I was raised by my grandmother. My mom, she passed away when I was a toddler. She overdosed on cocaine and heroin. My grandmother raised me and five of my siblings. She was honorably discharged from the Navy and just took on me my brothers and sisters by herself and she did a pretty good job. She raised us in the church – it was good but then I got put into foster care a few times. The first time was because she had an asthma attack and we were young and they really had no other options because she was in the hospital and there was no one else to take care of us.
But, I don’t know, I was just a teenager and I was looking for love in the wrong places and I fell in love with my daughter’s father and I was with him for about three years before I got pregnant. So I was with him all through high school. The first five years of her life I was working – I had a job and I did everything that I needed to do.
I ended up moving to Las Vegas because it got too expensive in California. My grandmother had passed a couple years back. With her passing in July 2014 – that really shook everything up. Life was not the same any more, not having her support there was really hard. So I called a friend of mine – I’ve known him since high school. I’ve know him for a long time, I believed I could trust him. He said I could come stay with him, so I did that. I went with him – me and my daughter. And not long after that he said that nothing is for free that you can’t live here for free you’re going to have to do something. And so my options were to either be out on the street or to do it, which was to go sell myself.
So he trafficked me.
We would spend about a week to see how the money was rolling in, and if he was okay with it the trafficking would continue. And if he wasn’t okay with it then we would leave and find something new.
So then we finally ended up coming to Arizona and then that was okay. At first we went back to San Diego and came back to Arizona again. And then the second time we arrived in Arizona I was rescued out of Human Trafficking. I was out there on 27th Avenue and a few detectives were you know questioning me asking me my name. I didn’t share that, of course, and everything that like – my phone number, who I was with, and all that stuff. So I couldn’t really say that at the time but I ended up giving the detective my actual cell phone number. Not the cell phone number that my Human Trafficker would use.
And she ended up tracking me where I was at. So we were going to leave to Flagstaff and so I called her when I was going to go turn the key in at the room and she said, Thank you for calling me – pretty much because she didn’t expect me to call and I said, Yeah. I was like who are you? And she said, I’m across the street. And I was like, Oh my God! What are you doing across the street? And she’s like, well you gave me your phone number for a reason and you know after that it just went up from there.
I was a little hesitant because I didn’t know who she was and I’m not from Arizona and I didn’t know anyone. So it’s just like, Okay, he’s the only person that I know and then I have people saying they’re going to help me when I had that before, I’ve had people say that they’re going to help me when they never do you know. So it was kind of a trust thing and I was a little hesitant but I ended up just kind of just going with it. I honestly knew that that’s not where I wanted to be in life. I knew that that’s not where my heart was. So I would just pray every single day – God, I know you hear me; you know my heart, you know my mind, you know who I am and this is not who I am. And I said, if You can just make a way… any way… I will leave and He did.
I’d be lying if I said it was the most amazing thing that I’ve ever seen in my life… Coming to the Phoenix Dream Center. Well, it was kind of in a way. Like my room was amazing. Konstance was so energetic. It was awesome, so awesome. But you know, it was little overwhelming. I would say that, as far as my room and the support that I received here was amazing.
I ended up finding a safe place for my daughter and that was perfect for me so that I could finish off the program. I just got continue my Education with my GED today so I will be graduating with my cap and gown tomorrow. Also, I got a job so that’s cool. And I signed up for college today, so i can further my Education, starting in the medical field. I’ll be a medical specialist – I’m going for my associate’s degree so that’s amazing. I’m really excited about that – I’m really passionate about the medical field.
So I’m just so happy. But I care for a lot of these Survivors – you never really realize that people care. People will put in the work because they want to see a change – they want to see a difference and with these rooms and everything that they put into it, like, it motivates you because you’re like, I get to go back to my room. I get to take my shower and lay in a comfortable bed. It’s crazy. It’s so pretty but it’s amazing and I want to just say thank you to the Phoenix Dream Center.
I would have never made it out of Human Trafficking with out the support from the Dream Center!