Victims are often lured by a friend or an acquaintance at the direction of a trafficker.
WHILE EACH OF THE five stories in this book gives a unique picture of the recruitment process, they have one common denominator— every survivor was lured by someone he or she knew. It is common for victims to be lured by a friend or acquaintance, with large numbers being recruited by same-sex peers at the direction of a trafficker.1
“We are finding that in 60 to 70 percent of cases, the victim knows the person who is trafficking them.”
—Minneapolis police Sgt. Grant Snyder2
“Skip parties” are common recruiting grounds for teenagers. “Skips,” a term coined by kids, are parties held during school hours in which youth are encouraged to skip school and bring a friend. Drugs and alcohol are provided freely, with the expectation that a girl will offer herself for sex at the party. If she declines, she can suffer gang rape and beating. The sexual encounters are typically visually recorded and used for blackmail purposes to keep the child from reporting the incident.3
Not only are teens recruiting their peers, but there is a growing trend of teenagers actually becoming traffickers. Law enforcement agencies are seeing pimps get started between the ages of eighteen and twenty, with some as young as sixteen. One study shows that the average age of men and women who begin pimping in Chicago is twenty-two, and they will stay in the “exploitation game” an average of fifteen years.4
“Kids are picking up kids and pimping them.”
—New York City officer5
Traffickers, much like pedophiles, frequent locations where kids hang out in an effort to recruit them. The top-five recruitment sites are malls, bus stops, parks, playgrounds, and schools.6 Other common locations are hallways of court buildings, fast-food restaurants, truck stops, youth shelters, and detention centers. A trafficker will often pay girls and boys a recruiting fee for luring unsuspecting kids out of youth shelters and into his hands.7
“A former Hopkins High School senior pleaded guilty Friday to prostituting one of her cheerleading teammates—a sixteen-year-old girl.’8
“Law enforcement officials across the United States have identified online sex ads as the number-one platform for the buying and selling of sex with children and young women.”9 Internet sites generated more than $45 million from sex ads from June 2012 to May 2013. Some of the popular technology platforms for recruiting youth are Facebook, Backpage, Eros, CityVibe, Myredbook, SmugMug, Instagram, Vine, and most other forms of social media that have an interactive property.10 The Internet is, regrettably, a very effective tool for both traffickers and child predators. It provides a significant measure of anonymity to advertise, schedule, and purchase sexual encounters with minors.11 One of the greatest challenges for law enforcement is identifying and locating victims solicited online. Traffickers use fictitious names, ages, and pictures of children to ensure they cannot be identified easily. “Ads that appear to be posted by an individual who is independently in the sex trade are often created by, or under the direction of, traffickers. As shown in Kate’s story, traffickers often disguise themselves as the person in the ad when communicating with johns via the Internet, texts, or phone calls.”12
“I was first forced into prostitution when I was eleven years old by a twenty-eight-year-old man. I am not an exception. The man who trafficked me sold so many girls my age, his house was called ‘Daddy Day Care.’ All day, other girls and I sat with our laptops, posting pictures and answering ads on Craigslist. He made $1,500 a night selling my body, dragging me to Los Angeles, Houston, Little Rock—and one trip to Las Vegas in the trunk of a car. I am seventeen now, and my childhood memories aren’t of my family, going to middle school, or dancing at the prom. They are of making my own arrangements on Craigslist to be sold for sex and answering as many ads as possible for fear of beatings and ice-water baths.”
—An openletter from M. C. to Craigslist13
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 grants Internet providers a measure of immunity from liability against child sex trafficking. The legislation states, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”
This legislation allows Internet providers to determine, voluntarily, the level of commitment they give to protecting America’s children from sexual exploitation. Many advocates and government agencies are trying to pass legislation requiring Internet companies to impose an age-verification obligation on anyone who publishes online ads of a sexual nature.
“The court upheld immunity for a social networking site from negligence and gross negligence liability for failing to institute safety measures to protect minors—and failure to institute policies relating to age verification.”
—Doe v. MySpace, 200814
“The list of groups involved in prostitution reads like a who’s who of organized gang activity in the United States: the Bloods, Crips, Folk, Gangster Disciples, Latin Kings, MS-13, Starz Up, Sur-13, and Hells Angels.”
—Attiyya Anthony, Journalist, crime reporter15
Gangs are expanding their activities to include child sex trafficking as a new source of income. Some gangs are diversifying their income by reducing or eliminating drug trafficking activities in favor of child prostitution, believing it is less risky to prostitute girls than deal drugs.16 Girls who join male-dominated gangs are at high risk for sexual exploitation. They are often required to complete an initiation process called “sexing in,” whereby they must provide sexual services for one or more of the established gang members.17
“Once there, the victims were instructed to walk through apartment complexes, going door-to-door to solicit customers while accompanied by a male bodyguard from the gang. The going rate for victims’ services typically was thirty dollars to forty dollars for fifteen minutes of sex, and each victim often had sex with multiple men in one night (usually about five to ten customers) and over the course of multiple weekdays or weekends (including as much as seven days a week).”
—Court transcript, US v. Michael Tavon Jeffries18
“These walls are funny. First you hate ’em, then you get used to ’em. Enough time passes, you get so you depend on them.”
—Quote from The Shawshank Redemption19
The process of “grooming” or “seasoning” is the systematic destruction of a girl’s will, independence, and identity. Its primary aim is to control her both physically and emotionally through a combination of physical, mental, and emotional abuses. Grooming can include any or all of these abuses:20
• Beating: With hands, feet, or objects
• Burning: Branding, cigarettes, lighters, or blowtorches
• Sexual assault: Rape or gang rape
• Confinement: Being locked in closets, trunks, or other tight spaces
• Deprivation: Of food, sleep, or even the ability to urinate/defecate without permission
• Emotional abuse: Verbal threats or brainwashing
• Isolation: Relocation, separation from family and friends
• Renaming: Giving the woman an online name or a stage name or calling her “bitch”
Several years ago, I spent time with a young woman who for many years had been called only “bitch” by her pimp and the other girls. She had grown so accustomed to the moniker that when she was free from exploitation, it took her a while to respond when someone called her by her given name. During her time of captivity she had lost a significant part of her identity, her name.
