Lucky enough, through the public school system, I had been able to have some music education, and that gave me something to focus on, and discipline - like a family to feel part of. There was a healthy family.
My humanitarian work evolved from being with my family. My mom, my dad, they really set a great example for giving back. My mom was a nurse, my dad was a school teacher. But my mom did a lot of things for geriatrics and elderly people. She would do home visits for free.
I have a four-and-a-half-, nearly five-octave range. I probably should have had extra lessons as a child, as I am certain my family heard my potential, but I didn't. I was in the choir as a schoolgirl, but really, it is all self-taught.
My father was a schoolteacher and my mother came from a teacher's family.
The best schools tend to have the best teachers, not to mention parents who supervise homework, so there is less need for self-organised learning. But where a child comes from a less supportive home environment, where there are family tensions perhaps, their schoolwork can suffer. They need to be taught to think and study for themselves.
It's tough to sort of balance free time and schoolwork and work in general and family time and hanging out with friends, but it is manageable if you have a good support team behind you, which I do.
As it seems, Spa is a good venue for the Schumacher family.
When I hit 16, I got a scooter to ride to school. It was bright pink, and I saw on the ownership papers that Jonathan Ross once owned it. My friends slated me for it because of the colour, but it was cool. My father used to ride, and my mother's boyfriend has a bike, so we're a bit of a biker family.
When I was a kid, there was unhappiness in my family - was dealt with partly by escaping to television. And from a very early age, for whatever reason, I became scornful and resistant to and angry about that. And some other time in my life, I realized that there's a lot I loved in television.
I do not believe the picture that some people paint of Scottish towns dependent on welfare. Every time I come here, I meet people who are determined to get into work. Who, with the right help are desperate to get off benefits, support their family and set an example for their children.
I was always really smart in school. My whole family is smart. We have 'Jeopardy' challenges and have Scrabble tournaments.
My family and I built my whole career from scratch.
My parents, my family, that's the biggest inspiration in my life. I've been in a lot of dark spots in my life, and if it wasn't for them, I wouldn't be able to get out of it, but they are who they are. They followed me. They yelled at me. They screamed at me. They loved me.
I was going to make movies. I was the one in the family who was always rolling the video camera, making movies of my brothers around town, and then screening them for my parents. I still would love to make movies someday... that's something that really means a lot to me, and I know I'll have the chance to do it one day.
When I decided to become a Christian and decided to change my life and just totally quit screwing up, it was like, 'Wow, why didn't I do this before?' No hiding anything. I just felt so much better, not only about myself, but my future, my family. It was awesome, and it didn't take me long to realize that.
Before I was attacked, I would write about the future - just goals, lists and plans. Iād scribble without depth or substance about the things I wanted to do with my life, whether short or long-term, and how I thought my future would be: a successful career in TV and modelling, marriage, a family.
Growing up, my dad was a pastor, and much like The First Family or people in front of the public eye, we were highly scrutinized as a family within the church and looked at as - well, I guess you would call an example of what that family image should be.
You're scrutinized all through your life - you're scrutinized by your family, by yourself, by society, and your friends in a certain way, shape, or form.
I love to travel with my family or my two best friends because I completely trust them. I forced my two best friends into learning to scuba dive with me in Sri Lanka - it was amazing but also hideous because we were learning in very difficult seas.
Vin Scully has been my broadcasting idol for a long time. He is so humble - he has the exact same work ethic that he had 65 years ago. His family is what he cares about the most, and at the heart of his whole being is his marriage and kids.
