I don’t usually talk about where I came from. Most people know me because of the opportunities I’ve had, the degrees I’ve earned, or the positions I hold today. They see the finished picture, but they don’t know what it took to get here.
Today, I want to share my story, not because I’m looking for sympathy or praise, but because I know someone out there is fighting a battle they think they can’t overcome. If my story reminds just one person not to give up, then it is worth telling.
Before I was born, my biological father rejected me. For the first 18 years of my life, I never knew what it felt like to have a father. It wasn’t until my aunt, and her husband took me into their home and loved me as their own that I was finally able to call someone “Dad.”
Growing up was anything but easy. I attended a public primary school where every student had to carry their own chair and table to school each day. My school bag wasn’t really a school bag. It was a polythene bag, or sometimes a rice sack with a nylon string tied around it so I could carry my books on my back.
I walked miles to school and back every single day. There were days when I sat through school hungry because I had no money to buy food. After school, I walked long distances to fetch water, and sometimes I hawked just to survive.
I wore other people’s old school uniforms for years. The first time I ever wore a brand-new school uniform was when I entered senior high school. My shoes were worn out and falling apart, but I wore them anyway because missing school was never an option.
While in senior high school, I was sent home many times because I couldn’t pay my school fees. Sometimes it happened during exams, even during my final examinations.
Then came another painful chapter. I failed my Senior High School examination and spent the next five years at home wondering if my dreams had ended before they had even begun. University felt impossible. I never imagined I would ever step onto a university campus as a student.
When I finally did, life was still far from comfortable. For three years, I slept on the floor while others slept on student beds because I could not afford student housing. Most days, my meal was simply cassava flakes (gari), hot pepper sauce (shito), and water because that was all I could afford.
Even after earning my first master’s degree, I worked in a restaurant for a year just to make ends meet.
Success didn’t arrive overnight. It came one difficult day at a time.
I’ve failed more times than I can count. I’ve been homeless. I’ve been broken. I’ve felt hopeless and confused. I’ve made mistakes that taught me hard lessons. I’ve been laughed at, looked down on, and embarrassed. There were nights I cried alone and wondered if all the sacrifices would ever be worth it.
But every single time life knocked me down, I got back up.
When people look at my life today, they see the achievements, the degrees, the titles, and the opportunities. What they don’t see is the little village girl who studied under a lantern, carried her chair to school, walked miles to fetch water, slept on the floor, and survived on almost nothing.
They don’t see the disappointments, the doors that never opened, the prayers that seemed unanswered, or the tears that no one else ever saw.
But God saw every one of them.
Today, that same village girl serves as the Graduate Senator at her university. She has also had the privilege of sitting alongside world leaders and decision-makers at the United Nations.
None of this happened because life was easy. It happened because I refused to let my circumstances decide my future.
This is not a story about luck. It is not a request for sympathy.
It is a story about resilience.
Your beginning does not have to determine your ending. No matter where you are today, don’t give up on yourself. Keep believing. Keep working. Keep moving forward.
You never know how far resilience can take you.
Source: FG Newswire