Move Toward the Mess: Curing Boredom in the Christian LifeНамуна

Rita’s Story

Rita’s mom was a prostitute. When she wasn’t working, she smoked crack in one of the many crack houses in the neighborhood. So as a little girl, instead of going to school, Rita spent her days wandering around the streets of Capitol View by herself. A family friend saw this and began to take an interest. Rita ended up moving in with this family. What should have been a blessing turned into a curse, since the men in the family began sexually abusing Rita, who was just nine years old.

As Rita grew older, she began to search for some kind of love outside of the home where she was being abused. Everything she had experienced told her that she was worthless except as a sexual object. So that’s the direction her search took her. She started dancing in strip clubs along Fulton Industrial Boulevard when she was in ninth grade. The pimps who worked the area around the club took notice. They persuaded Rita to begin work as a prostitute. They took everything from her. She had no self-esteem. Her body belonged to whoever had the money and the time. It’s no surprise that in order to deal with the pain Rita started to self-medicate. Alcohol became her drug of choice and by the time she was nineteen she was drinking up whatever cash the pimps allowed her to keep.

As the years passed, Rita began to lose her youthful good looks. She became less and less physically appealing. At some point, the pimps decided she was all used up. They drove her back to Capitol View, dumped her out onto the street, and told her to stay there. So Rita ended up back where she started, addicted and alone. She had lost the only thing that had ever made her life valuable to anybody. Well, almost.

While Rita may have no longer had the looks needed to work the clubs and streets along Fulton Industrial Boulevard, she could still eek out a living turning tricks in Capitol View and Pittsburgh, the neighborhood just up the road. The men there weren’t as picky. But the money wasn’t as good either, and there were no pimps around to protect their investment. Rita was standing on the bottom rung of the sex trade industry. And then, one Sunday afternoon, she saw some people giving away hot dogs at the corner of Desoto and Genessee.

She was immediately struck by the fact that these people didn’t want anything from her. On top of that, they were actually interested in her, not as a body but as a human being. It was unlike anything she had ever experienced. She became a regular. And every time she showed up, Leroy and Janelle, Jessica and Peter loved her, valued her, and expressed concern about her well-being. There was no judgment, only concern. It wasn’t long before Rita began to come by Leroy and Janelle’s house during the week. As time went on, Rita still worked the streets but also became part of the Lamar household.

Then Janelle became pregnant. The doctor told the couple she would give birth to twins. Rita was certain that would bring their friendship to an end. What young couple wants an over-the-hill prostitute around when there are about to be babies in the house? But as Janelle got visibly more pregnant, the invitation to be a part of their lives continued unabated. Finally, the love wore Rita down. She started to seriously consider leaving the streets, but she had nowhere to go. The handful of local nonprofits that provided a residence for women trying to escape the sex trades had no beds available.

So Leroy and Janelle did something as unthinkable as it was unavoidable. They invited Rita to live with them. On Christmas Day, 2011, Rita moved in. She would stay until a space opened up at one of the residence programs. The Lamar household was changed forever.