"I swear ever since that night, it was like Anthony Jr. just stopped growing up," I was saying to my neighbor, Joanne, sitting on the front porch of my home. It was the same home I had lived in when my husband had walked out. But it was ten years later now and I was making the payments on the house.

"I grew up pretty quick after that. I know I was 32, but I wasn't...I'd never been responsible for anything really before. After that, I just... I knew that I needed to do what was necessary to take care of my son. I got a job and I went...