#YOWO

     My name is Briana Hesse. On the outside I seem just like anyone else. I am white, 5'5", and I have both of my parents living at home. However, my life is anything but ordinary. My family was hit hard by the recession, both financially and emotionally. I had to grow up dealing with the implications of this and I currently still deal with it today. I also have to deal with the fact that affording college will be more difficult for me than it will be for my friends. But God has been there through it all for me and he will be in the future.                                                                                                                                                   When I was 8 years old, my father lost his job. Around that same time my mother lost hers as well. For many years after this my family lived in fear of becoming homeless. However, we did not lose our home, but we did have to surrender our pride. We lived off of food stamps, and the generosity of others. Not until after getting into debt, and 5 years did my father become employed again.
        The economic recession not only hurt us financially, but it also hurt us relationally. My parents’ relationship has not been the same since the recession and it still isn’t. I had to deal with that throughout high school and middle school which was stressful. However, I managed to achieve a GPA of 4.02.  And I will be one of the first people in my entire family to earn a college degree.
     Throughout my struggles in life God has shown himself to me. I think my faith in God is what makes me stand out the most from others. Unfortunately there is no scholarship for faith in God, but there doesn’t need to be. If God wants me to go to college after all that I have been through, I know that it will happen. Because my family should have been homeless, my father should have not gotten the job he did, and my parents should have split up. But by the grace of God none of that happened. So, God is the final say in my life. I don’t think that there are a lot of people out there who truly believe that, but in my situation I have to. Because if I don’t then I won’t go to college or achieve my dreams, but I know from my past experiences that God will come through in my life. And that is what makes me one in a million. I am a child of the One True King.