About Me —Alexandra

Writer, photographer, collector of children and animals

I’ve been reading some stories by a terrific writer, KL Simmons, about music in the 80s. The mention of Stevie Nicks took me back to my first year of college — well, art school — in California, where students and faculty alike swam nude, and kids lived in suites, as opposed to dorms. I shared a suite with a female videographer, her boyfriend, and his dog. Yes, pets were also allowed at this prestigious school founded by Walt Disney. A remarkable parrot named Duck lived down the hall and would scream every time someone played music. Basically, all the time.

Though this type of atmosphere may seem acceptable today, it’s a far cry from the small-town community I grew up in, in Central New Jersey. And certainly not who I am today. Thank God.

I was born in the 60s in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and spent my preschool and elementary years in Central Jersey, not knowing who I was or where I fit in. My mother was considered black, though her mother was Native American and her father was black and French. My first father was a very, very light-skinned black man, though his side of the family identified with the black race. No one back then referred to themselves as African American. I don’t think they even had any relatives from Africa.

I turned out very light-skinned with thick, semi-coarse hair — as the white children considered it in my elementary years — but “good hair” to the black children in junior high and high school. We moved to North Jersey when I entered the fifth grade, and there was more of a mixture of races there.

Color played a considerable part in shaping my life. I didn’t know who or what I was. To the white younger children, I was okay to be around until they played spin the bottle. Then I was sent home and ordered to wait for their phone call saying they were finished and I could rejoin the festivities. They were not allowed to kiss a black girl.

Junior high was the first time I saw black faces sprinkled through the hallways. These kids spit venomous words at me, such as “Zebra” and “Oreo,” as they kicked and pushed me and pulled at my hair.

“She think she so fine,” girls would sneer as they yanked at my thick curls. “She got good hair.”

Fine was the furthest thing I thought about myself. You see, I also carried a secret. It was a secret of shame that was as real haunting me at school as it did at home. A stepfather who took offense at me and the color of my skin. Except when his hands were all over me. But then, being black was why he did what he did to me. Or so he said. To him, I had no value.

So when I escaped to art school in California, the freedom I found there was exhilarating! No one cared that my skin was olive. It didn’t matter that I had thick, coarse curls and blended in with the foreign student population.

“What are you, Greek? Italian? Latino?” I would hear on a regular basis. No one knew how to categorize me, and I couldn’t understand why they cared. To this day, I still don’t.

Except for a few historical moments that no one would be able to forget, I withdrew inside myself and sailed through school on automatic, like a robot. I changed universities three times in three different states and somehow graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism at Oklahoma State University.

After a brief stint in Washington DC writing for an animal rights organization, I moved back to California, when my childhood trauma caught up with me, and another part of me took over to survive.

Fast forward to my late 20s, when I could no longer escape the damage of my past, and nightmares and daymares plagued me around the clock. I was a nervous wreck, jumping every time someone moved by me too quickly or raised their hands. Work suddenly became impossible as I would find myself hiding in closets when someone or something triggered me, and my past became intertwined with my present.

Finally, a therapist suggested I may need more intense help than she could give and checked me into one of the best vacation spots (well, not really, but that’s what it felt like) hospitals I ever experienced. Similar to my first year of college, this facility was like a resort for the upper class, and there I thrived. I was able to talk through my trauma with other people who experienced similar things, and for the first time, I felt a part of a family. I didn’t have to hide who I was, no one asked me about my heritage, and the best thing of all, they cooked vegan food, for there were many vegetarians and vegans there. To this day, I have been a vegetarian for 41 years.

Unfortunately, the years of trauma I faced didn’t miraculously go away with that one hospital stay, and I engaged in several years of counseling to try to take back my life. During a hospital stay in another state, I met a woman who knew God. I thought I knew God, but the thing is, this woman didn’t just talk about Him like all the other Christians I had known. She seemed to live Him out daily through her actions, unconditional love, and, well, joy. She invited me to live with her and her family, and it was in that home that I found out how much God really cherished me and had an amazing plan for my life. During my time with my new family, I accepted Christ as my personal savior.

My journey was still rough, but I was not alone. I made many mistakes, and relationships were a real struggle for me. But I continued to grow closer to God by reading the Bible, praying, and learning what it means to be a true believer in Christ. This woman, who I called Mom, showed me how much God loved me and how He wanted me to live. She said I was a valuable person to God, and He wanted me to be cherished and protected and not hurt. I never knew God felt this way about me. The idea felt so foreign.

To this day, I am still far from the recovered person I want to be. But it’s really not the end result that is important, but the small steps I take every day to change for the better.

Once I felt like I had gotten enough recovery under my belt, I started taking classes to become a foster parent. There is no way I could have undertaken this challenge without my faith in Christ and my willingness to trust Him in everything.

I went from a small two-bedroom apartment with just one foster child to a four-bedroom home God promised to fill with children if I trusted Him. And He did. Over a period of seven years, I had over 15 children live in my home.

Presently, I no longer foster but have three adopted boys, all from different families, and we are definitely a mixed bunch!

It is quite difficult to raise kids with a trauma history such as my own, especially as a single mom in her late 50s. But I’m really not alone at all as I have a Father in Heaven who loves and guides me as I place my faith in Him every day.