Natalie Carson doesn't want to spend another birthday alone.
So the Westminster, Colo., 19-year-old posted an ad on Craigslist saying that she was willing to rent a family so that maybe this birthday would be more memorable.
"I am not a weirdo or anything I was just inspired by another girl that rented a family from craigslist [sic] in California for the holidays," she wrote, according to ABC News 7. "I just want one day that I can feel important and special, and like I matter even if I really don't."
She added in her post: "I am NOT looking for any monetary support as I also work. I can pay $8 an hour."
Carson told the news station that she was born in Colorado and was adopted by a family that moved her to Georgia. After they abused her, she says, Carson was placed back in foster care, where she stayed until she turned 18.
Once out of foster care, she moved back to Colorado.
"I really didn't know anything, but I knew I was born here," she told the news station.
Since moving back to the state, she has been receiving help from Urban Peak, a Denver group that helps homeless youths. With Urban Peak's help, she earned her GED and is currently taking college classes, with a focus on computer science.
But Carson's success in school hasn't stopped the feeling that something is missing from her life, and so she sent out a message on Craigslist in hopes that a family would be kind enough to provide her one day when she could truly feel all of the joy that comes with a birthday.
"It's something that I've never really had. Of course I've had birthdays, but they haven't been good," she said. "Usually, every birthday is really painful and hard."
According to the news station, several families have reached out to the Colorado teen.
"I felt like having one day where it's OK—this is about me and it's my birthday," Carson said. "I don't have this big elaborate plan or anything; I just wanted it to be good."
Read more at ABC News 7.