If You Only Knew…

By Charisse Smith

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If you only knew how many times my life has been rewritten by someone else’s pen, you might understand why telling my own story matters so much to me. People often meet me and see only the present version of who I am—a woman who stands with strength and determination. What they cannot see are the

chapters that came before. They cannot see the storms that shaped that strength or the silence that sometimes followed those storms.

My story began when I was very young, sitting quietly on a couch while adults spoke about my life as if I were not even in the room.

A social worker held a thick folder in her hands. That folder was filled with reports, summaries, and observations written by people who had only

spent brief moments observing my family but believed they understood everything about our lives.

Inside that folder was my childhood.

To the people writing those reports, it was documentation. It was procedure. It was simply part of their job. But to a child sitting nearby,

watching their mother struggle to explain her life to strangers, it felt like judgment delivered before anyone had truly listened.

My mother stood near the window during that meeting. Her arms were folded tightly across her chest as the social workers spoke in calm voices

about concerns, evaluations, and possible outcomes. I remember watching her face carefully, trying to understand what those words meant.

Children may not understand every detail adults say, but they understand fear when they see it.

Eventually someone said something that would follow me for years.

“This may become a three-hundred case.”

At the time the number meant nothing to me. It sounded like a classroom number or the name of a hallway in a building somewhere far away.

But the way the adults in the room reacted told me it was important. The way my mother’s expression changed told me it was serious.

Years later I would learn that those words referred to a law that allows the state to intervene in families when authorities believe a child

may be at risk. In theory it is meant to protect children. In reality it sometimes means that strangers begin deciding the future of families

they barely understand.

That was the day the system first learned my name.

Soon afterward my life changed.

Foster care became part of my childhood. I moved from home to home, each place unfamiliar in its own way.

Some homes were kind and welcoming, while others felt temporary and uncertain. Each house had its own rules,

its own expectations, and its own quiet understanding that my stay might not last long.

Children who grow up in foster care learn survival quickly. They learn how to read the mood of a room before anyone speaks.

They learn that belongings must sometimes be packed quickly because change can arrive without warning.

But they also learn resilience.

Even during those early years something inside me refused to give up. I did not yet have the language to describe it,

but a quiet strength was already growing within me.

Years passed, and the little girl described in those reports eventually grew into a young woman.

Adulthood arrived without instructions. There was no blueprint explaining how to navigate life after growing up in a system

that had always made decisions for me.

So I began building my life piece by piece.

Eventually I became a mother, and that moment changed everything.

Holding my child for the first time felt like holding the future itself. I remember looking down at that tiny face

and realizing that I now carried the responsibility of protecting another life. In that moment I made a promise

that came from the deepest part of my heart.

My children would experience a life different from mine.

They would know love. They would know safety. They would grow up believing that they belonged in this world

without fear of being uprooted again and again.

Motherhood became the center of my life. Every decision I made was guided by the desire to give my children stability

and protection.

But life does not always follow the plans we make for it.

The same systems that once evaluated my childhood eventually returned to evaluate my life as a parent.

Meetings were scheduled. Questions were asked. Reports were written once again.

Suddenly my life was appearing in paperwork again.

Once again strangers were describing my story in language that did not fully capture the truth of who I was.

Some reports used words that painted a picture of instability. Others hinted at concerns that felt exaggerated or

misunderstood. Reading those documents felt like looking at a stranger’s story rather than my own life.

But official words carry power. Once something appears in a report, it begins traveling from office to office,

shaping how others view you—even if the full truth has never been heard.

Eventually decisions were made that separated me from my children.

That day remains one of the most painful memories of my life. The world outside continued moving normally—cars driving

down the street, people walking through hallways carrying coffee cups, conversations happening as if nothing

significant had changed.

But inside my heart everything had shattered.

A mother’s love does not disappear when her children are taken from her. If anything, it becomes heavier.

It becomes something you carry with you everywhere, even when there is no place to express it.

Years passed and the distance between us grew in ways that were difficult to repair. Stories written in official files began shaping how others understood my life, including my own children.

That silence and separation created a pain that is difficult to describe.

Then another challenge arrived.

Cancer.

When the doctor spoke the diagnosis, the room seemed to slow down. For a moment everything felt unreal.

I had already survived childhood instability, systemic judgment, and the heartbreak of family separation.

Now I was facing a battle inside my own body.

Treatment was exhausting and uncertain. Some days felt endless, filled with fear and physical pain.

But something inside me refused to surrender.

I had already learned how to survive.

Slowly, treatment ended and healing began. Surviving cancer became another chapter in my story,

one that reminded me how fragile life can be and how strong the human spirit must become in order to endure hardship.

Life continued to present new challenges. Housing instability became one of them. At times I found myself dealing with landlords who misused their authority and created stressful living conditions

for tenants who simply wanted a safe place to live.

Being a disabled tenant navigating those situations was exhausting.

False accusations, intimidation, and harassment sometimes became part of the environment.

But by that point I had already learned an important lesson: people may try to define your story,

but they do not control your strength.

Through every hardship, one thing remained constant in my life.

Faith.

Not the easy kind of faith people speak about casually, but the kind that grows through hardship and perseverance.

Faith that exists in quiet moments of prayer when the future feels uncertain.

Faith that whispers softly during the darkest nights: keep going.

Over time I began rebuilding my life again. Healing does not happen overnight. Some wounds take years to understand. Some relationships carry scars that never completely disappear.

My relationship with my children remains complicated by years of separation and misunderstanding.

That reality hurts deeply.

But pain is not the entire story of my life.

What defines my life is resilience.

What defines my life is the decision, repeated again and again, to continue moving forward even when circumstances

seem overwhelming.

Today when people see me they often see only the present moment—a woman standing with determination and strength.

What they do not see are the chapters that created that strength.

They do not see the child sitting quietly while adults discussed her future.

They do not see the foster homes and the uncertainty that followed.

They do not see the mother holding onto love even after separation from her children.

They do not see the patient sitting in a hospital room hearing the word cancer.

They do not see the nights spent praying for guidance and strength.

All of those moments live inside me.

They shaped the person I became.

They taught me compassion for others who struggle quietly. They taught me perseverance when the world

seemed determined to misunderstand my story.

Most importantly, they taught me that survival itself can be an act of courage.

I am not the words written in those old reports.

I am not the assumptions others made about my life.

I am a survivor.

I am a woman who refused to disappear.

And despite every storm, every hardship, every attempt to define my story without my voice—I am still here.

Still breathing.

Still believing.

Still standing.

Hope is not something the world gives you easily.

Hope is something you discover after every storm that tried to break you.

And if you only knew the storms I have walked through, you might understand why I refuse to stop believing

in what is still possible.