She could not see the board. So she pretended she could.

For twelve years, Humulani Mkhonto sat in classrooms across South Africa closing one eye to see, hiding a disability nobody knew she had. At home she watched her mother — a domestic worker who catered funerals at sixty years old — sacrifice everything so her daughter could have a future.

She hid it all. The disability. The bullying. The grief of losing her father at eight years old. The PCOS that attacked her body. The depression that came when every door closed after matric.

She bled silently. Because she loved the people around her too much to add to their weight.

I Am Still Here is the complete true story of a South African woman who survived what should have broken her and chose to speak when silence almost cost her everything.

Combining two powerful memoirs — The Girl Who Bled Quietly and I Learned to Pretend I Could See — this is a book for every child still hiding by the window. For every woman performing fine while falling apart inside. For every person who has wondered if staying was worth it.

It is worth it.

She is proof