Ziporah's Story: A Recipe for Success

Somewhere along the way, a truly gifted chef usually masters the culinary sleight-of-hand that makes everything they do seem magically effortless.

Plating a gorgeous spinach-stuffed salmon filet — the centerpiece of an appetizing, thoughtfully-composed platter — Ziporah, 21, would say there’s actually nothing magical about it.

In cooking, as in life, accomplishing goals requires hard work.

“I’m not gonna say I just came up on food like this,” Ziporah grinned, finishing the platter with sizzling stalks of roasted broccoli right out of the oven. “It took a lot for me to learn how to cook and to love what I’m doing. When I first started, it wasn’t looking like it looks now. It took me a minute.

“Now, it looks like it’s coming out of a restaurant.”

She wasn’t wrong. And she’s not arrogant. For Ziporah, the point of cooking is not to show out — it’s to invite others in. 

“Cooking is a joyful thing. I want to help people, and I like to feed people, as well. It just brightens my heart,” she said. “Everybody needs to be helped. I was one of those people that wanted to be helped. I found Immerse Arkansas, and they helped me. Now it’s my time to keep motivating and helping people.”

On her own since she was 14, Ziporah was a single mom experiencing homelessness with her autistic toddler when she heard about Immerse from a family friend.

“I felt unwanted, I was very depressed, I was mad. I just felt like I didn’t have nobody,” Ziporah said. “I was ready to give up.”

Before long, she and her son were accepted into Immerse’s LifeBASE Care transitional program for pregnant or parenting youth ages 18-21.

“Immerse is really a blessing. It gives us a second chance from messing up or going through something we weren’t expecting to go through,” she said. ”When I got here, it was kinda like home. I felt heard. Things I really needed to get done I felt like were getting accomplished with LifeBASE Care.”

The program equips youth like Ziporah for a successful transition into adulthood by providing tools including supportive housing, one-on-one coaching, trauma therapy, life skills and parenting training, educational and employment support, mentoring and 24/7 access to a crisis helpline. 

But transformation wouldn’t come magically, either. Making the most of these resources requires work. “We’ve all been through a lot. We all have trauma,” Ziporah realized. “If I want to change, I gotta make a change. It took a lot — that depression, it took a lot. And it just motivated me to have a positive, respectful mindset for other people.

“I’m not a person that gives up,” she added. “I’m a person that’s gonna keep going, that can’t look back.”

Dorothy Parker, program manager for LifeBASE Care, remembers that Ziporah “came in and took full advantage” of the tools that could help her achieve her goals, adding that Ziporah soon began to stand out as a leader among the moms in the program.

“She’s one of their success stories,” Dorothy said. “You can tell her leadership skills are there — the other moms can understand and relate to her.”

Meme Wilson, Ziporah’s LifeBASE Care coach, saw Ziporah’s connection with the moms in the program on a recent group trip to Memphis.

“She did a lot of the engaging with the other moms, bringing them together, and I saw how that caused them to be more relaxed with each other,” Meme said. “And with her son, she was so patient, loved on him the whole time, helped him get back in his seat gently when he got upset.  She’s an amazing mom. I don’t even know if she can see the strength and patience that she has.”

In learning to deal with anger and contention, Meme said, “Ziporah is perseverant, resilient. She’s willing to walk in a relationship when there’s conflict — to learn communications skills, and talk through things, process how she feels.”

Part of Ziporah’s preparation for life after LifeBASE Care was to come up with a solid plan that would turn a longtime dream into a catering business: Porah’s Kitchen. She developed a menu and, with some help from her Immerse team, designed a logo, ordered business cards and began building a website.

Now, Ziporah has officially started her catering company and enrolled in culinary school. A little more than a year after experiencing homelessness, she’s also moved with her son into a safe, stable home of their own.

At Immerse, this truly gifted chef found the tools she needed to achieve her goals and dreams. With hard work and support, she’s transformed into an overcomer. And now?

“I’m just ready for people to know my name,” she said, “and know what I can do out there.”