WITHOUT A HOME, TEEN PERSEVERES

Since she was 17, Iesha often attended school without knowing where she would go afterward. Kicked out of her foster home, she found shelter wherever she could, usually with relatives.

“In one school year I probably lived with about seven different people, seven different households, different rules, different everything,” she said.

A counselor at her IPS high school referred her to Outreach, which linked her to a case manager, Renee Bacon. “She is really nice. She’s like another mother because she kind of does stuff that I wish my mama did,” Iesha said. “Let’s say I’m feeling real down.  I can call her and she can just make my day.  She really helps me a lot. I wouldn’t be this far if she hadn’t stepped in my life.”

Now 19, Iesha is living with her boyfriend and planning to attend Ivy Tech in the fall.

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“If I wasn’t homeless, things would be a lot better. Like every situation that I’m in would be a lot better, like a lot better.

"One time I got put out like early in the morning, like 3:00 in the morning.  I sat there and I cried because there was nothing for me to do. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t just call somebody,  ‘I just got put out. Can I come live with you?’

“If I got put out one night, the next morning I get up and go to school. But then like I’m in school all day thinking, ‘Where am I gonna go? What I’m gonna do? Where I’m gonna put all my stuff at when I get out of school? How am I gonna transport all my stuff from this place to that place?’

“Earlier this year and last year, it was really hard for me to get to school, so I missed a lot of school.  But like after a while they understood what was going on so everything was clear.

“I really don’t own too much.  Like there’s nothing that I value. There’s nothing that I carry that’s valuable, nothing but my identity, that’s about it.

“If  I eat one day and I don’t eat a couple of days, I’m so used to not eating and my stomach hurting, that when my stomach does hurt, I don’t know if I’m hungry or if my stomach is just hurting. Sometimes I just wouldn’t have an appetite just ‘cause I probably hadn’t ate in so long.

“If I had one wish granted to me, I would wish that my mom could’ve been a better mother or at least try, even if she didn’t have the mother experience. Try to be the mother that I always wanted her to be.

“Stories that I hear from like other family members, my mom probably used to walk the streets with us. As young kids, we done been through like foster homes and other people’s homes and all that, from person to person, living with other people.

“Throughout everything I’ve been through, I never decided ‘Now I’m about to drop out.’  It was nothing like that. I just felt like whatever I go through, it just makes me stronger. It makes me want to go to school and graduate.

“School is my Number One priority. I’m gonna push myself ‘cause I refuse to fail.  I refuse to be a failure. Out of five kids, I’m a middle girl, and I’m the only one still in school about to graduate.

“I plan to go to a four-year university and major in medical office specialist or radiology. I just hope that I go where I want to go in life.  Like I hope my future turns out to be what I want it to be, and eventually everything works out for the best.”

Copyright 2011 Y-Press