The longer a victim is in the hands of a trafficker, the further she is removed from her true identity. It is especially important to rescue a trafficking victim within the first six to eight weeks of enslavement, known as the grooming period. During this short period of time, she likely will still be in a state of crisis and will not have bonded with her trafficker. If she can be rescued before trauma bonding sets in, her ability to cope and process the trauma will be significantly easier and quicker.21
“At first it was terrifying, and then you just kind of become numb to it.”
—Survivor22
The US Department of Justice indicates that traffickers accelerate the grooming process by introducing a child to various forms of pornography. She will be shown suggestive images, nudity, and progressively more graphic and violent sexual interactions. This process is to desensitize her to sexual activity between adults and children and to normalize deviant and violent sexual activities.23
Traffickers often tattoo or brand their victims to demonstrate ownership and control. The tattoo or brand typically will be located on the child’s neck, chest, back, legs, and sometimes the pubic area. Tattoos might be the trafficker’s name or nickname, money related symbols, sexually explicit designs, and/or slang from the sex industry.24
Barcode tattooed on trafficking victim. Spanish National Police
Brands are typically made from coat hangers formed into a symbol or ornamental pattern. The brand is then heated or put under extreme cold and pressed into the child’s skin to form a permanent scar.
“Taz, a sixteen-year-old girl here in New York City, told me that her pimp had branded three other girls with tattoos bearing his name. When she refused the tattoo, she said, he held her down and carved his name on her back with a safety pin.”
—Reported by Nicholas Kristof, journalist, The New York Times25
Pimps not only like to tattoo their victims, but also themselves, as a way to flaunt their power and control over others. Several years ago, I met a young pimp in front of a Target store. He had a large tattoo across his neck that read “MOB.” To his surprise, I walked up and asked him what it stood for. He smiled broadly and said, “Money over bitches.” I smiled back and said, “Well, when you meet the right girl, you’ll have to change that to BOM.” He gave me a surprised look and laughed. I walked on—there was nothing more to say, and certainly nothing I could prove.
“You charge him whatever you want to charge him; you ask if he’s police or a pimp. He’s gonna give you money, and then you’re gonna just do whatever he wants you to do real quick. It’s just a one-minute thing.”
—Romeo, pimp26
There is a “method to their madness.” Most pimps follow a relatively standard protocol within the pimping culture, as follows:27
• Most pimps manage only one to three girls at a time.
• Fifty percent of the pimps operate at a local level.
• One-quarter of the pimps are tied into citywide crime rings.
• About 15 percent of the pimps are tied into regional or nationwide networks.
• Ten percent of pimps in the United States are tied into international sex crime networks.
Typical rates in Ohio for street-level trafficking victims are as follows:
• Oral sex: $50
• Vaginal sex: $100
• Anal sex: $150
“Any man can kill, right? Any woman can be turned out.”
—Sir Captain, pimp28
Another common practice is the enforcement of a nightly quota. This is the amount of cash a girl must earn before she is allowed to return “home” for the night. A quota typically falls in the range of $500 to $1,000 a night. If the quota is not met, a girl could be beaten, forced to return to the street, or deprived of sleep and food as punishment. The quota is non-negotiable, and she is to secure that amount of cash by any means necessary.
A recent prostitution sting turned up a surprising new trend regarding quota requirements in Oakland, California. If a girl has not met her nightly quota, she might be forced to set up a john so her pimp can steal his wallet, money out of the ATM, and in some cases, even his car. Brazenly, these pimps then sell the stolen goods to other johns.29
“Polaris Project, a Washington, DC-based nonprofit working with victims of human trafficking, recently conducted an informal analysis of a pimp’s wages, based on direct client accounts. One teenage girl was forced to meet quotas of $500/night, seven days a week, and gave the money to her trafficker each night. This particular pimp also controlled three other women. Based on these numbers, Polaris Project estimates that the pimp made $632,000 in one year from four young women and girls.”30
The recruitment tactics of traffickers are as diverse as the traffickers themselves. There is no one method that works on every girl, every time. This is why pimps are forever “changing the game,” using the latest technology and incentives to lure the next generation of victims.
“‘You know what I just realized? All my life I have lived in chaos and drama. I was always fighting with somebody. I just realized now that I don’t live in chaos; I’m trying to create it. But really I can just go outside and read a book!’ I’m not sure if these words brought more joy to this fourteen-year old girl or to the staff in the group home she was living in. But that moment helped redefine ‘normal’ for this young lady. Over time she was able to allow herself to receive positive attention, began getting straight A’s in school, participated in the therapeutic process, and eventually reunified with her mother. She now gets to create new memories—ones that end much happier!”
—Melissa Hermann, executive director, Courage House
Samantha’s story reads like a “textbook” by most child exploitation standards. She had a history of sexual abuse, was “set up” by a friend, and became addicted to alcohol and drugs to cope with the pain. What is unusual about Samantha’s story is that she returned to the “life”—after being rescued.
For several years, Samantha has been a powerful spokesperson in the fight against child sexual exploitation. While this season of “speaking out” has been important for her healing process, Samantha has decided that this book will be the last time she shares her testimony for a while. She sees this book as a final chapter in her life as an “out-front” advocate and is eager to embrace the next phase of her life as a “behind-the-scenes” champion.
“What about this one?” Karen spins around and out of her closet, wearing a pink Op T-shirt that shows off her stomach. It is the third top she has tried on, and it looks good. She always looks good.
“I like it!”
“OK, then I’m done. But what about you, Sam? We’ve got to get you lookin’ good for the high school guys,” she says as she pulls a couple of shirts from her closet. I pull off my polo and slip into the first choice from Karen’s pile. It’s perfect! I straighten out the wrinkles of the purple blouse in the mirror as I admire how the color looks against my olive skin, dark hair, and brown eyes.
“You look great, Sam. Now let’s get going. This is gonna be fun!” We scramble out the front door and into the backseat of her brother’s Grand Am.
Karen and I are best friends. We met a year ago in the cafeteria on the first day of school. She’s thirteen and a year ahead of me in the eighth grade, but we hit it right off and since then have been pretty much inseparable. Well, that is, except for the times when Momma catches us together and grounds me. Momma doesn’t like Karen one bit. She calls her and her family bad blood and tells me to stay away from her. In some ways, she’s right. Karen’s mom drinks so much she can’t hold a steady job, and her brothers are regularly getting in trouble with the cops. But with Momma working and Nolan, my stepdad, back in prison for another DUI, being at Karen’s is way better than being at home alone. Besides, I dropped off the swim team the year before when I was late to practice one too many times. Momma never seemed to be able to get me there on time. So while my other school friends are going out for track or doing after-school choir, I’m at Karen’s house hanging out with her brothers and whomever else happens to be around.
