LINCOLN - Grit, determination and the support of several caring adults allowed Faith Walker to escape what she calls a harmful, toxic childhood.
But Nebraska laws on 18-year-olds made the break more difficult.
The laws offered her no means of seeking emancipation from her parents and were conflicted about whether, as an 18-year-old, she could have gotten protection through the child welfare system.
That left Walker in a state of fear and anxiety until she turned 19.
Now the University of Nebraska at Omaha sophomore is telling her story to state policymakers and advocates in hopes of getting the laws changed.
About a year ago, Walker said, she was living on her own after graduating from Duchesne Academy.
She had a bakery job that paid her expenses and had embarked on a quest to get a college degree, with help from financial aid she applied for on her own. Her majors are international studies and American literature.
At age 18, however, Walker was a minor in the eyes of the law. Nebraska sets 19 as the age of majority.
Her parents, she said, used that fact in attempts to derail her college career and bring her back within their control.
On one occasion they tracked her down at work and enlisted the help of police, who ignored Walker's pleas and forced her into her parents' car because she was a minor.
Her parents "said I would never go back to school, that I would never get away from them again," she said.
Walker did get away, though, and the second time her parents tried to get her back home, a sympathetic police officer advised her to "lay low" for the five months until she turned 19.
The World-Herald's attempts to reach her parents were unsuccessful.
Through friends, Walker made contact with Omaha attorney and City Councilwoman Aimee Melton.
Melton said Walker had talked with those friends in the past about her fear of her parents.
Her father had twice served time in prison for assaulting an officer. He also has been convicted of third-offense drunken driving and carrying a concealed weapon. Her mother twice took out protection orders against him, but later dropped the orders.
A protection order for Walker, however, was not an option: She was too young to file for one. The same was true of filing a petition for emancipation on her own behalf.
Walker refused to try child protective services. Even if it could have helped - which was unclear under state law - she did not want to be separated from her two younger siblings.
Eventually, Melton found a creative solution.
She sued Walker's parents for the young woman's emancipation and asked for a restraining order while the suit was pending.
The order was granted and lasted until Walker turned 19, in May, after which the case was dismissed.
Last month Walker and others appeared at a legislative interim study hearing to argue that Nebraska should address the legal gaps affecting 18-year-olds.
Juliet Summers, policy coordinator with Voices for Children in Nebraska, proposed a pair of solutions to cover different types of situations.
One proposal was for a law allowing minors to seek emancipation from the court if they meet specific requirements.
Some 21 states already have laws spelling out such a process, but neither Nebraska nor Iowa is among them. The only thing spelled out in Nebraska law is that minors are considered to be legally adults if they marry.
Nebraska case law provides some guidance in determining if a minor should be considered emancipated, but the cases must be brought by an adult. Typically such petitions are brought by parents seeking an end to child support obligations.
Summers said emancipation could benefit young people such as Walker, who have the financial and personal resources to live independently.
The process could be available to youths of a certain age, perhaps 18, perhaps a year or two younger. To be emancipated, young people would have to demonstrate financial independence and the ability to make decisions for themselves.
Summers said the other proposal could help when an 18-year-old's safety is threatened at home but that young person doesn't have the wherewithal to strike out on his or her own.
The proposal would change state law to make clear that authorities can step in to protect those youths from abuse and neglect, including filing petitions in juvenile court.
Anne Hobbs, director of the UNO Juvenile Justice Institute and a foster parent, said the second proposal could have helped a pair of brothers, ages 18 and 16, whom she cared for last year.
The youngsters were left at a youth shelter last year by their parents, who had adopted them from Colombia.
After being contacted by an advocate, Hobbs took the boys in as foster youths. She then spent weeks trying to get them help, particularly through the child welfare system, but ran into a series of brick walls.
It wasn't until five months after the youths had been left by their parents that the county attorney filed a child welfare petition in juvenile court.
The petition opened the door for state services to begin, and the boys were able to move in with an aunt, who is pursuing guardianship of the younger boy. The older one is now 19 and an adult.
The problem, as Hobbs found, is that current state law is contradictory.
One law limits juvenile courts, where child welfare cases are filed, to cases involving "juveniles," defined as youths under age 18.
Another law says child welfare workers are to respond to reports of abuse and neglect involving a "minor child," but does not define what a minor child is.
Until recently the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services interpreted the laws to mean abuse and neglect reports could be accepted only on children under age 18.
That's the interpretation spelled out in child welfare rules and regulations.
But Lindy Bryceson, who oversees the child welfare service areas, said the department changed its practice about a year ago. HHS now accepts reports on youths under 19, based upon a separate law that defines anyone under that age as a minor.
Agency statistics show that in 2015, the child abuse hotline got 567 calls involving 18-year-olds. Of those, 171 were investigated and 50 were substantiated.
Neleigh Boyer, an attorney with HHS, said the department can provide services in those cases if the family agrees to work with the department voluntarily.
But HHS runs into problems if a court needs to be involved to order cooperation.
Instead of asking a county attorney to file a petition, as is done with younger children, HHS can only turn over information and let the county attorney decide what to do, she said.
Boyer said some county attorneys have been willing to file cases involving 18-year-olds in juvenile court despite the limits set out in state law.
State Sen. Sara Howard of Omaha, who introduced the interim study resolution, said she hopes to introduce legislation to address both proposals brought forth by Voices for Children.
However, she said the legal issues involving 18-year-olds have turned out to be more complex than she initially expected.
Those complexities have stymied past proposals to set up an emancipation process.
The most recent effort was in 2007, when a bill introduced by then-Sen. Phil Erdman of Bayard made it out of committee but never got debated by the full Legislature.
Walker said she plans to keep advocating for changes, knowing that she is not the only Nebraskan who has had difficulties navigating the legal landscape for 18-year-olds.
"Nobody else should go through what I did," she said. "My situation is only unique in that it got attention."