Love Yourself First

Happy Petrishko 

Wife and Mother of two

This is story of a woman who never seizes to amaze me. Recently I ran to her for help and the one thing I got out of the conversation we had was, “Honey you need to love yourself first”. I stopped in my tracks and thought to myself, this woman has been through hell and back, led a life that I can’t bring myself to imagine and yet she is the same woman who is standing before me telling me to “Love Myself First”. Many of us look at our circumstances, our past, our reality and think “my struggle is too real so I don’t deserve the best”. After reading Happy’s story, I want each one of you to reflect and conclude whether your challenge is greater than your Worth. Happy is the most confident and self-acknowledged person I know….she recognizes her worth.

I’m proud to call her my friend, my sister and one of the many people with a story that are deserves a telling. In her own words…….

Exile child born in Zimbabwe to a South African father and a Zimbabwean mother, my first childhood memory is vivid, I don’t remember much, I just remember getting into trouble with my older brothers and that the police were called. From the age of 1 to 6, I remember my father being successful and extremely intelligent. He had a gift of the gab which I think I inherited from him. We lived in a huge house in Zimbabwe, had a domestic worker and a gardener. My father owned a few petrol stations among other business. At age 7 we moved to SA.

It only became a reality to me that my childhood life was going to be a struggle when at this age of 7 my father physically punished me so hard that my head was pouring down with blood from the beating that he was giving me. I got stitches on my head that day.

My mom was a farm girl with very little education, so when my dad began to struggle, lost his businesses, she became the bread winner of the house and she worked as a home nurse for Red Cross.

At the age of 11, I got molested by my god father, Uncle Frank.  I had to grow up very quickly; I took this life of destruction into my own hands. My life consisted of parties, sex and drugs. I started using Ecstasy, acid, man-drugs, glue sniffing, cocaine, cough mixtures

At 17 years, I met Alex who is my husband now. I met him through his best friend who I dated for 6 years. He was my first serious boyfriend because at that time I went for bad boys popular boys. We all grew up in the same neighborhood accept I grew up on the wrong side of the fence. Alex and I became best friends; he was the only human being I felt my inner childhood with. Yet, I still found a way to self-distract and I lost Alex.

I disappeared from my home and made a choice to live in the streets my brother. We were both hustling in the streets and we became a menace to society together stealing and so forth. Everyone knows when you are on the streets most females become sex workers. Well in my case  I thank God that I chose not to be one as I could not  see myself ever doing that it would have killed whatever soul I had left completely.

I was in and out of jail on many occasions if I was not in the streets getting high I was in Jail doing time. I had lost a lot of weight I was about 39 to 40kg, I was getting very little sleep staying in shelters, staircases and in those times I witnessed a lot of what goes down in this dark world. 3 years of living this crazy life style

One night I was coming back from hustling. I met a guy that drove with me in the same cab. He gave me his number and said I should visit him some time. I found myself phoning him occasionally, this went on for about 5 months. Towards the 5th month we slept together. On the very same day, I made a choice to go back home to my mother as I felt the street would kill me one day. My mother made the best choice for my life; she took me back home to Zimbabwe where she was born in the farm lands. In other words GOD quickly came to my rescue without me realizing it.

I came back to SA after I had cleaned up. I only came to the realization of how upset I was that grown up men could take my innocence and rob me of my childhood by molesting me and all I had  ever needed was a father figure and love instead they betrayed me. So I relapsed

I continued to get high and nobody had seen me for over 2 months. One day my body just gave up because of too much crack cocaine and heroin that I fell in front of some flats in Sunny Side when a passer-by phoned an ambulance. I woke up in hospital and was told by the Doctor that I was 5 months pregnant. My mother took me back to Zimbabwe. I cleaned up again and returned to SA. I gave birth to my miracle baby girl who saved my life through Jesus Christ. I named her Kiarah. It’s a simple fact had I remained in South Africa for those 3 months and found that I was pregnant I would have selfishly aborted like I have done before instead GOD saved this pregnancy so that I could be saved. I phoned ‘50c’ who is the biological father, the guy I met in the cab. I told tell him that I was pregnant with his child but he denied it.

So, here I was with a child from a drug dealer from the streets, no money, no nothing but yet again GOD had a huge plan for me. This baby who I just gave birth to would change my life forever, for the better. I got home from hospital with a new born baby only to my surprise to find boxes of pampers and baby clothes were waiting for me.

One day I received a phone call from a recruitment agency. It turns out my sister had advertised my CV online so they wanted to see me for a co-operate job interview as a receptionist which I had never done before. By some miracle I got the job. I was so in Christ that I was no longer interested in things of this world. One year of being completely sober, out of the blue my sister informs me that she had bumped into my best friend of many years, my soul mate, Alex. We then phoned each other and met up. I introduced him to Kiarah and on that day God performed yet another miracle. He shifted Alex’s heart and made him fall in love with Kiarah from day one and they have become inseparable. Blessing after blessing just showered my life. I’ve managed to travel around the world, bought a car which is now paid in full, got married to my best friend and was blessed with another child, Valentina.

The list goes on and on with how God has completely blown my mind, I have been clean and sober for many years now. Life has its challenges, but my GOD rescued me from so much, from killing myself. He has shown me love. I have forgiven but not easily forgotten and pray that all the people I have hurt forgive me too. I lost my dear brother to the street. My mom found him in the bathroom still alive but he had just taken heroin and it was too late so he passed on. He was only in his early 20’s. For as long as I remain in GOD my faithful loving father who is so full of grace and mercy I am Happy.