While growing up Mary Crow Dog was stuck in between two distinct worlds. One was her culture, which she was always denied of learning. The other was being a Christian and having to learn the ways of her white brothers. The world was being forced upon the reservations in which Native Americans lived. Many Lakotas had already adapted to being part of the Christian religion and weren’t willing to fight for their own culture like Mary Crow Dog did. She wanted to learn more about her culture but in her path to doing so she encountered different obstacles and gave into the bad influences that were around her. She wandered aimlessly around with the wrong crowd smoking pot, drinking beer, and fighting white people. She lived in the streets with other half bloods and full bloods. She would never stay in one place she would always be moving from place to place. Always with different people every time, following the drugs, alcohol, and violence wherever it went. Even though Mary Crow Dog took many wrong turns she learned from her mistakes and became an activist, not just to help herself but her Lakota community.
While Mary was growing up, she experienced her mom being turned into a Christian and she didn’t have her father. He wasn’t there for her when she was growing up and starting to experience the changes in her life. Instead she had a step father who was a drunk and didn’t care about her sisters and brothers. All he did was sit around and get drunk. Mary started drinking because of him. She would drink a glass of the booze that her step father had laying around. Her relationship with her mom wasn’t the best in the world either. They would argue about what was right for her and what she had to do with her life. Her mom was always opposed to Mary learning about her culture and so she had to go to her grandma and she didn’t want to tell her anything and that made Mary want to learn about more. So despite her moms disapproval she went on with her passion for her culture....