The Real World. . . . .

Directly out of high school, my parents sent me to college; CU Denver Center. I had no goals, no clear understanding of what I was going to do with my education, and I promptly failed my first semester. There would be no more college on their nickle.

I began work at a local donut shop working the graveyard shift preparing, decorating, and selling donuts and coffee. That lasted for about 16 months, and I realized I wanted more than to finish donuts, so I applied at one of the banks downtown for a position "coding" insurance documents. This was my first exposure to computers, key punch, and the resulting keypunch cards; trays and trays of cards. While there, one of my co-workers introduced me to her boyfriend's best friend; a slick talking, good looking, fun loving man that I quickly thought I was in love with. Within six months we were married and 10 1/2 months later my oldest child was born and my husband was on his third job and drinking pretty heavily. He was very possessive of my time, to the point of being abusive if he felt that I was slighting him in the least. The night I ran from the house, carrying my screaming 15-month old he threw an iron through the front window trying to stop me. He was so drunk that he could not get the keys in the ignition, but not too drunk to hit me repeatedly. I made it safely to my parents home about 1 1/2 miles away, and filed for divorce within one month after that. Six months after leaving him, I gave birth to my second child.

Welcome to the real world. I am a divorced, single parent with two little boys dependent upon me for everything. I have no education beyond high school, and no job. I think it is time to make a decision. I remembered my love for medicine and found that I could take a course at CCD in Radiological Technology. The pay was good and the demand was high. It was a two year course with a 1 year internship, and I graduated with an Associate in Science. This time I qualified for a grant and I completed my studies and internship with a 4.0 grade average. The moral of this story is, college makes sense if you know why you are there and you have a goal.

It is really not healthy to wonder what life would have been like if I had made a decision directly out of high school instead of just floating along with the current. I dearly love my two oldest boys. They were worth the abuse and the knowledge gained. They have been extremely close to my heart every since the day each was born.