I am blessed to be able to call him my brother

           My family moved to Texas and ten years later I saw my brother  Erik again. It was May of 2009 that I got to see him, and I didn’t just see him he also brought his girl friend and his one year old daughter. They mean so much to me he has been someone very important in my life that has thought me about real love towards family. He also proved to me that faith is the last thing you lose, after everything he went through. I didn’t go through his life but I feel like I have went through the experience with him, he is one of the most important persons in my life that I can always trust and count on. He has always done what he thinks is best for the family; Even for me and my little brothers. He changed his way of living when he went to live with us. He told me he stopped doing a lot of things to make sure my little brothers and I would be safe. We lived in a bad place in California it was in the ghetto so of course he would have to fight with others. He would also use drugs and do other stuff he shouldn’t have but he changed for us. I will never be able to stop saying how proud I am of him. He showed me everything: Love, hope, humility, faith, and critical thinking. I am just so proud to have him as a brother and to be able to tell the whole world how proud I always am and will be of him. Since when I was little I have always looked up to him. He has always been my hero. He has not always been close to me because he had to stay in California to help his other sister and brothers but he has always been with me in my heart. He has a two year old daughter named Emalei it will probably sound weird and crazy but I feel like if she were mine too. I just would not be able to live without her, I love her so much and would give anythin for her to be happy. She is my first neice and in November when I go back to California I will meet my nephew. My sister in law will have their baby November 16th and I will get to California on the 20th. I can't wait to meet my new nephew. My family means everything to me!

My older brothers life

I have two younger brothers and two older half-brothers. My two older brothers are not from the same mom. They both had totally different lives. I love them both but I feel a special attachment to one of them. My brother Erik did not have a very good life. They both lived with their moms but Erik’s mom was always gone she used drugs and never took care of them. My brother was always locked up in a room with his other brothers and his one other sister. Their meals where bags of chips and sodas, that is the great meal their mom would give them before she would lock them in the room and get high. Once he got a little older he started going out and being in the streets of California all day. One day my brother went home like any other day but he got home to the surprise of an empty house. He started asking neighbors what had happened. His answer was his mom had been checked up by child services and she got the custody of her children taken away. His sister and his brothers had been taken to a foster home. Erik was also being looked for by the child services to be taken to a foster home too. He decided to hide from them, he did not want to end up in a foster home. He was only twelve and he was in the streets all alone. He decided to go with a friend and stayed with him for a couple of months. Once November came by and he saw family coming over for thanksgiving dinner he decided he didn’t belong in that house. He called his mom and said he was going to turn himself in to the foster home. After he was in foster home for a while we got a call asking if we wanted to take him with us. My dad obviously said yes, but it was not that easy. My dad had to be visiting him and prove that he would take care of him. The foster home was six hours from our house. My dad still went and after two years they let Erik come live with us. After two years of him living with us my dad decided to move to Texas but my brother wanted to stay to take care of his other brothers. He was only fifteen and decided to fight for his family