She got pregnant at age eleven, but then she gave birth to shock everyone. Sallyoko did not have a great start to life. Sally was one of five children to her mother, Miranda Bosby, who was unfortunately hooked on drugs. Honestly, Miranda wasn’t a good mother to her children. The older siblings were often left to look after the younger ones.
There was a difficult task when trying to balance school, growing up, and the real lack of income in the family home. Miranda was out of the house all the time and the kids were left home alone to pen for themselves with no food. The electricity got cut off regularly, as did the water. All in all, it wasn’t the right home for children, or anyone for that matter. Sally grew up knowing that she needed to fend for herself.
She attended the local public school, but the practicalities of completing homework and doing well in class with everything that was going on at home made it pretty much impossible. When she was just nine years old, Sally dropped out of school. Her prospects were looking hopeless at this point. She had one older sibling and one younger sibling still at home. 14 yearold Jaden and sevenyearold Stacey, Sally’s older siblings, had both left home.
She hardly ever heard from them, but they did try and stay in touch by messages. Still, it wasn’t just that Miranda didn’t provide for her children. She wasn’t very nice to them either. She didn’t really let Sally talk to her, and when Sally tried to, she would tell her to go off and play with her toys. Her nonexistent toys, I must add.
Well, that’s not entirely true. Sally had one toy, her light blue Teddy bear, who was named Blueboy. Sally and Stacey had the same father, though he wasn’t involved in their lives at all. Luckily, Sally had Jaden. Jaden was a rock, despite him only being 14 years old.
He doted on his little sister and did his very best to keep them fed and with acceptable clothes on their back. Jaden too wasn’t in school and say they didn’t know it at the time, but he was involved in a gang due to his age, Jaden was one of the lower ranked members. When he disappeared from the house, it was to go be with them. One Thursday evening, Sally and Stacey had finally waited for Jaden to return home, but he didn’t. Hours went by and the girls were home alone.
Finally, Miranda showed up in the early hours, but she was too out of it to notice that Jaden hadn’t come home. Sally walked over to her mom’s room and asked her something along the lines of, Mommy, do you know where Jaden is? No, Sally, how would I know where your brother is? Sally and Stacey went to bed hungry that night. The following afternoon, police officers were on their front steps.
Something terrible had happened. Jaden wasn’t going to be coming home, and Sally was now without her only ally in the world. So what had happened? Police say that Jaden had been involved in a shootout with another rival gang. Poor sweet Jaden had been caught in the crossfire.
Most horrifically of all, his gang members didn’t even take him to the hospital. There was a chance that if he had received quick care, he might have lived. The police informer end of what had happened and she broke down in tears. Sally and Stacey came over and were immediately worried. They’d never seen their mom cry before, even though she was so young.
Nine year old Sally had a feeling that this was about Jaden, so she asked her mum if it was Jaden’s dead. She was told coldly the loss of her brother is something would affect Sally for many years to come. During this altercation, the police observed the little girls. They could see that their hair hadn’t been brushed and that their faces were dirty. It didn’t help that Stacey asked Miranda if the men, referring to the police officers, had any food on them.
After this, the CPS investigation was launched. A social worker visited the house and asked to come in, but Miranda didn’t allow them to. The social worker then came back with a warrant and was able to see inside. It was a horrible scene. There was no food in the fridge other than a moldy Apple and some milk and Sally and Stacey had been sharing a bed, or should I say a mattress.
There was no bed frame at the time of the visit. The water and electricity had just been cut off social worker had seen enough and made the call that Sally and Stacey needed to be removed from the home. But the thing about children going into foster care is that to them, leaving home isn’t the best option. Far from it. When the day came to them being separated from their mother, the girls were desperate to stay behind.
There were a lot of tears involved, but unfortunately they had no say and regardless of any feelings, the home environment wasn’t suitable for children. In fact, had Jaden not been around for as long as he was, this likely would have happened years prior. Foster care was a nightmare for Sally and her whole world fell apart. When Stacey was adopted by the young couple, the sisters had now been separated. Yes, Sally was fed and bathed, but she now lost the last part of her family.
It didn’t help matters that Sally’s 10th birthday was spent without anyone knowing. It was a day to celebrate. Over the following week, Sally got more and more sad. She felt alone and got no attention from her foster home. Sally had other children in the home with her as well, but they weren’t very nice to her.
