16
A Modeling Career

One evening I saw an ad on TV about a modeling school called John Casablancas Modeling and Career Center, and it was located in Miami.

I can do that. I can become a model.

After I told Mom about the ad, I asked, “Why don’t you put me in modeling school? That will help me feel good about myself.”

I still lived with a victim mentality. People lied to me and I believed them, so they took advantage of me. More slowly, my persona deteriorated to rebellion and anger because I was off drugs and had nothing to numb the pain of my life. I became fearful, compliant, and suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), severe depression, and low self-esteem.

I couldn’t comprehend how people could always hurt me, not realizing that as an abuse and trafficking survivor I carried around an invisible target that showed predators how vulnerable I was. Once I was in a relationship, I was so afraid of abandonment that I did whatever anyone asked just to please them. I lost all sense of what I liked, needed, or wanted.

At John Casablancas Modeling and Career Center, I made friends with the staff and with a few other students. Just being accepted there helped me to start feeling better and better about myself. Although there were girls there who asked me if I wanted to do coke, I declined and said I was trying hard to better my life. I really wanted to make my mom proud of me.

After I finished the course, I sought out modeling auditions and received several jobs. I was proud of myself. Twice I played an extra in the TV series Miami Vice that was filmed in Miami. That may not sound like a big deal, but it was special to me. I had found something I could do, and for someone like me to feel any level of success was big.

I participated as a model in several boat shows around Miami and Fort Lauderdale. I wore bathing suits because having shapely, bathing-suit-clad women was supposed to help sell the boats. Besides, I was paid quite well.

To some, my modeling probably didn’t sound like much, and I knew I would never be a top model, especially with my full figure. Although I was sexy and received compliments, I never seemed to be thin enough for the high-fashion modeling industry. Even so, I was happy and life was good.

God was somewhere in my life, but not as important as he should have been. Even though I often heard his voice deep inside my heart and prayed regularly for guidance, I still held back.

God did protect me and I believe he orchestrated the positive things that were happening. Slowly he was helping me become who I was supposed to be.

I needed glasses, but I didn’t like to wear them in public. I didn’t consider contact lenses because of the inconvenience. And after I became a model, I felt eyeglasses detracted from the glamour of the profession.

Occasionally, I got together with Heidi, a girlfriend from elementary school. I suppose part of it was that I wanted to impress her by what I’d done with my life. On one occasion I drove Heidi and her boyfriend to Hialeah. She had the same problem as I did with poor eyesight, but we felt that wearing glasses made us look like nerds, so neither of us wore them.

After we dropped off Heidi’s boyfriend, we were driving on Forty-Ninth Street in Hialeah when I thought I saw her former boyfriend. “Look there! That’s Roger!” We pulled into a parking space and went back to talk to the group of guys who were there. I waved at Roger and he waved back.

But because of my nearsightedness, I was wrong. As I got closer and saw him, I realized he was a stranger. Although embarrassed, I started talking to him anyway.

His name was Joel and he was from Colombia, South America. Joel didn’t speak much English and I didn’t speak Spanish, but we spoke the universal language of love, and we were able to talk, laugh, and have fun together.

Soon we started dating. After I got to know Joel a little better, he told me about his dad, who was a drug dealer high up the chain in the Colombian cartel.

“That’s cool,” I said. Hearing about his father made Joel seem even more exciting. That was in 1988, when Colombians were known as “cocaine cowboys” because they ran drugs into the United States.

Joel was a hard worker at the local Winn-Dixie grocery store. He didn’t do drugs, even though that was his father’s business. If he had done drugs, I never would have dated him. I didn’t want to be around a druggie. I was done with that.

After we started to date, I disconnected from my old friends. From here on, whatever I say about Joel is obviously my interpretation of our relationship. This phase of my life happened because I had just come out of a lifestyle in which I had few choices and was under the dominance of others. In retrospect, it seems natural that I would be attracted to a man like Joel.

I thought it was my decision, but looking back I have often wondered. It seems to me that like those who had snared me in the past, Joel isolated me from my family and friends. He took me to his family functions, and I acquiesced because I wanted to please him. I liked his parents, especially his dad because he had a sense of humor.

