I've been through a bit in my thirteen years of life. I lived through moving from California to Texas in the last two months of fourth grade and having no friends for what seemed like forever. I dealt with my mom's ex-boyfriend and his abusive nature. He would scream at me, tell me I was worse than his pinky finger and that I deserved nothing more than to go to boot camp just so I would be out of the way. He'd spit on me, threaten me. But, that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was that my mom would just stand there, stand there and pretend everything was alright. I guess that's what she wanted to believe. She wanted to ignore what was happening, put on a fake coverup and make the world believe that everything was okay. It wasn't.

That didn't kill me. Sure, it broke me down until I, myself, believed what he said. But, deep down I knew better. I knew I was better than that. All the while little pieces of me where falling apart, but glueing themselves together. I was building a brick wall by hand. A brick wall of my beliefs. Of what I chose to believe and what I knew was wrong. He took away some of those bricks, but all the time I was adding more. I was growing stronger.

The man that made my life a mess is gone now. I'm never going to be able to accept another one of my mom's boyfriends. They terrify me. But, I've learned to forgive. Despite what he put me through, I know now something must have happened to him to make him that angry. To make him want to yell and scream for no apparent reason and explode with all of that built up tension. Will I ever be friends with him? No, that could never happened. But, if at any point in time he needs help, if someday I need to die to save his life, I'd do it. I'd die for anyone. Because every person you meet, you change. So if I died to save his life, I've changed him. It doesn't make sense to some people, but I know it's true in my heart.

So, what matters to me isn't what matters to some people. What matters is my beliefs. My ability to make a mistake and still understand why what I did was wrong: what makes me who I am. You can change how you look. You can dye your hair, get a nose job and give yourself a full-body tattoo. But, no matter what you do, if you dig deep enough, you're still who you always where, and what you always will be.