My AutoBio, Written in College

I was born on August 26, 1982 at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. My mother’s water broke at 10:00 a.m. that morning, but I was not ready to come out until 11:00 p.m. and many complications later. I am the first child in my family as my mother and father were married less than a year before I was born. I was seven pounds and one ounce and 19 inches long. Mom says that once I was born my father was very much affected and re-evaluated many of his priorities.

My mother had many health problems and did not work outside the home, so I had her all to myself. Just after I was eight months old, I began to walk with help and then took my first steps two months later all by myself. At eleven months I say my first words: “Da-da,” soon followed by “Ma-ma.” I loved playing with our family dog, Wendy, and my first birthday was complete with cake all over my face and body.

My mother says I was a very easygoing child: I would go to bed when told, listen when told, and was very amiable. There were only two distinct things that I would absolutely refuses and throw temper tantrums about. One was drinking powdered milk, and the other was wearing the color brown. Mom said it was easy to potty train me.

I was a quiet and shy child growing up. I was very imaginative and playful, and felt very free around my home, but more frightened outside my home. My favorite playmate was the family dog, Wendy, who I would dress up in my clothes. I loved to sing, and could catch tunes very quickly. I loved to create forts. My mother took on my education at home, and my kindergarten year (I was 5) was stressful because we both had to learn and adjust to the other’s learning style.

With school, I also started activities such as swimming, gymnastics, and piano. I was close friends with the Fletchers, who had two daughters my age and a son a few years younger. My mother had great expectations for me, and I remember one day feeling truly horrible because I could not get a picture just how I wanted it. Exasperated, a friend of the family called and told me it was all right as it was. This seemed to solve my perfectionist problem, then and always.

My sister was born when I was six. This and my mother’s added health problems left me playing a lot with my sister and on my own for completing school assignments. I became self-regulated since there was no one telling me what to do, and was creative with what we had.

Style was important to me, at least my own version of it. At one stage, I would not leave the house without wearing two belts. Another time I had to have elastic at the bottom of my pants. I tried to do the 80’s frizzy hair, but my hair refused to comply, and my pictures show only a slick little lump of bangs instead of the five-inch high ones I desired.

Around peers that I knew well I was open and outgoing, but in larger groups I instantly became quiet and reserved. I gave my best friend a “best friend” necklace and she replied that I was not her best friend. After that, I began to be good friends will everyone, but not focused in on one close friendship.

I was never in the popular group and often wondered if this meant there was something wrong with me. I had glasses and was not self-conscious about them until someone called me “four eyes.” I tried to imitate what was cool, but found that I failed miserably and it took to much work to try to fake.

I started to do a lot more thinking as I got older, and became a lot more hesitant and reserved. I remember going over and over things that happened in my life and turning them and thinking what else could have been or should have been. I would not do something unless I was asked to if it involved being in the public eye. I wanted to see what everyone else thought and did before I would do it.

At 13, I began to take voice lessons. My achievement in those lessons helped me to be more open and outgoing in other areas. I figured that if I could do one thing well, then perhaps I could do other things if I tried. I wanted to be adventurous, and went bungee jumping with a friend. At 14 and as a freshman, I found more acceptance with my peers than before. Getting contacts instead of glasses made me feel much better about myself, and the change in how others responded to me impacted the idea that I was only pretty if I put some effort into how I looked.

To the end of my sophomore year, I began to feel some internal changes. Although I was friends with everyone, inside I was lonely and never really felt included. At home, my father made some changes in his life, really practicing all the things we had learned about in church. We began having family devotions together, and my father took an active role in having a closer relationship with me.

I wanted to please my family, but I wanted to do anything it took to fill the loneliness that I felt with my friends. I tried to dress like them, talk like them, listen to their music, but I just felt like I was different. That summer (1999) I went to Brasil for a short-term mission’s trip. Coming back from that made me feel even more out of place with life in general. I did not see how I fit into anything.

During that year I came to the conclusion that it was all right to be different. I gave up trying to fit in and was still friends with everyone, but that was not my source of fulfillment. Instead, I began a deeper relationship with my heavenly Father. I had professed Christianity since I was 7, but it did not become real to me until this time.

My junior year I began working at an alternative school in the mornings (I was home schooled and did my work in the afternoon). I was in charge of character training for the 4-8 year olds, and then tutoring with the 4-13 year olds. It was an inner city setting, and I walked into a completely different world and culture than my own.

I got to know the older kids and they seemed to always wonder about my standards and beliefs. Through their questions, I discovered where I stood on issues like God, dating, clothes, music, and so on. Suddenly my parents were not there to tell me the right answer, and I had to come up with it on my own. I was building my own identity, and sometimes it surprised me.

I graduated when I was 17 not knowing what I wanted to do, but knowing I would enjoy learning whatever came my way. What came was a car crash as I ran into a parked car. Out of that came my decision to live with my elderly grandparents that fall, something I will never regret as they have now passed on. The time with them was very quiet, as they were older and lived alone on a farm. I had a chance to reflect on life and set my own schedule and daily disciplines since I was not under parental authority.

The next year (2001) I spent getting training and then working at a home for juvenile delinquents. It was the hardest year of my life, but the best. During this year I really gained a sense of what I wanted to do in life: help underprivileged and hurting youth. I saw that I had been given so much in life—and a loving home—and now I needed to learn how to give to others. I also found purpose, fulfillment, and complete satisfaction in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Love relationships have always been different for me. When I was younger I was too shy to talk to guys, or only saw them as friends. Growing up, I did not purposefully “fall in love” but found that I would wander into one “emotional attachment” after. I didn’t date much. Instead, I had closer friendships where one or both of us were attracted to the other, but nothing came of it for one reason or another.

After the juvenile delinquent home, I began to work at Good News Ministries Youth Center, an after school program for children 8-18 that serves dinner, helps with homework and tutoring, gives a Bible study, and assists the children physically, mentally, and spiritually. I finished my associates of art degree in Child and Youth Character Development with internet classes through TELOS, and then started taking classes at Crossroads Bible College.

In 2004 I had an internship in Brazil for three months and began taking classes at Ivy Tech Community College. I continued taking classes, receiving my Associates degree in Early Childhood Education. I also continued going to Brazil, teaching English as a Foreign Language at an International school and learning Portuguese.

By 2008 I realized that I wanted to stay in Brazil longer, so received a student visa by beginning college in Portuguese, and continuing my dream of working with street children through the Living Stones program. 2010 I took a year off to graduate from IUPUI with a Bachelor’s degree in General Studies and to spend time with my family and my new nephew.

This year I am back in Brazil (with a summer trip home and to Hong Kong), working as coordinator of Living Stones, developing curriculum and raising awareness for the program. My goal is to help start/assist 10 Living Stones programs in 10 towns in the next 10 years.

I am investing in the next generation today by working with youth. My role will change with marriage, children, and time, but the basic idea of what I plan to do with my life will stay the same, whether with working in my own family, with my own children and grandchildren, strangers, inner city children, or youth in Brasil. My life purpose is to serve, assist, influence, and encourage seeking young people through writing, teaching, and counseling for the reason of them surrendering their life and each day to all God has for them.

I sincerely hope that this purpose will not change, no matter how old I get. I want to be one of those sweet little old grandmas that can get away with anything because everyone loves her and they know that she loves them. I don’t intend on ever retiring. There are too many people out there to love—and so little time.

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