As we drive to the city, I roll down the window and let the wind blow through my hair. Karen’s twin brothers, John and Marcus, both high school seniors, got an invitation to a house party in Kansas City, and rumor had it there were gonna be all kinds of drugs. When she heard that, Karen convinced them to let us tag along.
Karen and I have been smoking pot together since we met. It’s part of our bond. We go out to the hill behind the school after class and smoke whatever we have. Karen is the main supplier, but she didn’t introduce me to it; I’d already been smoking with my sisters for a year or so. She’s just better at getting it.
John exits the freeway and turns into a neighborhood with tree-lined streets and nice-looking, two-story houses. He pulls up to a white house with blue trim. “This is it,” he says as he leans over the backseat, “so remember what I said to you: Just play it cool, stick close to me, and I promise you, you’ll get all the pot you want.” We nod confidently as we slide out of the car.
Inside the house, loud music is blaring from the stereo, and people are everywhere. Some are dancing, and others are huddled in smaller groups smoking or snorting something. A few couples are making out on couches scattered around the room. John and Marcus push past the crowd and lead us to a dark room in the back of the house, away from the music and dancing.
“Stay here. We’re gonna go grab some drinks from the kitchen and be back in a minute. Don’t go anywhere else, OK?” John gives Karen and me a firm look. His eyes rest on Karen for a moment longer, and she nods. Karen and I look at each other, and then we realize we’re not alone. A college-age guy with bloodshot blue eyes and shaggy blond hair is seated on a low couch. “Hi, girls. … Thanks for joining me.”
Karen quickly befriends him. She is so friendly with guys. She always has a boyfriend or someone she’s hanging out with. He offers us some pot, and we gladly accept, settling in to smoke our joints.
Karen has her arms around this stranger and is whispering something in his ear as I take my first puff. She catches my eye for a moment and winks … and that’s where the party ends in my memory.
When I come to, Karen and her new friend are gone, and I’m in an empty room staring up at a popcorn ceiling and a light bulb hanging by its wires. My head is pounding and fuzzy, and my body feels sore—like how I’d feel after an all-day swim meet. I push myself up to my elbows and take in the rest of the room. There are two boarded-up windows and a door with a hole where the doorknob once was. The walls are dingy, and the wood floor looks pretty beaten up. The mattress I’m on is the only furniture in the room, and outside of the small blanket at my feet, the mattress is bare. I lean over and see my pants in a pile on the floor. I don’t know where my shoes are.* As I continue taking in my surroundings, my head starts to throb, and I let out a painful sigh. I’m pretty sure there was more in that joint than marijuana.
Just then the door opens and an arm slides in a plate with two sandwiches and a glass of milk. Seeing the food makes me realize I’m really hungry, and I overcome the headache enough to crawl to the food. I sit cross-legged eating the bologna and white-bread sandwiches and gulp down the glass of milk. I feel more clearheaded after the food and begin fiddling with the door, but it’s somehow locked from the outside.
“Hello!” I yell through the hole. “Can anyone hear me?” My voice echoes in the hallway.
I yell a couple more times and start getting scared—really scared. My mind runs away with thoughts of why someone would lock me up in a place like this. I try to figure out how I got here, but nothing comes together. The party feels like so long ago, and maybe it was. As the light fades outside, I’m overcome with a foreboding anxiety that feels very familiar.
That’s when I hear footsteps in the hallway. They stop outside the door. I look through the hole, seeing nothing but jeans, and hear muffled voices. One set of footsteps walks away, but the jeans don’t move.
I’m still cross-legged on the floor when he enters the room. I don’t remember any details about him—the color of his hair or what he was wearing. All I remember is the look on his face. It was one I had seen on the face of my brother-in-law two years before. I shudder as the memory comes rushing back.
I had been over at my sister Amelia’s house because Momma was running errands and wanted me out of her hair. It was OK because I liked Amelia. She asked me how school was going and what I was doing with friends, and she let me help her around the house. She also let me smoke with her, something I had come to look forward to. When we smoked, I felt more relaxed than I ever did at home. Amelia had married Sean about six months before, and they were already expecting a baby. She would let me put my hands on her belly and feel the baby kick.
When it was time to go home, I jumped in the truck with Sean for the short drive across town. We were about five minutes from my house when he pulled over into an empty parking lot and turned off the truck. He leaned across the seat and put his hand on my leg. “Don’t worry. I’m not gonna hurt you,” he said with a look on his face that made me nervous.
His hand moved up my leg and then under my shirt. I gasped and backed as far as I could toward the door.
“It’s OK, Sam. … Just trust me. You’re gonna like this.”
I couldn’t believe what was happening. Sean had always been so nice to me, and now here he was—in an empty parking lot in broad daylight— touching me and having me touch him in places I had never seen.
The look on this stranger’s face in front of me is the same look that was on Sean’s face that day in the truck.
“Boy, they were right when they told me you were young,” the stranger says. He smirks and squats down on the floor so he’s at my level. “Come on. Come with me.”
He lifts me up by the shoulders and leads me over to the mattress, and then he’s on top of me, unbuckling his belt. He’s old, maybe as old as my stepdad. I try to get away, but he pulls me back.
“Oh, no, you don’t. You’re staying right here with me, and you’re gonna do exactly what I want. Understand?” His look hardens. He pulls off my clothes and then his own pants, then holds me down and has sex with me. I scream and twist in pain, but he doesn’t seem to care. His body pounds against mine until he sighs and finally lets up. He lies with his dead weight on me for a moment before getting up and dressing.
“Bye, darlin’,” he says as he leaves.
I lie on the bed until I hear the footsteps fade from the hallway and let out a single cry.
Before I can process anything, I hear footsteps again. I gather my purple blouse and pants, dress myself, and then scramble to the door to peer through. Again I see jeans and begin backing away in fear. The door opens, and a different man comes in.
The reality of what is happening hits me, and I shiver uncontrollably. I think back to the party and the last look I remember on Karen’s face—the older guy she was with, the joint, how friendly she was with him—almost like she knew him from before. It all becomes a blur. I don’t have the energy to fight this time, so I let him lead me to the mattress to do what he wants.
