Chapter 9 : Looking For Me

At 18, independence was all I thought I wanted.

I was tired of depending on people.

Tired of being controlled.

Tired of feeling like my life belonged to everyone except me.

I wanted freedom.

My own money.

My own place.

My own decisions.

And after becoming a mother, those feelings only grew stronger.

When I looked at my son, I knew I wanted more than survival. I wanted stability. I wanted a future. I wanted to give him everything I never had growing up.

What I didn’t understand was that freedom comes with a price.

And sometimes that price is heavier than you expect. Leaving my son’s father wasn’t the hard part. The hard part was leaving my son behind while I chased a life I thought would eventually bring us both something better.

Every day I told myself it was temporary.

Every day I promised myself I was doing it for him.

But every night, when things got quiet, I felt the weight of those choices.

The streets gave me money.

But they took time.

They took peace.

They took relationships.

And little by little, they took pieces of me.

Back then, I thought being independent meant never needing anyone. I thought strength meant carrying everything by myself. What I didn’t realize was that even the strongest people can break when they carry too much alone. But what nobody tells you is what the game takes from you when you in these streets there are no mentors  it’s your mind vs everybody.

The trauma.

The depression.

The anxiety.

The low self-esteem.

The constant need to stay alert.

Doing Drugs to feel numb.

You have to become strong just to survive it.

And sometimes that strength comes at the cost of your peace.

I had spent too much of my life being controlled by other people.

I wanted control over myself.

Even though I stayed independent, I learned from every person I encountered.

I learned the cities.

The states.

The websites.

The hotels.

The hustle.

The dangers.

It felt like I was collecting pieces of a blueprint.

One night, While working I got caught up in my first adult sting operation.

For the first time as an adult, I found myself sitting in Santa Rita Jail on a misdemeanor charge. Reality was starting to catch up with me. And for the first time in a long time, I realized I couldn’t keep running forever. But somewhere along the way, I started asking myself a question I had been avoiding:

If freedom costs you your peace, your relationships, and pieces of yourself…

Is it really freedom at all?

For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t chasing excitement.

I wasn’t chasing money.

I wasn’t chasing anybody.

I was tired.

Tired of running.

Tired of looking over my shoulder.

Tired of carrying everything alone.

But life has a funny way of showing up when you think you’ve finally found a moment to breathe.

Looking back, I should have known peace wasn’t going to last.

Not for me.

Not yet.

The streets had a way of pulling people back in.

Old faces started popping back up.

Old opportunities.

Old temptations.

And with every phone call, every knock at the door, every familiar face, I could feel myself standing at another crossroads.

Part of me wanted to go home.

Part of me wanted to be the mother my son deserved.

Part of me still believed one more move, one more hustle, one more opportunity would finally get me where I wanted to be.

I didn’t know it then, but one decision was about to change everything.

A decision that would take me farther than I had ever been before.

Farther from home.

Farther from the little girl I used to be.

And closer to a reality I wasn’t prepared for.

As I stared at my phone that night, listening to the voice on the other end make an offer that sounded too good to pass up, I had no idea that saying “yes” would become one of the most important decisions of my life.

And by morning…

Nothing would be the same.