My name is Royal Roan Eagle and this is my story, well as brief as I can. The first half of my life I lived on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, and life was brutal there. I lived with a father who drinks a lot and he was abusive too. I had to live like I was caged in a house like a bird, to morn my pain I went to school, that was the only place where I felt safe. When my father left, the many scars he left on us didn’t hurt anymore, before I didn’t like having them on my body.
The people who helped us with giving us food when it was winter, which was only one, my auntie, she died some time ago. I lived thru so much in my young life, being the first person in my family to be in college, it was hard getting here. I am not giving up, and giving my all, I am royal and I be damned to have anyone take that away again.