By the end of my first night in the room, the cycle has repeated over and over and over, with a different pair of jeans at the door every time. My body is sore, and my insides feel like they are burning. I want so badly to get up and take a drink of the water someone’s left for me, but instead I fall into a restless sleep.
The next few weeks of my life consist of the same pattern. I sleep most of the day, eat what is given to me, and have men coming by all night. I have moments where I become clearheaded enough to try to figure out how I got here, but it’s like my memory has been wiped clean from the time of the party to ending up in this room. I’m pretty sure my food is laced with some kind of drug because without the numbness I feel, the pain in my body would be too much to handle. But the drug doesn’t numb the shame.
Two years ago, after Sean molested me, I got home and immediately called my older sister, Jamie, and her husband, Robert. I’m not one to keep things to myself. Despite being an alcoholic, Jamie still had the mother-hen mentality that came from being the firstborn. She was flaming mad when I told her what happened and sent Robert over to take me to the hospital. Meanwhile, she called the police and filed a report on Sean. They came to the hospital to question me and arrested Sean that night.
Robert sat in the waiting room with me, prayed for me, talked to the nurse, and took me home after the checkup.
When we got there, Momma was home, and she didn’t want to hear anything of it. “You’ve got some nerve, Sam, sending a married man with a baby on the way to prison. Get to bed. You’ve got school tomorrow.” I could see Robert’s anger at her response, but he’d been dealing with Momma’s way of denying reality ever since marrying Jamie, and he’d given up fighting battles he couldn’t win.
“Sam, I love you. Don’t you forget it. You’re precious,” he said, kissing me on the head as he let himself out the front door. I didn’t know it that night, but that would be one of the last times I’d ever see Robert. A few weeks later, Jamie had a bad drinking episode and ended up driving their car straight through the front of their house. They separated shortly afterward and got a divorce a few years later. He was one of the few men I ever felt truly loved me.
The day after Sean was arrested, I biked over to Amelia’s to make sure she was OK. The door was open when I got there. I peeked in and saw her sitting on the couch, hands on her belly, crying. I knew it was because of what had happened, and I felt so ashamed and guilty—like I must have done something to have this happen to me. Sean had never, and then, I must have done something. I biked away without saying a thing.
The shame began that day I saw Amelia crying. And now, as I lie here trying to sleep after another night of men coming in, I can feel it growing inside me again.
I turn toward the door, looking for the glass of water that’s waiting for me every morning, and that’s when I realize the door is open. I’m up, dressing, and at the door in seconds. I pause to listen for a moment, but all I hear are the crickets outside. I tiptoe down a hallway, past a couple of other closed doors to a staircase that takes me into a big front room. The rest of the house is in about the same condition as my room: boarded-up windows, peeling paint, and a couple of torn-up pieces of furniture. I head for the front door, and I’m out.
Just like that.
I look back for a moment but see and hear nothing, so I make my way out to the sidewalk and start walking, then running, to a bigger road. I can’t go as fast as I’d like because I still don’t have my shoes, but I move as fast as I can without them. As I run, I pass houses that are in about the same shape as the one I came out of, with paint peeling and windows covered with black plastic. There’s trash everywhere: on the sidewalks, in the gutter— everywhere. Most of the houses come right up to the sidewalk with no yard, just a metal fence. The cars are the nicest thing about this neighborhood. Most of them look brand new—like they just came from the car wash. Their paint sparkles, and they have gold and silver rims on the tires. As I head toward the intersection, I see a couple of black girls on the corner looking at me. They’re wearing high heels and are dressed in spandex and shirts that show off their bellies. One of them is definitely wearing a wig because her hair is pinkish red. They’re older than me, and the looks on their faces make me nervous. I turn to head the opposite direction, but just then a car comes around the corner. I jump out in the street to flag down the driver, hoping to hitch a ride home.
A man rolls down his window and says, “Can I help you?”
“Yeah, I need to get a ride out of here,” I say, looking around nervously.
“Well, sure, honey. And what do you do?”
“Well, I just need to get home. I’ll do anything to get home.”
“Get in the car, then,” he says and motions for me to jump in the backseat.
“Thank you, mister. I can’t thank you enough. I—”
He reaches over the seat and grabs my arm. I’m scared, thinking I just got in the car of one of the guys who came to the house, and I go for the door.
“You’re under arrest,” he says as he pulls me back toward the middle of the seat.
“What?” I’m shocked.
“You’re under arrest,” he repeats as he clamps down on my arm.
“For what?” I say in disbelief.
“For prostitution. For soliciting me.”
“Wh—what is that?” I ask. All I know about arrest is what happens to Nolan, my stepdad.
“Don’t play dumb with me, girl. I see ones like you all the time.”
“I just want to call my mom, please. … ”
“Well, you can call her from booking at Juvenile Hall.”
“What is that?” I ask again.
“You really are playin’ dumb, aren’t you? You got an early start, whore,” he says.
“I—if you just let me call my mom, please,” I beg him, but he’s not listening.
“Mister,” I try again, “I—I’m only twelve. I’ve been locked up in a house for days, with men coming all night. You’ve got to believe me.”
“Well, things like that wouldn’t happen if you stay out of this side of town,” he says.
“Mister, I didn’t get here on my own. They drugged me with something.”
“Oh, don’t act like you’ve never had drugs before. All you girls are up here for the same reason.” He glares at me from the rearview mirror.
At that, I give up. This man is no more my friend than whoever had me locked up in the house. When we get to the jail, he books me and lets me call Momma. My hand is shaking as I pick up the phone. I realize I’m scared to death at what she’s gonna say when she finds out I’m calling from Juvenile Hall.
“Hello?” It’s Momma.
“Momma, it’s me,” I say weakly.
“Samantha! Oh, my God, where the hell are you?”
I don’t want to answer her question.
“Momma, I’m here at the jail, but it’s not what you think. I was at a party with Karen and—” She cuts me off. “It’s the Juvenile Hall,” I add weakly.
“Momma, wait. … I’ve gotta tell you what they did to me.”
“Sam, we’re on our way. We’ll talk about it on the drive home,” she says, and hangs up the phone.
The next thirty minutes creep by slowly. When she arrives, Nolan is with her. Momma looks at me, expressionless, then turns to the officer to go through some paperwork. Nolan grabs me by the shoulder and leads me out to the car. He is silent, but I can tell he’s angry with me.
