Words From The Heart

This I believe

This I Believe Essay

I believe that life gets better, wounds heal, and scars fade. It's sort of like a balance; where there's light, you can always find darkness, and where there's darkness, you can always find light.

For the first six years of my life, I lived in a dirty, two-bedroom apartment with my parents. There were times when I was locked in my own room while my parents were out somewhere doing any and all drugs you can think of with some of the worst people that I've ever known. They were in and out of jail most of the time; sometimes I'd be left with my mom's mom, and other times I'd be left with some of my parents' friends. When my baby brother was born, I had to fend for the both of us with help from my grandma, but even then there was no money to live off of and sometimes we didn't know where our next meal would come from. Eventually, Children's Protective Services came and finally saw my parents unfit to take care of me and my baby brother. We would have been put up for adoption if it hadn't been for my dad's parents who took us in. Years passed, and I eventually realized that every promise my mom made to sober up and come around would never happen. My little brother died at the age of 5 in a car accident. When I was around ten, my dad died in an explosion trying to make meth. Six years after that, today, my mom is in jail on charges of stealing prescription drugs on multiple occasions.

As you can see, I wasn't exactly used to having something constant in my life, but that's not to say that my childhood was all bad; when I was with my parents, I specifically remember, as most children do, falling down and starting to cry hysterically. While I was doing so, my dad sat down in front of me, folded his hands in his lap, and smiled. With every single tear that fell down my cheek, he'd count each of them one by one in silly voices until I was laughing again. There was a balance between a bad situation and good memories I'll never forget. There'll always be a balance.

Once I got a bit older, after my father died, I struggled with blaming myself. I really thought that I could've tried harder, that I could've done something to make him stay the night he left. It wasn't until two years ago that I realized it wasn't my fault. I couldn't do anything other than beg him to stay when he came to the house asking for money from his parents, and I did beg him to stay. Every single time. He never did.

We don't ever talk about what happened, so I'm not exactly sure how this affects my half-brothers or my grandparents or my father's siblings, however, I do know that it gets better with each day for me. I've got friends now, people who'd listen if I chose to tell them about what happened to me. My grandparents give me the parent figures I didn't have growing up, and I love them just as I would if they were my real ones.

Where there was a really bad situation, good things came out of it to balance it out, like light in darkness and darkness in light. For me, I think the key thing to change is to be open for something good in life, rather than blaming ourselves or even blaming others. It's better to forgive, but not to forget. Life does get better, and there is a balance between good and evil, we just have to find it.