Jabrilla English was 24 years old and heavily pregnant when the mother of her half-brother told her to have an abortion or leave her house. She left and gave birth two weeks later after seeking refuge in a homeless shelter in New York. Five years on, life is starting to look up for Jabrilla and she has hope for her future and that of her son, Elijah.
In spite of going through what Jabrilla describes as a 'nightmare' in order to bring her son into the world, she is refreshingly down-to-earth about the whole experience: "I’m not going to play victim and say that this or that is the reason why I am in the position I am in. You have to take responsibility," she told a reporter for the New York Times, "There were some things that I could not control. But I’m a mother, I have a son, and I’m no good to him if I’m not together mentally."
As the article points out, Jabrilla's struggle to raise her son is by no means over and she is receiving support through a New York Times charitable fund, which has enabled her to buy her son a bed so that they do not have to share a futon. But I can think of a certain powerful person in the U.S. whose mother struggled single-handedly to raise him and who did rather well for himself. Unfortunately, his policies will not allow other children like Elijah to live long enough to realise their potential.
