The Crazy Life That I Have Lived….

My name is Veronica Hayes and I'm 19 years old. I'm from Fillmore, Page Street to be exact. I lived in a seven-bedroom Victorian house on Haight Street .My family and I call it the Granny Rine spot!!!

I'm going to introduce my life to you guys by sayin how you can support someone to make your life and their life better. My grandmother passed when I was 17 years old ... that's when all my sisters, my mother and I really had it tough. My granny supported us with everything: a house, food, love, and care -- that's all we really needed. I lived with her my whole life, born and raised. She was just like a mother, but I always had my real momz by my side, but not fina go too deep into detail, but when my grandmother passed - it made my fam stronger.

WHERE iS FaMilY WhEn You NeEd them???

Shit got harder as weeks passed by, but in order for me and my sis Erica too stay strong, we had to keep our heads up. My sis was 18, lookin out for herself and didn't need nobody's help really but God is always good. My sis didn't have no where to go, but my aunty had a sweetheart and accepted her in…and my sis also had a job. She was workin and stayin on her feet, that was SWEEt.

The wonderful thangs my mama did for her kids???

Man, my mama will give up da world for her kids. Momz went to rehab and changed her life, gettin her money, doin' her thang and I love her for that!!! When my mama saw that my granny passed and that's all we really had, she changed because she knew life could be better than it had been!! We lived with my granny forever. My lil sis Miracle brought support to my mother and I. She's 3 yrs of age, and if it wasn't for her right now, we wouldn't have our own spot to stay. My mom wouldn't have no job, but it was a miracle, so life got turned around.

I had got put on transitional housing, had my own space to think about how great of a fam me, my sisters and mom was going to have - and my mom was doin the same at her program.

Not much more to say, but I love my family - my mama the most because she makes shyt happenz and I have a k00l relationship with her. You only get one mother and I love mine !

- Veronica

In My Footsteps

Being sent to Mexico after going to jail and being through so much would make someone think that that's why i would change my life. But honestly, november 24th 2007, is the day my whole life hit a 180. Not only did I have to think of myself, but I had to think of this little person beinb brought into my house. Seeing my little sister made me think to myself, "What if she had to see the things I've seen? Or go through the things I've had to go through?" It made me think, "hell nah, she's not going to have to go through that shit!" I made sure that I got my life together in order to set a good example for her and help her avoid making the same mistakes I've made.

-Me

My School Life

I have done a lot of things n my life. I’ve changed a whole lot especially all the different schools I went to. I started at Edison from kindergarten until the 5th grade. I graduated from there and went to Gloria R. Davis from 6th until 8th grade. There is when my life changed. More things was happing as far as new friends, boys, stress as well as all the problems I have till this day with my mom. I had fun at that school because it was in my neighborhood and it was mostly black kids. They turned that middle school in to a Dream School and I started 9th grade there as well. Even with a lot of different stuff going on in my life all the new changes, I still remained to get good grades and stay on the Honor Roll. The dream school was supposed to go up to 12th grade, each year it would go up a grade but it got shut down and all the kids had to go to a regular high school.

So from there I went to Galileo with one of my best friends, who I’ve been going to school with since the 2nd grade. The school was so big and filled with mostly Asian kids. I didn’t know how to get to most of my classes by myself for about two weeks. The only good thing was that every one got off campus lunch; not just the seniors. After staying there for one semester I had a lot of friends, but I wasn’t really feeling the school. It was too big and most of the time I just used to cut classes because they were so boring, so that meant my grades began to drop. My mom, as well as my friend’s mom, got us both out of Galileo and we went to ISA. I heard ISA was poppin’ so I wanted to go there and check it out for myself and my other best friend went there already. When I got there it was cool. I knew a lot of people already because the school was kind of by my neighborhood. The classes was cool not too big not too small. But still they were boring and my grades were affected by it. My best friend who I had been switching schools with wasn’t doing so good either so her mom got a house in Sacramento and she went to school out there and I went to John O’Connell. This school was different to because it was small and mostly Mexicans.

My grades got back on track - not how I want them to be - but it’s way better then what they were. I guess because I had to make a decision like everything is not going to be fun and poppin’. School is not going to be how I want it and I need to stay committed to something. So I’m still here at John O’Connell and this is my senior year.

- Kenisha

My Sister

My name is Monique and one of the things I struggle with the most is my older sister Raquel. My sister Raquel start doing drugs late 90s and my nieces Kalea, Tatiana, Raquel and my nephew Aaron got taken away from her because of it about four years. I was 12 at the time.

I think that is one of my struggles because I used to be really close to my sister and all her kids. When my mother wasn’t doing so good, I would stay with my sister and her baby daddy Travis. My nieces and nephews were like my sisters and brothers – that’s why it hurts so bad that they got took away from her. Not only did they get took from her – they got took away from my family. The only family they get to see is their Dad’s family and I don’t think that’s fair because the only one who did wrong was my sister!

I don’t only blame her for getting her children took away from her – I blame her baby daddy Travis, too. I also blame her mother (we have different moms) because she was on drugs their whole life and is still on drugs. Travis is the one that got them taken away, but, at the same time, he got her hooked on those drugs. They used to live together and they started doing drugs.

My sister got hooked on them but he didn’t, so I feel that he’s to blame, too.

My sister – who is 28 now – is always in and out of jail, stealing from everywhere and the family, and always running away from the drug programs she promises she’ll stay in.

I don’t really take my sister too seriously now, but I will when or if she gets clean. It’s not fair that that’s my family and I am not even allowed to see them.
I hope we can all be a big family again and I will be able to see my nieces and nephews again because I grew up with them.

- Monique

Sisters Rising and Blogging

Welcome to the Sisters Rising blog -- the official blog of the amazing Sisters Rising program run out of The Center for Young Women's Development (CYWD) in San Francisco. This blog comes out of a collaboration with the CYWD and YO! Youth Outlook Multimedia from bi-weekly writing workshops held with Sisters Rising participants. The bloggers will discuss their lives, issues young women in the Bay Area are dealing with, media representations of young women and more. There are very few places on the internet where young women like these have space and a voice to be heard: so stay tuned ....

- Neelanjana Banerjee, Sisters Rising/YO! Youth Outlook workshop facilitator