DALLAS -- Sometimes, the best way to show how far you've come is to go back to the darkest place you've ever been.
For Melissa Daniels, that's a vacant parking lot in an industrial area near LBJ and Skillman in North Dallas.
"I would park right here because this was a vacant building, and I knew nobody would come down here," she said. "Being here just makes me very emotional, you know."
It's where Melissa slept in her car, off and on, for eight months. Homeless. Pregnant with her youngest daughter, Ellie, while Journey, her oldest, slept in the back.
"There was one day I was pregnant, and it was raining, and I remember just crying 'Lord, like Lord, I don't want to go through this," she said.
Melissa's life had been unstable for a long time. She grew up in foster care, and eventually got into a controlling, emotionally abusive marriage.
"He wanted to be in control of everything," she said. "The car, where I go, the people I talk to. It was an emotional rollercoaster all the time."
She left her marriage shortly after finding out she was pregnant with Ellie, she said, because she didn't want her girls to grow up seeing an abusive relationship. She didn't think she would end up on the streets, but staying with family wasn't working out.
"If you only knew what I've been through," she cried. "It's just to be here and to see me now and to see where I've come from."
Melissa says everything changed when she swallowed her pride and went to a homeless shelter, where she first found out about Family Gateway.
"I came to Family Gateway a year ago, damaged, broken, uncertain," she said.
The shelter is a haven for homeless families in downtown Dallas, unique because entire families are able to stay together in their own bedroom, whereas other shelters may divide rooms by age or gender.
It serves as both a short-term emergency shelter, and a longer-term shelter that connects families to counseling, education, jobs, and long-term housing through the Dallas Housing Authority.
"It's just been an oh so amazing experience for me," she cried. "It really has. It's been amazing."
Family Gateway helped connect Melissa to a job working in Dallas ISD's cafeteria. She is getting her GED. And, best of all, she is about to move out of homelessness and into an apartment of her own.
"It's a journey, but as long as you stick in there and want it for yourself, it will happen," said Melissa.
But moving is all scary, she said, because for the last year at Family Gateway, she has been surrounded by support.
And that's why we wanted to introduce her to someone who has been there.
Cichez Woods was also homeless after leaving an abusive marriage. She was also pregnant, and then she found Family Gateway.
That was 12 years ago. And now she's back, as an example of hope. She and Melissa connected immediately, hugging and praying.
"I'm so proud of you," Cichez told Melissa. "I thank you for her father God, I thank you for opening doors in her life."
"You're not coming back here again," Cichez told her.
"Oh my goodness, y'all are going to make me cry," Melissa responded.
Cichez now teaches Zumba to kids at Care Center Ministries in Pleasant Grove, where she works, full-time as an administrator.
"An edifying Zumba, a worship, mostly Christian music, salsa," she smiled.
She also returns to Family Gateway every Saturday to teach Zumba to families staying there.
"I wanted them to see what God had done in my life, you know," she said.
Cichez knows like her own, Melissa's kids will grow up to see just how hard their mom has worked to give them a better life.
"You have to get in your baby's face and tell them it's going to be okay," she said. "They're watching you. You're going to be their hero."
Just ask Deanna Reyna. She was six years old when her mom moved them into Family Gateway. In fact, it was her first bed.
"What I would say to my mother, I'm still astonished by how strong she is, every day," she said.
It's why Deanna, serves on Family Gateway's board, 26 years later. "It's an opportunity of confidence for these families," said Deanna.
More than 400 families got help from Family Gateway in 2017. They are the homeless you don't see. Most are young, single moms. They are often couch surfing, or sleeping in their car with their kids, trying to survive. Often, they were on the edge of poverty, then suffered devastation like job loss, serious illness, or violence in the home, and had no family to fall back on.
"I carried this pride of I don't need help, I got this," Melissa said.
But Melissa knows it doesn't matter where you came from, its where you're going, that counts. And she is on her way.
"You've got to stay in there, you've got to try, you've got to, you know, you've got to, you've got to have that willpower, to (say), 'I'm going to do this for myself. For me,'" she said, through tears.
Family Gateway doesn't have the facilities to fully support the community's needs for family homelessness. They receive an average of 300 calls a month from those who need support or shelter. Dallas ISD recently identified 3,700 homeless students throughout the district.