When Momma gets in, she wastes no time. “Samantha, I can’t even tell you what the past two weeks have been like. The phone calls, the questions from people at work, the whole neighborhood. Hell, I’ve hardly been able to work dealing with all this. And how many times do I have to tell you I don’t want you spending time with Karen? But what do you do? You go around me and do that very thing! Do you not hear me? I mean, what is your problem?”
I sit silently in the backseat. I don’t even try to interrupt. She obviously doesn’t want to hear what I have to say.
“Samantha, I was at the end of my rope before, but this. This is it, Samantha. I can’t take it anymore. Only someone that’s crazy does what you do, and I just cannot take it anymore. Now we’re gonna get home, and we’re gonna start lookin’ for someone who can take care of you because I just can’t do it.”
I know what she means. Last year, when she caught Karen and me drinking, she threatened to send me to a Baptist home or boarding school.
“Now, Sam, I don’t want nothin’ of this talked about around the family or anyone else, you hear me? You’ve already disgraced me enough. No calling Robert or your dad or anyone.” She glares at me, and I look away, tears streaming down my face.
When we pull into the driveway, I go to my room, crawl into bed, and fall asleep almost immediately. I feel like I could sleep for days, but at 6:00 p.m., Momma comes in and tells me to come to dinner.
“You need to eat and get back to bed because you’re going to school tomorrow. Until we decide what we’re gonna do with you, you’re gonna keep going to school,” she says decidedly.
“Are you serious? Momma, please, you have no idea how much pain my body—”
“That’s enough! The decision is made. I won’t have you staying around here and getting in more trouble.”
When Momma found out about what happened with Sean, it was the same thing: go to school, don’t shame me, stop finding trouble, and don’t you dare talk about it. I guess I shouldn’t have expected anything different this time.
So I never tell Momma about what happened in that house in Kansas City. Besides, I know she thinks it was me. She thinks I chose to go to that horrible house. I hear her talking about it on the phone with her friends. And Nolan, he hardly even looks at me anymore.
Later that week, I see Karen at school. I ask her about the party and she says, “You just disappeared and when I went lookin’, you were gone. I figured you’d hooked up with some guy, and we had to go. So I just hoped you were OK.”
Her explanation doesn’t feel right, but I’ve stopped caring. I stop caring about a lot of things. And nobody ever asks me about anything. Nobody asks me how I feel. Nobody asks me why I’m not making good grades anymore. Nobody asks me why I don’t want to do fun things. I cry myself to sleep every night, and during the day, all I want to do is get high to numb the pain.
About a year after escaping from the house, I’m really depressed. My grades have slipped so much that I am repeating the seventh grade, and I’ve stopped hanging out with all my friends. I spend most of my time at home alone, or with Karen—if I can sneak around Momma. I start contemplating suicide and even make a couple attempts by cutting my wrists with a dull razor blade I find in the garage.
After two trips to the emergency room, and subsequent groundings, Momma comes in my room one day and tells me she’s found a place that can help me: St. John’s, a mental institution. I know about it because at school we’d joke about people who ended up there.
“It’s for the best, Sam. I can’t take care of you anymore. You’re too much for me, but St. John’s has people who know how to deal with this kinda stuff. We’re gonna leave on Friday at noon, so have your bags packed by then, and say your good-byes this week.”
In a moment of desperation, I decide to try to contact Dad. The next day after school, I ride my bike to the pay phone at 7-Eleven with a handful of quarters. I haven’t talked to my dad in years because after he got remarried, Momma got jealous, and her way of punishing him was not letting him see me anymore. I don’t understand it because Momma had already married Nolan by that time. But that’s just the way she is. Every year, Dad sends me a birthday card with twenty dollars in it and writes me a long letter all about his life and what he is doing. He’s in construction, so he travels a lot for whatever job he’s working on. My fourteenth birthday was a month ago, and his card came. This time it was sent from Chicago; he’s there working on a new skyscraper.
I snuck two phone numbers for him from Momma’s address book the night before. I wasn’t sure which one was the most recent, so I took both. The first one goes straight to the operator saying it’s no longer in service. I try the second one. It rings and rings and rings until finally someone picks up.
“Hello?” It’s a woman’s voice.
“Hey! This is Sam. I’m looking for Vernon. Is he home?”
“No. … I think you got the wrong number. There’s no Vernon that lives here.”
I’m crushed, “Are you sure? He’s not just traveling?”
“No, hon, I’m sure. You’ve got the wrong number. I’m sorry.” She must have heard the disappointment in my voice.
“OK. Well, thank you anyway.”
I hang up the phone, slide down the wall of the phone booth, and cry until it hurts. I’m out of options. Robert and Jamie are going through their divorce, Amelia has her hands full with the baby, and now I can’t even find my dad. What’s left?
I bike to Karen’s house and knock on the door. Karen answers.
“Hey, what do you say we get out of here?” I say.
“Get out of where?” she asks.
“Here. What do you say we get out of here and go to the city? I just found out my momma got me a place at St. John’s. She’s taking me there on Friday unless I figure something out on my own.”
Karen raises her eyebrows. “Well, where ya wanna go, Sam? You know a place?”
“Well, not really. I mean, I was hoping you could help me figure that out. Or maybe your brothers know a place?”
“Let me talk to them and see what they say,” she says, and a sly smile appears. Karen is always up for an adventure.
“Look,” I say, “I gotta get home before Momma realizes I’m late from school. See you tomorrow?”
“Sounds good, Sam. I’ll talk to them tonight,” she says. I hop on my bike and pedal away.
The next day at school, Karen pulls me aside and tells me her brothers are going to the city for another party that night and will take us along. They’ve got a friend who will let us stay with him for a while and sell us joints for a dollar apiece. We make our plans to meet at Karen’s house that night. Before leaving, I go into Momma’s room and grab the forty dollars cash that’s in her jewelry box. She’s working the night shift, and Nolan is out drinking, so there is no one to suspect anything.
We get to the city, and John pulls his car to the curb. “OK, this is it.”
Something about where we are feels familiar to me.
“See that house over there with the silver car out front?” John points to a house across the street. “That’s Derek’s place. You just tell him John sent you, and he’ll take care of you.”
“Perfect!” Karen says excitedly, “Bye, guys! We’ll find our own ride home, so don’t worry about us.” We hop out of the car, and they pull away.
