All Image Credits: Brynlee Hollis / Imgur
Brynlee Hollis, an Idaho teenager (17) took to Imgur to share some gut-wrenching photos — showing the squalor she and her four siblings lived in while in the care of their drug-addicted mother.
“This is me at 18 months,” she wrote alongside a photo of a toddler lying in a filthy room strewn with drug paraphernalia.
“Yes, those are needles on the windowsill, and yes, this is what the entire house looked like.”
Brynlee said she and her siblings were taken into foster care after her older brother, who was 16 at the time, grew “sick of (their) conditions” and took the photos to show a teacher at school.
The images were handed to Child Protection Services, and the children were removed from their mother’s care.
Brynlee spent about nine years going back and forth to different foster homes, but has finally settled into a permanent one.
The images sparked quite a few comments, the majority showing compassion for the young woman and her siblings.
One user wrote: “My daughter is about your age and this breaks my heart.
“Please accept a really big mom hug, you deserved better.”
Another said: “It physically hurts to think of how many children are in situations exactly like this or worse right this second.”
Brynlee replied, writing: “Thank you for all the support! I was not expecting this much of a reaction!”
She also mentioned how she hoped one day to help other children in similar situations.
“I don’t want to give birth to children. I only want to foster/adopt,” she wrote.
“I would prefer older kids, as it’s harder for them to get adopted.”
Drug addiction is a very serious epidemic. Drug addiction does only affect the drug user, it affects everyone around them. If children are involved, they are helpless. If you know of children living in unstable and unsafe living conditions, it only takes one phone call to your local child protection service agency to have them perform a welfare check. It could save a life or lives.
