Liz Quiroz is a survivor. For roughly 12 years she was addicted and trafficked on the streets of San Francisco. She is outgoing, passionate and brutally honest as you will hear this week’s episode of From Sparks to Light.

I met her several years ago when she was a student in one of my classes, first, at the junior college when she was studying to be an alcohol and drug counselor and then again as a sociology undergrad. I’d heard her tell her story even before that, a guest speaker in a room full of strangers telling a story about a life I could hardly imagine. I remember leaving the conference room that day my head swimming with what I’d just heard.

Her’s is a story about redemption. About second chances and what happens when you turn your life around. About learning to be honest, and never giving up, no matter how many times you get knocked down. She talks about how she remade her life and dedicated it to making sure that what happened to her, doesn’t happen to others.

In the years since her final confinement, Elizabeth battled to reclaim her life. Now, clean for more than a decade, she’s overcome addiction, arrests and incarceration. She’s gotten married and along with her husband, built a new blended family. She earned and a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Sonoma State University and is currently working on her Master’s degree in Social Justice. In 2018 she received a full pardon from the governor of California.

That same year, Liz and her partner Lisa McQuaid formed Redemption House of the Bay Area. A non-profit dedicated to helping victims of trafficking. Elizabeth’s memoir, Purified in the Flame, will be released next month.

I’m so grateful to Liz Quiroz for sharing her story with me on the podcast. I hope you’ll enjoy this frank and honest conversation about a subject many of us know very little about. You can listen here.