It’s dark out, but under the streetlight I see two black girls, and then I realize what’s so familiar. I turn to look behind me, and sure enough, there is the abandoned house where I was locked up. Karen doesn’t notice I’ve stopped following her. For a few seconds I stand there frozen, with all kinds of thoughts running through my head. Were Karen’s brothers in on what happened to me, or is it just a fluke that they took us to the same place? Was Karen in on it? What do I do now? I was the one who wanted to get away. Do I tell her?
I think back to the morning I escaped from the house—my hope when I saw the car pull to a stop, followed quickly by the cop’s cruel words: “All you girls are up here for the same reason.”
I guess he was right. Here I am, back for the drugs.
Karen is several steps ahead of me. “Sam? Are you all right? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I’m good. I’m coming,” I say.
I decide at that moment not to tell Karen about the house. As far as I can figure, there’s no point in bringing it up. I don’t want her to think I’m accusing her of being involved. As we walk down the block toward Derek’s house, people are coming out on the streets. The girls are dressed in spandex, short shirts, wigs, and lots of makeup. They stand on their corner, two or three of them, mostly black girls, and the men with them stay within a couple hundred feet, keeping an eye on them.* They’re all much older than us.
Everyone we walk past is staring at us, and they don’t even try to hide it. The girls look suspicious, and some of the guys whistle, but Karen seems oblivious to the attention, so I just stay close to her. I don’t have much of a plan beyond getting away from home, and I am feeling a little uneasy now about my decision. Thankfully, Karen has always been fearless.
We walk up to Derek’s house, and Karen knocks on the door. A large black man answers. “Well, hello, ladies! How can I help you tonight?”
“We’re looking for some pot, and my brother John said you’d take care of us,” Karen says with confidence.
“Ah, you must be his sister, Karen. He told me you’d be coming. Have a seat.”
He leads us to some dusty couches, and we each buy a joint for a dollar. After our first, we buy another. And then another. We start getting goofy and giggly and then really tired. Derek brings out some blankets and lets us sleep on his couches.
After a couple days of being in the neighborhood, I realize that most houses on the block are a lot like Derek’s: some sell joints, others sell special types of alcohol, others are crack houses, and almost all of them are whorehouses.
It’s been about a week now of Karen and me wandering around the neighborhood and spending our nights at Derek’s when we run out of cash. So Karen says, “Come on, let’s go see how the other girls make their money.”
As night comes, we go out to the street and watch the other girls. Cars pull up with men in them, the girls get in the car, it pulls away, then after a while, they come back with money.
Both of us are smart enough to figure out what’s going on. “OK, I’m gonna give it a try,” Karen says as she takes her place on an open street corner. I hang back, closer to Derek’s house.
It’s not more than a few minutes before a car slows to a stop. Karen is the only blond-haired, blue-eyed girl on the street, and she is by far the youngest. I watch the car pull away with her inside.
For as long as I’ve known Karen, she has been bold with guys, and I know she’s been having sex for a couple years now with her boyfriends. But getting in the car with a complete stranger is a whole different thing.
Not more than twenty minutes later, she’s back, and sure enough, she has some cash. “That was easy,” she says. “I’m gonna try it again.”
She goes back to the corner, and the routine repeats itself. After she comes back from the second trip, one of the men who had been watching us from across the street starts walking toward us. He had come to Derek’s a few times; his name is Tate. He’s a tall guy, real skinny and lanky—which makes it look like he’s always walking with a limp—and he’s got tattoos all up and down his arms. The biggest one across the inside of his arm says “Daddy”* in scroll-like letters. He flashes a smile at us, revealing his gold teeth. “Y’all have been staying with Derek, yeah? Why isn’t he taking care of you?”
Karen answers, “Well, we ran out of money, so we just need to get some more, and then we’re fine.”
“If you like what Derek has, I can give you even better stuff, and I’ll take care of you. I’ll make sure you have a place to sleep and good clothes and food. You won’t have to worry about anything. What do you say?”
Karen and I look at each other. “Give us a minute,” I say.
“Sure, take your time. You know where I am,” he says as he heads back across the street. There was something about the way Tate said “I’ll take care of you” that gave me hope. If I was going to be doing this stuff, I wanted someone to protect me. I didn’t want to end up in a situation like I did after the party.
“I think it’s a good idea. What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” Karen says with hesitation. “Derek’s been pretty cool letting us stay with him. If we just get some money, we’ll be fine.”
“But he’s not gonna let us stay forever. He’s got a business to keep up; he can’t have us taking up his space all the time,” I respond. “Besides, if we don’t like it, we can always leave.”
“All right, if you say so. I guess we can give it a try,” she answers.
So Karen and I are now Tate’s girls, and he is our “daddy.” Tate’s bottom girl gets me all dressed up, and I go out to the corner with her for my first night on the street. I’m a nervous wreck. My heart beats faster, and my palms get sweaty each time a car pulls up. The third car that night is a blue pickup truck. After talking to the driver, she says to me, “OK, this one’s for you.”
Every trick I turn that first night is scary, but after about a week of being trained by Tate’s girl, it’s no big deal. It’s just what I do.
We work the streets at night and sleep most of the day. And Tate keeps his word. We give him our money, and he gives us whatever we want: drugs, clothes, shoes, and perfume. We are well taken care of.
Everything is going fine for a couple weeks, until one day when Tate is out of pot, and that’s what we want.
“We’re going to Derek’s to get some pot,” Karen says nonchalantly.
“Oh, no you’re not. You’re staying right here,” he says.
“Whatever. You said you’d always have it, and you don’t, so we’re going over there. We’ll be back in a bit,” she answers.
He slaps Karen hard, and she falls to the ground, holding her cheek. “You’re not going anywhere. You’re my bitches* now, you got that? So you do what I say.” He walks off, leaving us in our room.
That night, Karen makes plans to leave. While Tate is getting dinner, she sneaks off to Derek’s to call John and arrange for him to pick her up. She tries to convince me to go with her, but where do I have to go? As crazy as her family is, at least she has a home to go back to. But Momma, she’ll take me straight to St. John’s. I know it.
So I stay, and working the streets becomes my life. Every day is the same routine. We get up at 5:00 p.m. and prepare for the evening. Tate likes to keep things fresh, so we have a huge closet full of stuff to choose from: all kinds of wigs, jewelry, spandex pants in all colors, and midriff tops. We get dressed for the night and then have hamburgers or fried chicken for dinner at a place a few blocks away. We work all night until the sun comes up. We bring Tate all the money we earn, and in exchange he gives us whatever drugs we want. I’m Tate’s favorite girl because I’m the youngest. He takes extra good care of me—especially now that Karen is gone. His lead girl coaches me to tell people I’m only eleven because, as she says, “They’re always lookin’ for a younger one.”
