From Foster Care to Westeros

I’ll never forget when I heard about Game of Thrones. I had been recommended it by a friend, who also was my foster sister. I was packing up my bag to leave foster care, or AWOL, as they call it for us, after 10 years of hell. I wasn't about to make it 11. She was the only person who knew, and who I trusted living there. I love to journal usually, but the staff went through everything we had, including diaries. If I dared to write that I felt like leaving, I would be put on “R-Level”, which was 21 hours a day in your room, with three designated hours, two hours for cleaning, 30 minutes for bathrooms, and 30 minutes for eating. Another AWOL would mean two months of R level, a report to my social worker, and possibly juvenile hall for an indeterminate amount of time.

I remember packing, and her putting the book in my hand.

“Take this with you. You remind me of Arya, and Daenerys, who are two of my favorite characters. You’re gonna need something to do other than be a fugitive for a bit.”

I remember how sad she looked. And how bittersweet it was to have my only friend in the world, who made living there somewhat tolerable, to leave her behind, and venture into the world with no money, and no legal freedom or autonomy.

I hugged her goodbye, and we promised that we would stay connected on Facebook. She was my last bit of family. But she was going to a new placement, and I had already proven to be “too defiant” for this system. I couldn’t handle being separated from yet another family member.

I had slipped out the back, with the small bag she helped me pack, the big books bouncing around against my back.

When I finally made it to the train station to get to Bakersfield from Camarillo, I brought out the book. I didn't allow myself to cry, or to sigh from relief that I could go where I wanted, how I wanted. But I was going to zone out, and be with the book my best friend gave me.

I was enraptured from its first pages. Terrifying ice creatures laughing at Ser Waymar Royce, but then we began jumping around POVs of characters I would come to love. Reading Daenerys’ chapters were a connection to Darby*, my best friend. I finished the book during my week long journey in Bakersfield, and then I heard about the show. I was fascinated.

As I crossed the country, from California, to Illinois, to Florida, to Illinois, to back to California, and then back again, I watched in multiple Best Buy’s and bars, trying to get the next episode. I was filled with wonder, and for the first time in a long time, hope.

Seeing Dany, go from an abusive situation, to getting a new husband, becoming a Khaleesi, fight back against her brother when she harmed her son, was like I was able to have the support of Darby from thousands of miles away.

And then, at age 17, I became pregnant with my son, which only deepened my need to stay away from foster care. I wasn't going back, and they weren’t going to take my son, my own son. But I wasn’t afraid. In fact being pregnant made me bolder, fiercer, like a dragon, or a mother of dragons.

I cleaned houses, I worked under-the-table jobs, and did what I could to get by, which made me feel like Arya, who was everything I wanted to be as a young girl with a bunch of people telling me I wouldn't matter, and that I didn't matter, or that I was just another cog in the wheel.

I was 18 when my son was born. It was 2012, the year of the Dragon. I never felt fiercer, or more determined to make it, then when he was put into my arms.

After he was born, I made my way back from Florida to California, where I enrolled in college, and connected with my best friend again.

My paper on Game of Thrones impact from me for my acting class, was the catalyst to meet my husband, and someone I consider a brother. Watching each season we would all get together, discuss theories and fight over who should win the throne or if the Night King should just wipe them all out.

Without Game of Thrones, and the inspiration of the vastly diverse set of characters, I wouldn't have ever had the strength to keep going, to keep fighting, to not let a system wash me away. I wouldn't have my best friend, my husband of almost six years, and now three little dragons of my own. I walked into my own pyre when I left foster care those years ago, and emerged new. Free. Powerful.

Instead of an army, I built a family, something I thought I would never have.

So to Game of Thrones, I thank you. For giving me the much needed strength to leave, but not slip under the cracks. I climbed that ladder of chaos, and out of it, I got my own army, my family, and my children.