Hello, my name is Chloe and since my mother
died, I was forced to change foster families a few times, and honestly, those were a tough
couple of years. My Mom was a nice person when she wasn’t
drinking. The problem was that she was drinking almost
all the time. Honestly, everyone in our family hated her
and didn’t want to have anything to do with her because she was always asking for money
and causing problems for everyone. So we had almost zero contact with anyone
else. When I was 14, she went into the hospital,
and, well... she died. I couldn’t believe it and I was in, like,
a haze, so it was hard to understand what to do next. At first, they wanted me to move to my grandfather's
house, but he said he never wanted anything to do with my Mother or me. He didn’t even come to the funeral. Almost no one did, in fact. It was only me and her brother’s family. He had a wife and a daughter, a year younger
than me. Nobody even talked... and I felt so alone. The family of my uncle decided to take me
in, although honestly, they really didn’t want to. I didn’t want to either, because I knew
they secretly hated me and my Mom. They had all these rules for me, that they
never had with their own daughter. We shared a room and she would get angry if
I touched her stuff, although I needed some of it. For example, once, I really needed socks because
each pair I had was old and had holes, so I borrowed hers and I didn’t have time to
ask because I was late. Later, she told her parents that I was stealing
her stuff and they got angry at me, even though I tried to explain myself. I didn’t want to spend time “at home,”
so I would stay out late into the night, and when I would come home my uncle would be angry
at me and then they would let me do even less. I basically could only eat and sleep in their
house. I didn’t even have enough clothing to go
anywhere. They would sometimes have a family dinner
and I wasn’t even invited, so instead I would eat alone in my room. It wasn’t like they were openly against
me being with them, but secretly they were. The only thing that helped was my friends
from other cities, you know, we talked through Facebook. They would really help me when I was feeling
down or when I wanted to cry, which was almost always. Because the conditions were bad in the house
and they didn't have enough money to take care of me, soon I was put into foster care. Suddenly, I was living in a completely different
house, with a completely different family, and it was even crazier. These two, Mr. and Mrs. Collins, had two other
foster children, and they were kinda nervous and aggressive, they would look at me like
I was their enemy and we never talked. At the same time, the Collins's would shout
at each other ALL THE TIME, like they shouted more than they talked. They were constantly arguing and I was wondering
how people like them could become foster parents. They probably did it for the money, because
they didn’t provide us with anything more than food. They were strict, too. They even took our phones away, so I lost
all of my online friends as well. They only allowed us to use the fridge until
certain time of day, so if we got hungry, we had to just deal with it. But we didn’t, and that was how my friendship
with my new foster siblings began. One evening Dylan, a boy who was living with
us, got grounded and they wouldn’t let him eat for half a day or something. Dylan was laying in his bed, and he was so
hungry he couldn’t move. So I asked another boy, Andrew, about sneaking
into the kitchen and getting Dylan some food. Andrew agreed and it was the first time he'd
ever talked to me. Andrew stayed on the lookout while I veeery
slowly opened the fridge and took a little bit of food for Dylan. A few pieces of bread, cheese, and sausages
so the Collins's wouldn't notice. I closed the door without making a sound and
then Andrew gestured to me that I should hide. We both hid under the table, and our foster
father came into the kitchen to grab a bite. Our hearts were pounding! Finally, he was gone and we slowly and quietly
returned to our room and gave Dylan food. He was extremely thankful and this changed
everything. After that, all of us became friends and we
would stand up for each other. One day, Andrew was grounded and it was his
turn to be hungry during the evening. This time, Dylan and I snuck into the kitchen. Dylan accidentally hit a chair with his foot
and our foster parents came looking to see what was going on. Dylan hid under the table, but I couldn’t
manage to do it in time. Mr. Collins caught me, shouted at me for an
hour, and locked me in my room for the entire next day. Now even Dylan and Andrew couldn’t help
me. It really helped to finally have friends,
but it didn’t last long. Soon, we were relocated again. We promised to keep in touch with each other,
but it was so difficult and I was afraid I would never see or hear from them again. It was scary to relocate a third time, and
I couldn’t imagine what kind of horrors I would have to endure. I arrived at my next “home” to find a
single woman named Susan. I was afraid of her and wasn’t talking much,
and I felt I couldn’t trust her at first. She was understanding and she let me have
my phone and even to go out, but she had rules - I had a lot of chores around the house,
and I was doing them because I didn’t want to change homes again since it was so scary. Just having access to food and not being shouted
at every day felt really nice. Still, I would often misbehave and be rude
to her and sometimes even refuse to do my chores. But she kept on being nice to me no matter
what, so I started to trust her more. Susan warmed up to me and I warmed up to her. She was nice to me. She eventually told me that her son died a
few years ago and she wanted to spend time with children because she didn’t want to
be alone and because she had no other family. Susan honestly started to remind me of my
mother. Once, I accidentally called her “Mom”
and I thought she would get angry, but instead she smiled and hugged me. After a few months at her home I tried to
find Dylan or Andrew on Facebook. I found Andrew and I was so happy. I asked him whether he knows anything about
Dylan, but sadly he didn’t. I continued to live with this lady for a year
and I honestly love her very much. She wanted to take more kids in, but she wouldn’t
have been able to care for them. And then Susan said something beautiful to
me. She asked if I wanted her to adopt me and
I said “yes,” without hesitation. She had one condition, though. She asked me to start studying harder so I
could have a better future and maybe help her when she was too old to take care of herself. Of course I agreed, because it was nice that
someone finally believed in me. After all of this, I decided to become a social
worker once I got older. Honestly, I had it much better than most children
in foster care, and I want to help them as much as I possibly can. I’m grateful that you listened to my story
and I want to ask you to share it with your friends because thousands of children are
suffering and there are always small things we can do for them.
