of burning in a fiery pit for all eternity, I became very apprehensive about what I really wanted. Those fears caused me to keep feelings in that I desperately wanted to let out. The only problem was I couldn’t let them out because that wouldn’t be the Christian thing to do. I was to be a good Christian boy that followed the bible and not

These last two years have been the most incredible years of my life. My perspective of the world has drastically shifted in a positive direction the day someone stepped into my life. This special individual shaped me into a remarkably better person. She is my best friend, girlfriend, and soul mate, Jacqueline. The relationship I have with this woman is like no other and I am madly in love with her. Jackie is beyond perfect for me and holds every feature I desire in a woman. To name a few significant qualities, she is beautiful, funny, intelligent, loving, and supportive. Many people think I am too young to know what true love is or even claim that twenty-four months is not long enough to know for sure she is the one for me. I tend to