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Despite the devastating damage caused by Monday's earthquake, Marjorie Sterling is grateful that neither herself nor her four children were hurt.

"It did really feel traumatising in a one and sad inna next one, but mi just say give thanks there is life, and once there is life, there is hope somewhere," Sterling said. When THE STAR visited the home in Cottage Hill, St Andrew, Sterling and her family had covered the room with pieces of ply board but that could not hide the severe damage that the earthquake had caused to the family's home. The 50-year-old mother of four lives a few houses down from her elderly mother who she cares for. She said that when she felt the earthquake, she feared that all of them would die.

"Death did a run through mi mind. Mi a wonder if everything was going to collapse on mi and mi mother," Sterling said. She told THE STAR that she is currently living in fear that a minor tremor will completely destroy her home

"Fears deh here a lot because when I look at the house, I mean the joining, like them keep separating from each other. Suh I have a lot of fear same way," she said. "I know that it is nature so a just have to accept it as it is."

In almost every room of the family's three-bedroom house, there were large cracks. There was a large pile of rubble at the front that used to be the wall of her 10-year-old son's room. Sterling added that beneath the room where the wall collapsed is what seems to be a cellar, so the floor is unstable. Despite the damage, Sterling and her children are still living in the home which belonged to her grandparents.

"I'm staying right here. I don't have anywhere else to stay. I have to stay right here because I have maybe two more room round there. Suh I can ,yuh know, kotch wid my kids dem for the time being," Sterling said.

She said hat she full intends to rebuild the damaged section of the house even though she doesn't have the funds.

"By the help of Almighty God, we have to plan to do something 'cause it cannot stay like that," Sterling said.