No one bullied Sally, but all the children were focused on surviving their current situation. They didn’t have time to look after a ten year old girl. One benefit was that Sally had been re enrolled in school. She quite enjoyed school. Sally’s favorite part was having books to read at home.
It felt like she was escaping to her own little world. Everything came crashing down after an incident in a foster home, though. One day after coming back from school, Sally arrived to find one very angry foster mother. She was accusing Sally of drawing on her bedroom walls. Sally had done no such thing, but this woman wouldn’t listen to her.
And then she did the unthinkable. She bent Sally over her knee and smacked her three times, all for something that Sally hadn’t even done. Sally ran back to her room and was completely shattered. She didn’t know why this woman would do something like that to her, and it was while lying in her bed that night that Sally decided she needed to get out of there. Sally knew that no adult was allowed to do that to her, especially when she hadn’t done what she was accused of.
Miranda was a terrible mother, but one thing she never did was hit Sally or any of her kids. Maybe that was because she didn’t care enough to but still, this display of violence left Sally feeling so Sally set up a plan to escape. Bear in mind, she was only ten years old at this stage and her plan was far from sophisticated. Sally’s room was on the bottom floor of the home and she was small enough to fit through the window. She’d placed a few belongings in a pillowcase, and as the sun came up, she was off.
She had no idea where she was going to go, but she knew she needed to get out of there. The following week was truly awful for Sally and the details are too much to hear. But during this time she was taken advantage of by an older boy and she didn’t know it at the time. But Sally fell pregnant. She was just ten years old.
It was around this time that an angel appeared in the form of Olga. Sally had run past Olga down an alleyway where the old woman called out to her through a thick foreign accent. Olga said, what are you doing, little one? Where are you going? Sally stopped immediately and ran back to Olga.
At first, Olga was adamant that Sally be taken back to her foster home. This was after she had asked Sally about where her family was and her response had been, I don’t have a family anymore. Sally then explained what had happened during her childhood and then during her stay at the foster home. After a while, Olga just shushed her and told the broken little girl to just come here and gave her a big hug. Sally couldn’t remember the last time she’d been hugged.
Olga decided to take Sally in and look after the little girl the best she could. Sally learned that Olga was originally from Czechoslovakia but had fallen on hard times, which was why she’d ended up living on the streets. Olga knew her way around though, and had befriended a few local grocers who helped the old woman with weekly food. Olga made sure that Sally was well fed and luck would have it that Olga used to be a teacher, so she spent afternoons teaching Sally how to read and write, plus some history and math. Sally had more of a mother in Olga than she ever had in Miranda.
The circumstances were far from perfect, but she had love that meant the world to Sally. At the stage, Sally still hadn’t told Olga what had happened to her, but noticing Sally’s growing belly, Olga finally queried with the young girl. Sally then told her what had happened, and Olga knew instantly that this ten year old girl was pregnant. She couldn’t believe it. Olga then had to explain to Sally what was going on far sooner than a young girl should ever have to learn such information.
At this stage, Sally was about six months pregnant. Olga was now in a predicament. If she took Sally to the hospital, the girl would most certainly be taken away. It wasn’t that Olga was delusional about her situation. She knew Sally couldn’t live with her forever, but she knew that Sally was happy and feared that the girl would just run away from any home that she was put into.
So over the next few weeks, Olga did her best to educate Sally on what lie ahead. Sally would have to have her child at the hospital. There’s no way around that. But for now, the two still had a few more months together and they had a birthday to celebrate. Then the day finally came and Sally was about to have the baby.
Olga hurried her along to the state hospital and the nurses were absolutely shocked by what she had told them. The girl was eleven years old and she was having a baby. They’d never seen someone so young in that position. Cps was called and Olga waited in the waiting room. She wasn’t going to be in any trouble as she had simply looked after Sally over the past nine months or so.
Without her, Sally might not be alive anymore. Sally ended up needing a C section and the nurses couldn’t believe what came out. Not only was Sally pregnant, but she was pregnant with twins. Even though she was so young, Sally insisted that her babies were not going to be taken away from her. She did know that CPS have been called and was feeling terrified about going into foster care.