Although we didn't have much when I was growing up in Split, Croatia, my parents always tried to ensure that my sister and I had the things we needed, and it was enough for us.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I had a wonderful mother who wanted my sister and me to have everything, even though money was a very prominent thing we didn't have. But we had a very happy childhood - pretty much ideal, in fact.
We were never a family that had a lot. We had enough, but not a lot.
I have three older sisters, so we were a reasonably large family and, in general, a happy one.
Growing up, we didn't have anything. My mum wasn't well, so I was in three care homes then foster homes before me and my little brother went back to her. I was passed from pillar to post.
Ours was a loving, nurturing household, but, at the same time, my parents' goal was to make all their children self-sufficient.
My parents, who were split up, were so good at keeping my environment strong and keeping everything around me not focused on the fact that we were poor. They got me culture. They took me to museums. They showed art to me. They read to me. And my mother drove two hours a day to take me to University Elementary School.
Our parents provided us with the essentials, then got on with their own lives. Which makes me realise that my parents were brilliant, not for what they did, but more for what they didn't do.
I had a really hard time growing up; we were a large family, and we didn't have much money at home.
I grew up as the only child, and we did not have a large family. So for me and my mother, our friends tend to become our family.
At home, growing up, we weren't really poor. We had everything we needed, we just didn't have what we wanted.