I'm a mother of four beautiful daughts their ages are 18, 16, 15, and 12, three still in hight school and the youngest in middle school, before I started having children I lived a very destructive life with no sense of responsability nor a hope for a bright future having come from a home with an abusive alcholic mother I vowed if I ever had children I would be the best mom I could be. At the age of eight years old I diagnose with having a rare eye condicition called "Retinitis Pigmentosa" a night blindness which is passed down by (skips) generations, and the older I get the worser it gets and will eventually lead to blindness. After having my first child my life was still in such termoral, then I had my second daughter and life still wasn't going as I had once dreamed, then one day my dad who was dealing with his own demons came to my house one day and said all he wanted for me was to have the life that comes with having the faith in the Lord, and on this day I promised my dad I would get my life together so I can be as good of a mom to my girls as he has been a dad to me, that was the last time I saw my dad; I hadn't seen my dad for two weeks since we lived in the same apartment complex I had the rental office let me into his apartment and I found him dead. I had lost my only support, my backbone, and my only stable parent. All I could remember after that was the last conversation I had with my farther and the promise I made to him, but you know what they say it gets worst before it get better and all I could do is pray to the Lord and look at my daughters and feel the love and be thankful what he has blessed me with and found the strength to hold on to my faith. The Lord soon after brought me through all the pain and my hope was restored and I sit here today writing this essay fifthteen years clean and sober. Even though you clean up all the mess from your pass (life deals you all kinds of hands and it's up to you how you play it out) I've been married for severn years and I'm now seperated and living off my disability and working part time from home maybe 15-20 hrs a week. I'm struggling to pay my bills and support my daughters I don't even know where I'm going to get the money for school supplies and cloths, I've been trying to give each of them $40 a month from my disabilty check and buy food with the money I earn from my part time job which is still not enough to last a whole month I always run out of food and always have to try to borrown money until the third of the month. I've been to the state for assistance and only quailify for food stamps ($90) and medical assistance for the kids. About a month ago I notice a change in my vision and went to the eye doctor and found out the progression of my condiction is worsening, but in spite of it all, the things that keep me going are my faith in the Lord and my love for my four blessing in my life today which is the thing that keeps me grounded and blessed.
S. Pam Gordon