After years of wrestling with depression and trauma from childhood sexual abuse, Noelle ended up on the streets like many unlucky young women. Just a teenager, she was exposed to many potentially dangerous situations, including one night when a man grabbed her and held a knife to her throat. She was saved by another young woman who leapt onto the man’s back and scared him off.
Through these painful experiences, Noelle gained inner strength and learned that she had a quiet gift for healing. She knew she had to offer that gift to others. This sparked her journey into medicine.
“The pain of my childhood had lit a fire inside of me, which the struggles and experiences of the women around me sustained. I took that fire, and decided to carry it as a guiding light for the empowerment and betterment of women everywhere.”
Noelle finished her GED and began studying alternative healing and medicine. Later, she took up massage therapy, and traveled to learn more about the healing arts.
After she gave birth to her two sons, she says, “This was the beginning of the most rewarding journey as a woman. … The healing that I had done helped me to be an available and loving mother. My sons have had the experience of knowing a healthy home and a healthy love and I trust that as a result, they will know how to be good men and good fathers.”
Now that her sons are almost grown, Noelle has decided it’s finally time to fulfill her dream and commit to nursing school.
“Nursing school has given me a path and direction that will lead me toward professional and personal fulfillment, as well as providing quality service and passionate dedication to the community I serve.”
“Yet the financial compromise made by not being able to work as much, is beginning to have a substantial impact on our lives.”
The Live Your Dream Awards she received will support Noelle and her family as she finishes her dual associate and bachelor’s in nursing next year.
“It will allow me to focus more of my time and energy on studies, and less on the logistics of how I’m going to pay the bills and provide enough food for these growing sons of mine.”
“I am an excellent student and a dedicated mother. This award will help me to be both.”
Noelle was selected by volunteer judges to receive a $1,000 first level and $3,000 second level Live Your Dream Awards.
About the Live Your Dream AwardsThe Live Your Dream Awards provide over $2 million in education grants to about 1,500 women each year. Since 1972, the program has helped tens of thousands of women achieve social and economic empowerment through education. <strong>HOW TO APPLY</strong> <strong>HOW TO HELP</strong> |