After almost a year of working for Tate, I’m out on my corner one night and see a brown sedan coming down the block. There’s something familiar about the car, but it doesn’t click for me until it’s too late. The car speeds quickly toward me, pulling up on the curb. It’s Momma.
“Sam! Get in the car!” She jumps out and starts pushing me toward the car. I resist, but she overpowers me and pushes me in the backseat. We speed off in the direction of the expressway, and the monologue begins with her rattling on about how angry she is. I realize we’re not headed in the direction of home, so I ask where we’re going.
Momma rolls her eyes, “Like I have to tell you, Sam. We’re going to St. John’s.”
When we arrive, two men come to the car to get me. Momma comes in, too, but goes the opposite direction into a small office. The men lead me down a long hallway and into a small room with two chairs and a table. I wait alone for half an hour until Momma arrives with an older man wearing a white doctor’s jacket and carrying a clipboard. He sits down at the table with me, but Momma remains standing.
“Hello, Samantha,” he says, “I’m Dr. Crawford. I’ve been speaking with your mother, and now I’d like to ask you a couple of questions.”
I nod.
“Your mother has stated that you have exhibited unstable behavior, putting yourself in dangerous situations and threatening to take your own life. Is that right?”
I answer Dr. Crawford, “Well, when you have to live with someone like her, you’d feel the same way,” I say, avoiding eye contact with Momma.
“Well, then, Samantha, we’d like to see if we can help you. You’re going to be staying with us for a while. I’m going to give you a moment alone to say good-bye to your mother,” he says as he gets up and leaves the room.
I glare at her with my arms folded across my chest.
“Samantha, these people are equipped to take care of you much better than I am,” she says firmly. She kisses me on the forehead and then turns for the door.
“Thanks for nothing!” I scream after her. I pick up my chair and throw it at the door and am going for the next one when the two men come in and pin me down. One of them has a syringe, which he sticks in my arm. I collapse to the floor almost immediately.
I wake hours later in a room on a twin bed. There’s a bookshelf and a chair in the corner, and light streams in through a small window. There’s a knock at the door, followed quickly by a man entering with a glass of water and a plate of food. He sets it on the bookshelf, gives me a quick look, and leaves.
So here I am again: drugged and locked in a room with people leaving me food and water. Only this time they say it’s because they’re going to help me.
I spend the next three years of my life at St. John’s. Dr. Crawford diagnoses me as bipolar and paranoid schizophrenic and gives me drugs to treat my sickness. Eventually, they move me into a room with three other women. I make a few friends and pass the time by reading romance novels. When my eighteenth birthday is within six months, Momma starts visiting more often to convince me to stay willingly until I’m well, but I’ve already decided that won’t be the case.
A few days before my eighteenth birthday, she tries to convince me one last time. Dr. Crawford shows me into the visiting room, and I can tell Momma’s clearly upset about something.
“Samantha, your mother has something to tell you, but she’s having a hard time with it,” Dr. Crawford says as he coaxes me into a chair.
“Well, of course she’s got something to tell me. She’s never short on words,” I say with a mocking tone. Our relationship has not progressed at all from where we were three years ago. I’m surprised when she stays serious, eyes fixed on her feet. “Samantha, you need to know something important about your father.”
Now she has my attention. “What is it? Is he OK?”
“Yes, yes. Vernon is fine. But what I need to tell you is that Vernon … he’s not your real father.”
I sit there stunned. Vernon. Dad. I’m even named after his mom.
“You’re lying! You’re a liar! You’re a lying bitch; you always have been!” I’m screaming at the top of my lungs while attempting to control the tears that are streaming down my face. “Give me the phone! I’m calling him.”
“Samantha, I don’t think that’s a good idea. I knew I should have told you before, but I could never find the right time, and he didn’t want me to tell you, either. But you’re an adult now, and you need to know the truth.” She continues to rattle on, but I’m ignoring her.
I step out of the room and into Dr. Crawford’s office to call my dad. He must have known this would be my response because he already has the receiver ready to hand to me. Dr. Crawford dials Dad’s number, and after two rings, he picks up. “Hello?”
“Dad, it’s me,” I say, attempting to control my shaky voice.
“Well, hey there, Sam, it’s good—”
I cut him off. “Dad, Mom just showed up here at St. John’s tellin’ me that you’re not my dad. And I just can’t believe the nerve of her—right before I’m ready to go. It’s like she doesn’t care, making up these lies about you. She’s never cared about anyone but herself, Dad. Can you believe this?”
I pause for a moment to give him a chance to agree with me, but he doesn’t respond. Instead, I hear him crying on the other end of the phone and realize Momma’s not lying. I hang up the phone without saying goodbye and storm out of Dr. Crawford’s office, back in the direction of my room. Momma runs after me, explaining how they were just trying to protect me, but I block her out. I slam the door to my room and bury my face in my pillow. If I thought I felt alone before, it was nothing compared to what I feel now: Those who I thought were my family my whole life aren’t even related to me.
Five days later, I’m released. I’m given some money for my bus ticket home, but instead I hitch a ride with a stranger headed for Oklahoma. I’m quiet in the backseat, wondering what to do next as the dreams of starting over and getting an education or meeting a good man and having my own family someday slip away. Everything I’ve ever cared about or hoped for feels like it has been taken from me.
The stranger takes me as far as a truck stop on the Missouri-Oklahoma border, and I hop out, thanking him for the ride. Within days, I’ve returned to prostitution. I’m the new girl at the truck stop. I hear the guys talking about me; they call me the “lot lizard.”1 I have a steady stream of clients and don’t really need a place to live since I sleep in a different man’s truck cab every night. Most of the ones who do drugs share what they have, so before I know it I’m back on the pot, and occasionally cocaine, when I get lucky.
Thus begins the next twenty years of my life. I go from prostituting at truck stops to ending up on a ranch in east Texas as part of a drug trafficking ring, and ultimately back in Kansas City, working out of a crack motel. I am in and out of prison the entire time, but whenever I get out, I always find my way back to my little motel, taking on clients as needed to support my addiction. My drug has become my pimp.
