It's not unusual for kids to look up to their parents and think of them as their heroes. At one point or another, they grow out of the mindset that mom or dad are super heroes and refer to famous athletes, movie stars or singers as their idols. But for me, my parents have always been #1 on the list of people I look up to. You could say that it is because they raised me, and I will always think of them as heroes for that reason. But once my dad died, my mom became my hero on a whole new level. She saved me.

I was only 16 when my dad passed away. It is always hard to deal with a death, but it can be very difficult at such a vulnerable age. Without my mom to help my family, I don't know if we would have gotten through it. Suddenly, she had become a single parent with three kids. I'm sure it was very hard for her to keep up with all of us and stay as strong as she did, but she did it. I looked to her when I felt I couldn't keep going, because she was living proof that no matter how hard life gets, you can't just stop when things get difficult.

There wasn't one exact moment when I realized my mom was my hero, there were many. Like most girls, I went through a very hard breakup, two actually. Each time when I needed someone she was there. I'm not a very open person, so I didn't want to tell her much about what happened, but when she saw how depressed I was getting, she coaxed me to open up. There were tears and crying and hugging, and then she gave me words of wisdom. With her words, I was able to get back on my feet from the nasty breakups and reclaim the person I was before. It took time, but without my mother helping me, there's no way I could've done it.

My mother has also shown me what it means to have faith. It can be easy to lose faith in everything when someone close to you is gone, but even through all the pain, my mother's faith grew stronger. She never lost hope or gave up on God and she made sure we didn't either. Without her showing us first hand that there is still good in the world, I would have only seen the bad.

Lastly, she is my hero because she has proven to me, time and time again, that no matter how alone I feel in the world, she will always love me. I'm so blessed to have a mother who never stops loving me or my family. She continues to show us that her love is neverending. And for that, she will always be not only a wonderful mom, but my hero.