**************DISCLAIMER - THIS IS MY TRUE LIFE STORY. EVEN MY CLOSEST FRIENDS DO NOT KNOW 1/2 OF THE STUFF THAT I HAVE GONE THROUGH....I AM HOPING THAT BY OPENING UP AND TELLING MY STORY, THAT IT MIGHT HELP SOMEONE SOMEWHERE....************************
September 11, 1976, 11:28 am, Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Camden, New Jersey
I was brought into this world a screaming wiggly seven pound, two ounce, 21 inch long baby girl to an unwed teenage mother. This was the simple beginning of my life. Although I don’t remember much of my childhood, the little that I do remember was fun and loving. For a while, my mother and I lived with my grandparents in the Cramer Hill section of Camden, New Jersey.
Meager beginnings, not having much of our own, my mothers family took care of us. I vaguely remember my mother telling me stories of sitting me in front of the Christmas tree there. I would stare in wonder and glee at the big flashy bulbs of color like they were a lifeline to the outer world beyond our big Victorian house that we lived in with my great grandparents….It’s funny now how I don’t even celebrate Christmas and cant stand what it stands for.
I know as I got older, we did things with my mothers friends who actually stuck around. For some reason, I remember being in the backseat of my mother’s friend Mary Jane’s car, playing with a pink comb…Even at a young age, I liked hair “stuff”. Little did I know it would lead to a life filled with make up, hair spray and curling irons.
There were days filled with play, love, animals and my grandparents pool table. Days filled with sleeping and love…and then we left…
I’m not altogether sure when it was that my mother and I moved out of my grandparents house. I just know that when I was 18 months old, my mother met my step father who was the man that raised me from that point on.
Suddenly, instead of living in the comfort of my grandparent’s big house, we lived places that I don’t remember. We moved a lot. Different apartments, different houses…I believe this is when the gypsy in me was born.
I do remember living in one big house in Marlton, New Jersey, my dog Stosh that protected me with his life, going to Olga’s Diner for breakfast some Sundays, and my favorite thing, before my fear of the sun started, playing in the home made sand box my Daddy made for me in the backyard of that big house, stripping down to just my panties (I always DID like being naked) and getting a beautiful deeply bronze skin tone like I was born to be in the sun…To bad I can’t get like that now. To bad we can’t walk around in the summer time naked.
When I started kindergarten, I remember having to repeat it but not because I was stupid and was held back. No, for some reason, I think it had something to do with my age and the way my birthday landed and something about not being the “right” age to move onto 1st grade. That time is a blur to me. I don’t remember my first day of school; I don’t remember class pictures or anything of the like.
Sometime between 1st grade and 2nd grade, my parents and I moved into a house with my father’s mother. We only lived there a short time but oh boy did I have fun in the enormous backyard she had. She also had a cherry tree which I absolutely loved. I used to climb the tree and pick and eat them. One of my very first favorite desserts was a cake that my grandmother used to make called a Black forest cake. It was an extremely moist chocolate cake with cherries in it from that cherry tree. I will never forget that.
While we were living at my grandmother’s house, my brother was born. The day my mother went to the hospital to have him, I remember getting up for school and my mother was lying on her bed. She told me it was time for her to go to the hospital and have the baby. At the moment, I don’t remember having much of an opinion of that. I was almost 7 years old.
The day that he was brought home, I remember being across the street from my grandmothers house waiting for the bus to school. My father’s car drove up and I saw my mother get out holding a tiny bundle of blue in her arms. I ran across the street and she bent down for me to see this newest addition to my family. I remember touching his nose and him wrinkling it at me. Then, I had to cross the street again because the bus was coming.
After that day, I remember having this feeling inside me, knowing that not only were things suddenly never going to be the same again, I was not an only child anymore and would have to share the spotlight with this little creature bundled in blue. I also found myself feeling something stir inside me at that young age…I couldn’t wait to have a baby of my own when I got older. A short time after that, we moved again. To apartments in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. We stayed there sometime until we got a house in another part of Cherry Hill when I was getting ready to go into the fourth grade. For some reason, unbeknownst to my 10 year old mind, we only stayed there a year.
During that year, I got the very best present in my whole life up til this moment. I got the kitten I had always wanted. I remember having a fish tank and always going to this one pet store on route 70. When we’d go in there, I would always go to the kitten area. This one particular day, I believe it was a Saturday, my mother announced that we had to go to the pet store for more fish. I didn’t think anything of it because it was something we did often. I just know I got excited because I got to play with the kittens again. Little did I know, we were actually going because I WAS GETTING A KITTEN!!!!
