Nancy, 28 – Abused and Homeless

“I’m very manipulating. No matter how chaos my life can be, I am always smiling.”    

The first time I met Nancy, she was working as a server at the same job as me. She would always yell “Happy Monday” to the customers. The rest of us workers would all smile awkwardly to the customers, we were not used to having someone so outgoing. Her wide smile would easily make ones Monday better. However, who could have guessed what was hiding behind that bright smile of hers.

“I remember getting my first hug from her [my mother] probably when I was 21. There was no nurture in her. So growing up it was hard for me because when people would give me hugs I would feel grossed out, because I wasn’t used to it.”

Most of Nancy’s childhood took place in Santa Barbara, California, together with five brothers and two sisters. Three fathers where involved however there were only one mother. 

“The first father, he beat her up. The second one, he got her pregnant and this other girl pregnant at the same time. So he was a cheater. And then, my dad molested my sister. So he went to prison.”

“One sad moment that I always look back at and never will forget is being 6 years old and being abused physically by my brother who was addicted to met[afin]. He would throw me like across the room or kick me in the stomach as a 6 years old. One time I remember going to my mom’s work. We lived kind of blocks away. So I walked there and I said ‘Mommy he’s hitting me again,’ and she looked at me with a blanked face and just said ‘Go home.’ I just remember walking home crying and thinking to myself, ‘I wanna run away’”

“I was fighting with my boyfriend at the time and I look at my phone, my brother had text and it just said ‘Mom died.’ I was so upset that he had text me and I didn’t get a phone call from  none of my five brothers and two sisters.”

Nancy’s mother died in a car accident in 2015.  

“I regret not taking school seriously. I was really just a bad girl. Also I didn’t have a role model to tell me school was important. I had no direction. Now that I’m 28, there is so much in the world that I don’t know and I just wish that I was still caught up in school. But I’m planning to go back [to college].”

“After high school I never had a stable home. I was living everywhere. I would live with friends and sometimes I would live with my sister. And currently I don’t have a home. I’m sleeping on a friend’s couch.”

“My sister is an angel. She loves helping people, she’s really outgoing. She just puts everybody first before herself no matter what she’s going through. She inspires me.”

Nancy’s ex-boyfriend for two years, recently left her for drugs. A decision she today is grateful for.

“The first year, it was great. He was sober, we were going to church every Sunday. We met at a homeless shelter. And than the second year… he went back to his choice of drugs and the second year of our relationship just went south. I was just taking care of him. Everyday I wasn’t working, I was just trying to make sure he ate. He liked living on the street when he was on drugs so sometime he would beg me to sleep with him on the street, and I would.”

“The happiest moment in my life would be when I was working two jobs. I didn’t have to think about my life. I didn’t had to think about anything that stressed me out, I was just really busy working.”

“My biggest goal would be living in a home. Hopefully having kids and making sure that they live comfortable. Seeing them grow, seeing them happy and give them life.”