I was still modeling and had enrolled in night school, where I received praise for my work. I also went to work as a secretary in my dad’s office because I didn’t have modeling gigs every day. My new lifestyle built up my self-esteem.

My life was going smoothly. Joel and I were dating, and our relationship was becoming serious. Mom liked Joel and said he was a normal man, not involved in gangs and not into drugs. We didn’t tell her that Joel’s father was in the Colombian cartel.

I entered the Miss Teen USA Pageant. I had gotten sponsors, people who paid money for me to go into the pageant. My life was changing. I felt so good about myself. It felt awesome to be off drugs and away from those bad people. I was happy, beautiful, young, and getting stronger on my way toward a successful future.

Soon the sponsors wanted me to consider going into the Miss USA Pageant. I was excited. My path was coming together and life would be wonderful. Since I had worked for my dad off and on over the years, I knew a great deal about business and began learning how to start new businesses and how to get listings and sell real estate. Everything seemed perfect.

I fell in love with Joel—and that’s not surprising to me now. He showed me attention and affection, and I believed it was genuine. He treated me nicely, and I assumed that eventually we’d be married.

I didn’t really want to have sex with him. When we met, I was trying to be good, and I was determined that I was going to wait until we were married. That was my chance to start over. More than once I told him, “I’m not ready for anything more.”

Joel persisted. “I love you,” he said many times.

Not only did I like hearing those words, I needed to hear them from someone other than people involved in sex trafficking.

After three months, I gave in to Joel’s insistence. After we finished, I started crying. I wasn’t on drugs. Until then I hadn’t been doing anything I thought was bad, but the pain from the past abuse hit me.

Oh, dear God, I’ve failed you again, and I’ve failed myself.

The sex continued. One day I suspected I was pregnant with Joel’s child, but I didn’t want to say anything to anyone. Instead, I visited a women’s clinic around the corner from our apartment. They gave pregnancy tests for five dollars. The woman in charge confirmed my suspicions. I felt terrible and unsure of what to do.

“It’s your right to have an abortion, you know.” She kept talking about my legal rights.

“What about the baby?” I asked. “Will the baby be hurt? Will he feel anything?”

“No, it’s not even a baby,” she insisted. “It’s a blob of tissue.” She persisted, “You’re still a beautiful young girl and you don’t need to throw your life away like that. Just wait there. You need to speak with the doctor. She is in and can do the abortion today.”

“I guess I could talk to the doctor.” There was my compliance again, and it was the only way I knew to stop her from pressuring me.

Leave. Get up and leave this place.

Without the slightest doubt, I knew God had spoken, and I had to leave. Not speaking to anyone, I got up and walked out of the women’s clinic.

As I walked around the corner to where we lived, God definitely spoke to me: I love this child, and I have a plan for this child’s life.

“What should I do, God? What about my life? I’ve finally gotten my life back together.”

I have a plan for this baby.

I just kept hearing those words inside my head. As I walked home, my brother, Daniel, was the first person I saw. The words burst out, even though I hadn’t meant to say anything: “I’m pregnant.”

We hadn’t been close in a long time, and I expected an angry reaction. Instead, Daniel gave me a strong hug. “Don’t worry, Kat, I’m going to help you take care of this baby. And this baby is going to be a surfer like me. I’m going to help you and be there for him, I promise.”

My brother will never know how wonderful the embrace and the words were to me. I felt God had given me a sign—proof—that I was to have the baby.*

When I told Joel I was pregnant, he didn’t seem surprised. That made me suspect that he had gotten me pregnant on purpose.

Even though God had spoken to me and I knew I had made the right decision, I still struggled. This is going to ruin my life. I’ve tried so hard to do well and get my life straight.

I knew what I had to do next. Immediately, I went to an official of the Miss Teen USA Pageant and told her about my pregnancy.

“You have to drop out of the pageant,” the leader said. “A pregnant teen is not a role model.”

I hated hearing those words, but she was right. In 1989, pregnant teens were shunned in society much more than they are today.

