Thriving After Their Rejection

I got pregnant when I was in tenth grade. When my parents found out, they didn’t yell

or cry. They looked at me like I was something rotten. “You’re a disgrace

to this family,” my mother said coldly. “You’re no longer our child,” my father added.

They gave me a small bag and pushed me out into the night. I was sixteen, pregnant,

and alone. That night, I slept on a bus station bench, holding my stomach

and promising my unborn baby I would never abandon him the way I had been abandoned.

The years that followed were brutal. I worked nights, studied during naps, and survived on

exhaustion and stubborn love. When my son, Lucas, was born,