As we entered the store, I bee lined for the area they kept the kittens. As I was standing there talking to an orange one, my mother comes up behind me and says into my ear, “Why don’t you pick one out?” At this point, my breath caught in my chest and I looked up at her in shock and it dawned on me…she was SERIOUS!!! Suddenly, I felt an exclamation point appear overtop of my head and the excitement welled up inside me like a volcano getting ready to erupt. I started jumping up and down, hugging my mother with all my might. I picked out a gorgeous little striped calico and named her Mindie. To this day, I still think about her. Sadly, Mindie passed away in 1994 from cancer…the first loss of many in my life and I miss her. She was a gorgeous cat with the most amazing shade of green eyes. And she only liked me and my mother.
Shortly after we got Mindie, we moved to our house in Merchantville. I started fifth grade there and went straight through to 8th. It was the longest we’ve ever been somewhere. Here was when my first troubles and heartbreaks came alive and happened. It was also where I discovered my love for cheerleading and writing, and my abilities of reading tarot and seeing visions came. It’s also when I discovered astrology.
When I was 12, my Dad left us. My mother was violent and it became increasingly worse. After that, she began beating on me and leaving me and my brother at home by ourselves so that she could go out and party til all hours of the night. I was suddenly the “mistake”, she “never wanted me and was forced to have me” and from there the verbal, emotional and mental abuse started…I suddenly went from the worthy wonderful daughter to the “child that took away her childhood”, the “child that would never amount to anything”...It was devastating to hear that from the mother who had, up til this point loved me so completely and lovingly and cared for…
From then on, I was unwillingly shoved into the “Mother” position, suddenly having to parent my hyperactive brother who was extremely difficult to handle. I was also the maid and the cook. The only room I was NEVER permitted in was my mother’s bedroom.
Most days, I would get up in the morning get my brother up and walk to school since Merchantville didn’t have a bus system. Since my mother didn’t often have to be to work until 9, she wouldn’t get up with us. I would be the one to dress my brother, make sure he ate breakfast and get our lunch money from her doorway of her bedroom, since most times, shed still be in bed. Sometimes the mornings were brutally cold and it felt like we were walking forever. There were days we would be so cold, our hands would be so frozen, we would go into the bathroom and run them under hot water just to warm them up. I would say that it was a good 45 minute walk from our house to the school. I’m fairly certain, now a days, that it could have been construed as abuse on my mother’s end.
You would think that I would have hated that I had to take care of a child that wasn’t even mine but truthfully, it prepared me for later on in life. Did I hate it that my friends were never able to come over because my mother was never home? Yes. Did I hate it when all the friends that I DID have had brand new clothes and I had to wear hand-me-downs because my mother would have rather spent the money on designer clothes for herself and my brother? Absolutely I did. But I played the cards that were dealt me. Because I had to. This would be my mantra for the rest of my life from there on out.
When I was 13, one summer when my mother was at work and my brother was away at a baby sitters, a few of my “friends” came over. They were older then me, five of them ranging in age from 16 to 19. One of them, I had a schoolgirl “crush” on. It was an extremely hot day. I had an air conditioner. I was very young and naïve and didn’t think anything when they showed up. I invited them in and we were sitting, watching television, music videos, eating snacks and goofing around.
Adam* (named changed), the boy I liked, was sitting next to me on the couch, his friends all in different areas of my living room since that’s where my A/C was. Adam kissed me and I liked it. I shied away from him, blushing. It hadn’t been my first kiss but it was my very first “teenage” kiss. He smiled at my shyness and put his arm around me. He kissed my cheek and I shyly looked at him and kissed him on his cheek. We went back and forth like this for a minute, me giggling like a little girl. I got up to change the channel on the tv (before they had remote controls) and sat back down closer to him. Innocently flirting, the way most young teenage girls would do.
Little did I know that it would cause a situation that to this day, I will never forget. Adam wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close to him, planting a kiss on me that was a little too passionate for my childlike, 13 year old mind. I pushed away from him, moved away and nervously giggled. Then, I heard the bone chilling, cliché words come out of his mouth “Oh, stop, you KNOW you like it. Why don’t you come a little closer to me?” The next hour of my life was the longest I’ve ever endured. All five, taking turns with my young, virginal-never-been-touched-by-a-boy body, holding me down, calling me names, raping me. When they were all done, one spit on me, another kicked me and Adam just laughed and called me a slut. I never saw them again after that. That day was fateful. It was the most horrendous I’ve ever endured physically.
