Rewriting the Binary: My Journey Home

As a child of the foster care system, you’re never really prepared to hear the words “get out.”

But for me, it wasn’t just about being told to leave. It was about realizing that the people who raised me, who were supposed to love me unconditionally, could decide that who I was becoming made me unworthy of staying.

That’s the part people don’t always understand.

My journey through homelessness didn’t start on the street. It started much earlier, inside a home where I was trying to figure out who I was, and whether there was room for that version of me to exist.

Growing Up Trying to Fit

I grew up in a big adoptive family. On paper, it looked like everything was fine. But internally, things were always shifting.

I was a Black kid in a mostly white community, already standing out in ways I couldn’t control. At the same time, I was starting to question my identity, my gender, my sexuality, and I didn’t have the language or the safety to explore that honestly.

So I did what a lot of kids do…tried to adjust.

I got involved in church, tried to follow the rules, and tried to be who I thought I needed to be to belong.

But the more I tried to suppress that part of myself, the louder it got.

And the response around me wasn’t support but was instead correction, control, and silence.

At one point, I was put into programs that were supposed to “fix” me. Spaces that treated my identity like something that needed to be managed or erased. That does something to you.

You start to question everything, like whether you deserve to be loved at all.

Finding Something That Was Mine

The one place I didn’t feel completely shut down was in the arts.

Performing gave me a way to express things I couldn’t say out loud and a sense that there was more out there. Maybe there was a version of my life where I didn’t have to hide.

That idea stayed with me even when everything else felt uncertain, so I held onto that.

The Moment Everything Changed

Leaving home was a buildup, not one big dramatic decision.

Arguments and tension grew, along with a growing understanding that I wasn’t going to be accepted as I was.

Eventually, it reached a point where I was told, directly and indirectly, that I didn’t belong there anymore.

So I packed what I could, got on a bus to New York City, and hoped I could figure it out when I got there.

I had no plan and no backup, just the belief that staying wasn’t an option.

Showing Up With Nothing

When I arrived in New York, reality hit quickly.

I didn’t have anyone and I didn’t have a job or a place to stay.

I found Covenant House through a search and walked there from Port Authority. At first, they told me they were full. I remember thinking, “Of course,” complete with an eyeroll. “Just my luck.”

But as I was about to leave, a bed had opened up and I was called back. That moment still stays with me. That call didn’t just change my night. It changed everything that came after.

What Covenant House Gave Me

Covenant House was the first place where I saw people living openly in ways I had never been exposed to. There were trans women in different stages of transition, young people from all kinds of cultural backgrounds, people navigating their identities without being shut down for it.

It was overwhelming at first but it was also freeing.

For the first time, I could start figuring out who I was without someone trying to control the answer.

I had access to mental health support.

There was so much structure and people who actually listened. Over time, I started to rebuild my sense of self.

What Pride Means to Me

Pride, for me, is a celebration. It’s choosing to be visible after being told your identity is something to hide. It’s unlearning the idea that you have to earn your right to exist as yourself.

There were years where I thought I had to choose between being accepted and being authentic.

Now I know that wasn’t a real choice. It was a condition placed on me and I’ve let that go.

Carrying It Forward

It’s been more than a decade since I first walked into Covenant House.

Now, I come back as an alum. I also serve as a speaker who can stand in front of young people and say, “I’ve been where you are.”

When I share  my story, I do my best not to minimize what they’re going through but to make space for it.

Every young person’s story is different, layered, and complicated.

But we all deserve to be treated with dignity and supported without conditions.

Covenant House gives us the freedom to figure out who we are on our own terms.

Still Becoming

Today I am a lifelong learner, still growing and creating.

But I’m doing it as fully myself, unapologetically.

And if there’s one thing I know now that I didn’t know then, it’s this:

There was never anything wrong with me. I just needed to be somewhere that could hold that truth.