Raven McDowell is a survivor.

In care by age seven, she later experienced drugs, homelessness and incarceration.

And she was a mother.

Losing custody of her eighteen month old son was a turning point.

Hello, I'm Bonnie Boswell.

Well, we've all heard the expression it takes a village.

This is particularly true when it comes to helping formerly incarcerated women.

Raven found an apartment after her release, but still, she needed to stabilize her life.

So she turned to ARC-- The Anti Recidivism Coalition.

Sam Lewis is the executive director.

And so the first thing that we did was connect Raven to our onsite attorney.

We also paid for drug and alcohol counseling.

She literally put her life back together.

She got an apartment made sure her son would have his own room, started a college fund for him, did all the things that a parent does and the courts still at that time, didn't think she should have her son.

I feel like Sam changed my life.

He supported me, especially to want my child dependency case.

What happened?

They didn't want to give my son back.

It was real stressful Raven wasn't getting a fair shake.

She was denied an appeal multiple times because I don't have a lot of knowledge of the foster care system or how family court works.

I reached out to people that I knew that did and I said, Can you help?

And they went to work.

Well, after four long years, Raven's son is finally being returned to her.

I fought to the end for my son.

Because my son deserves me.

He doesn't deserve what I've been through.

He deserves his mother.

He deserves me whole.

And that's who I am today.

Join us next week to see the last in our series about this heroic young woman and the people who helped her.

For KCET, I'm Bonnie Boswell.