By the time I hit my late thirties, I’ve been in and out of prison more times than I can count, and I’m tired. I’m alone in my room one night, higher than a kite after finding out Vernon has died. I catch my reflection in the mirror and pause, as if seeing myself for the first time in ages. My face is bony. Wrinkles have formed around my eyes, and my mouth droops down in a constant frown. My skin is gray, and my eyes are hollow. But then there’s my chestnut hair. Momma always said it was my best feature, and somehow it still picks up the shine from the light overhead, like the women in the shampoo commercials. Suddenly, I want nothing to do with it, and I root around in the closet until I find a pair of rusty scissors. I begin to chop off my hair, grabbing chunks at a time and working through them with the dull blades. With every handful of hair that falls to the floor, it’s as if I’m accepting the loss of all I’ve never had. Vernon is dead. My family is not my family. I have no goals. No values. No morals. No purpose. I prostitute myself for drugs and live from trip to trip. I finish the haircut, my eyes blurry with tears as I curl up in a ball on the floor and fall asleep.
I wake the next day, surprisingly clearheaded and sober for the amount of drugs I took. I feel the coolness of the linoleum floor against my cheek, my eyes focusing on the chunks of hair and small bits of dust in front of me as the morning sun filters through the window.
I roll to my back and look up at the ceiling, breathing deeply. Something feels different. I go to the mirror to survey the damage of my haircut and laugh at the messy, uneven bob I’ve given myself. I feel the weightlessness of the hair that is gone, but more than that, the weightlessness of my soul. It’s like I have finally allowed myself to grieve, and it has left me empty— like a glass ready to be filled.
I’ve had other moments through the years—and especially the past six months—when I have wanted to change. But deep-rooted shame from how I had lived my life always dragged me back down into the very things I was trying to escape. But today feels different. I reach into my pocket and pull out a business card that reads, “Hope for Recovery.” I found it in the lobby a few months ago and have been carrying it around in my pocket ever since. I walk across the room to the telephone and pick up the receiver. My hands are shaking as I dial. I hear the ring on the other end of the phone and say to myself out loud, “Samantha, today is the day.”
My vulnerability to being trafficked began when I was ten years old. Being molested by my uncle was a horrific and scarring experience, and the lack of counsel and care from my family—or anyone, for that matter—left me damaged and wounded. I remember having nightmares for months in which I would see my uncle and other men violate me. I would wake up in a cold sweat, breathing hard and scared stiff, but I honestly didn’t feel like there was anyone I could talk to about it. We were going to church sporadically, so I did not have close relationships with anyone there, and I didn’t have a connection with any of my teachers or counselors.
What I did have was access to drugs, and while they did not help me process what had happened, they did numb the pain.
When I was arrested after escaping the house where I was held captive is another moment when I believe intervention would have changed the trajectory of my life. As a twelve-year-old victim of sex trafficking, I was treated like a criminal. It sounds atrocious, but it still happens today, decades later. Legal protocol is just now being developed for how to identify and handle child victims of sex trafficking. As a result, many victimized children are treated as delinquents when brought in on charges of solicitation.
My time at St. John’s was intended to be an opportunity to get away from all negative influences and start over, but it did not serve me well. While I don’t think medicating is always wrong, in my case it only reinforced my dependency on drugs. Counseling and group sessions were involved in my treatment, but the drugs enabled me to fake my way through it all without ever confronting the real issues.
For me, friendship is a cornerstone of the freedom I have today. Pearl—my sponsor through AA—is an incredible woman. She can see right through me and doesn’t pull any punches. But she does so in the most graceful and loving way. Pearl has experienced a lot of pain and betrayal in her life and has overcome it. She has learned to forgive and start again. Pearl was the first person I ever met who really, truly believed in me. She led me through the Twelve Steps, and she has never once given up on me, even when I wanted to give up on myself. I don’t think I ever experienced unconditional love until I met Pearl. She is the mother I never had, and having her in my life has brought tremendous healing.
Finding deep relationships has gone hand in hand with finding faith. I have a wonderful church community that has helped me through the highs and lows of the past several years.
Going back to school is another important part of rebuilding my life. The challenge and discipline of learning has helped me stay focused. It’s been hard—really hard—and I have not yet completed my degree, but it is my most sincere hope that once I graduate, I can use what I am learning to help other people, especially children, who are in situations like I was.
The truth is, staying free is something I have to work at every day. There are constantly things that remind me of how far I have to go. Getting married was a huge step for me and something I had always dreamed of. When we got divorced a few years later, it was a really low moment and probably the closest I have ever been to returning to my old lifestyle. I slipped into a deep depression, and there were entire weeks when I didn’t get out of bed. I was fighting suicidal thoughts, and had it not been for Pearl and a few other close friends, I don’t think I would be alive today.
The hardest thing for me to do is accept where I am in the healing process on a daily basis and be OK with it. If I’m having a bad day, it means learning to give myself grace and not beat myself up for taking a step or two backward. My mind will tell me that I should be further along than I am, that other people think I should be further along. It is when I compare my progress to some arbitrary standard that I find myself struggling with depression and hopelessness.
I have had the privilege of speaking at churches, schools, and conferences about the dangers of sex trafficking and drug use. While I love the opportunity to help others through sharing my story, there can be the added pressure of wondering if I’m good enough, healed enough, removed enough from my past to be worthy of sharing my story. My mind can use this against me.
While my story is unique, there are common themes that repeat themselves in the stories of so many other victims of trafficking.
The first is that trafficking is often connected to drug use. Whether drugs are used to kidnap the victim or to build an addiction that causes the victim to choose to stay willingly, they are frequently an integral part of the lifestyle. In my case, my early exposure to drugs led me to put myself at risk willingly. In the end, it kept me bound to a lifestyle of prostitution.
My friendship with Karen is another commonality between my story and others’. Karen was my best friend, and quite honestly one of my only friends. I didn’t want to accept that she and her brothers were involved in my being trafficked. I chose to remain oblivious and continued to go behind my mother’s back to spend time with Karen.
And finally, shame is the common emotion I share with so many other trafficking survivors. I let the false responsibility of those things I had been victim to define who I was, so much so that I began hurting myself. I was my own worst enemy and a victim at the same time. If I could have a conversation with twelve-year-old Samantha, I would say one word: forgive. Forgive Sean for molesting you, forgive Momma for being angry and controlling, and most of all, forgive yourself. Let go of the shame you’re holding on to, and find the courage to look at your life with all its challenges and start fresh. Today is the day.