“The only time my mother spoke to us was when she was drunk....

“The only time my mother spoke to us was when she was drunk. And she’d tell us we were unwanted. She convinced me to drink with her when I was ten. She told me that it would make me feel better. I started smoking crack when I was twelve. I never learned to read or write. I lost my entire childhood. My friends and I would break into cars, steal whatever we could, and use the money to buy more. It made me feel good and I wanted to feel good all the time. And nobody ever tried to stop me.”

(Santiago, Chile)