“You’ve messed up your life,” Mom said. She was right, and that made me feel even worse. I had once again brought shame on myself and my family. I had tried so hard to be good, and now I was embarrassing my mother. She had an unmarried, pregnant teen for a daughter.

“I did this to myself,” I said many times. “I got myself into this.” Being pregnant, I could no longer model, so there went my career.

Shortly after that, Joel and I met with Joel’s mother and her friends one evening. The meeting lasted until four o’clock in the morning. They pressured us to get married. “You have to give this child a father.”

Joel proposed, probably because of their pressure. Although I didn’t want to marry him, I felt obligated. I wanted to give my baby a wholesome family life. Because I was seventeen years old and still a minor, I had to get my parents’ permission. Both Mom and Dad agreed it was the right thing to do. A justice of the peace married us.

Ashamed and embarrassed, I went through the brief ceremony. This was one of the saddest days of my life. Several times I felt like crying; instead, I forced a smile on my face.

Joel’s mother had insisted that we marry, but I felt she had more in mind than providing a legal father for the baby. She wanted her legal citizenship too, and through our marriage both she and Joel eventually received that.

Although I have no way of knowing Joel’s heart, I can say that he professed faith in Jesus Christ and put on a show for his mother during our marriage, but I’m not sure he ever had a spiritual change. He went to church with me, and everyone accepted him. Joel was likable, and he smiled and chatted with everyone and seemed sincere. But once we were home, he behaved differently. I saw no real evidence of God in his life outside the church building.

Even though I was a pregnant teen and shunned by society, God was still with me. I had been going to night school, and in my sixth month of pregnancy I dropped out.

About the time I dropped out of school, I learned that my history teacher had nominated me for “Outstanding High School Students of America” and “Who’s Who Among American High School Students.” I received both awards, and that boosted my confidence in my ability to learn. So I studied and earned my high school diploma through a GED.

A month after my eighteenth birthday, in February 1990, I gave birth to our son, whom we nicknamed Kipper. Even before Kipper’s birth, I had disconnected from my friends, and they turned their backs on me too. They didn’t come out and say, “You’re a pregnant teen,” but the attitude was obvious.

My son was one month old the Sunday morning the pastor gave an altar call for people to turn to Christ or to rededicate their lives to Jesus. I had made that initial commitment as a child. Even though God protected me, I hadn’t been faithful. Many times I’d pondered God’s mercy in saving me from terrible situations when I hadn’t followed him. Yet God never gave up on me. And the words that Billy Graham had said rang true once more: “God will never leave you or forsake you.”

“I’m going forward,” I told Joel. “Do you want to go with me?”

And just like my dad, who years before had stayed in the stands, Joel stayed where he was.

I went anyway. By the time I reached the front, I was crying and couldn’t stop. In that moment, I realized I had tried to give up control of my life but felt ashamed for failing God so miserably. “God, take me back,” I pleaded. “I don’t want to be in control of my life anymore.”

God did a marvelous work in my life. Many times after that I failed, but from that moment on, I wanted God as the center of my life.

After that Sunday morning at the altar, I wanted to become a true follower. Part of that determination came about because of Kipper. I determined to raise my son to believe in God. My life had been so crazy, and I didn’t want him to go through that kind of turmoil.

Many times I’ve told Kipper that God used him to bring me back to himself. Until my son was born, I tried to be good on my own, yet I hadn’t fully surrendered to God. I didn’t go to church or pray. But God was faithful. He had told me that he had a plan not only for my life but for my baby’s life as well. Because of Kipper, I was finally able to hear and act on that. God was leading me in the right way.

That day I threw myself on the altar and rededicated my life to him. I know only that after that morning, my life was never the same. I had finally surrendered everything, and God had taken me back. It would still take a long time for me to follow completely, but I had started down the pathway. And as a result of giving my life back to Christ, my mom and brother began witnessing the change. After a while, they too surrendered to Jesus Christ.

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*Daniel never went back on his word. My son is now in his early twenties, and his uncle has been like a hero and a second father to him.