I lay on the floor for hours it seemed like. I finally picked myself up, showered and looked at the bruises they had left on my battered body, over the ones that my mother had left that were healing. My swollen neck from hands on it, the pain in my stomach from being kicked. I threw the clothes that I had been wearing into the garbage, never wanting to see them again. I put long sleeves and stretch pants on and when she came home, I told my mother I was cold when she asked about the clothes. She just rolled her eyes and made a nasty comment. Of which I was used to. That night I didn’t eat dinner. My mother actually seemed genuinely concerned but I told her I was fine, doing to her what I had practice at with other people. I constantly covered up the bruises my mother left on me with make up, constantly said I was “cold” because I would wear long sleeves on a hot summer day. It was nothing new for me.
We moved to West Collingswood shortly after because my mother lost our house from not paying the mortgage. We went back to cramped apartments and scrounging by. Shortly after moving, I missed a period. Of course, I didn’t think anything of it because I had just started getting it so I was still somewhat irregular. Also, with moving again, I was stressed out about starting at a new school…Collingswood High School.
But, then I started to not feel well, my aunt took me to “Birth Right”, a place you can get pregnancy tests at. Sure enough, my rapists had gotten me pregnant. I barely had gotten used to the idea when my mother found out. It was perhaps the scariest moments in my life, rape aside. Of course, instead of telling my mother what happened to me before we moved, I let her go on and think that I was the slut that she was calling me, that I was sleeping around with “god-knows-who.” Somewhere inside me, I couldn’t bare to utter the words “I was raped” to her. Those words were disgusting to even think, let alone say out loud to anyone.
She told me she “was too young to be a grandmother” and that I wouldn’t “be having this baby”. Now, mind you, she was somewhere in her 30’s. She called and scheduled an appointment at an abortion clinic in Cherry Hill. Did I want to go? No, I was scared out of my mind. Did I know what I was going to do that day? Not really, I had no idea. Until later when I saw something on television had I realized that I had killed my child. I had no say in it. I had no say in if I wanted to carry the baby to term and possibly give it up or keep it. Regardless of what happened to create that child, I would have LIKED to have had a choice in the matter. But, I didn’t.
Then, the depression started. The suicidal thoughts, the sadness. My grades slipped fatefully. One day when I was watching my bother, I was sitting in my room and my thoughts consumed me. I went around the house and found every spare pill that I could find. My mother was on various medications for various things…I took those pills. I found Advil, Tylenol, and some other stuff that I couldn’t identify. I found a bottle of vodka that my mother had stashed in her bedroom and went back to mine. I locked my door and turned up the music as loud as it would go. I proceeded to take handfuls of pills mixed together with gulps of vodka, trying to kill the pain that I felt so deep within myself. I don’t know what happened after a few because I blacked out. I woke up in the hospital with charcoal all over me.
As I opened my eyes, it took a moment to register where I was and started to cry when I realize my suicide attempt hadn’t worked….I had to continue to live a life that I hated…The nurse came in and checked my vitals…Everything after that was a whirlwind. Of course, in true form, no one, including my mother, took responsibility for it. After that, I went to counseling for 6 months and that’s where I discovered writing.
I started going to my therapist after I tried committing suicide. He suggested I start writing. Write everything and anything under the sun. First, it was just supposed to be a journal type thing but then it turned into stories and poetry and songs…I had unleashed a gift I didn’t know I’d had. I believe this is where my creativity started.
I would write and write and write and write. I had a whole book filled with poetry, songs and other stuff. I lost the book when I went to a boarding school for girls. Ill tell you more about that later on.
Of course, 2 years later, even with the writing, life at home didn’t get any better. My mother had stopped going out so much but she was still unavailable, to busy for her children or to even care. She and I used to fight so badly, someone called the cops and called DYFS (Division of Youth and Family Services) on her. When they came, I lied. I lied through my teeth for fear of my mother would find out and the consequences would be fatal to me. I told them that everything was fine of course. That things were peachy. They never found out about my suicide attempt. And, if they did, they didn’t ask me about it. Of course, I was told later by my Father that my mother said I was the one to call them. I didn’t even know who they were. Just knew suddenly these people were in my life that could take me and my brother away from my mother. I was around 16 at this point.
Even though life was difficult and angry and violent, this was the only life that I knew. If I would have to leave, I would be separated from the brother that I had been raising and taking care of for 4 years. I wouldn’t ever see my friends again. My life wouldn’t be the same and it had already been so tumultuous that I didn’t want to betray what little faith I had that my mother would change.
Shortly after that, my mother sent me away. She told me that it was because I was “too hard to handle” and that she “wanted me to get back on track in life”. Bull shit, she wanted to get rid of me. She didn’t want me anymore.
It was October 1992 when she left me that fateful day at that boarding school for girls. It was a Christian school. We were homeschooled, never allowed to leave unless accompanied by one of the adults for “fear we’d run away”…Many girls did manage to get away. I knew I didn’t have anywhere to go at that point. It was either stay there or go back home, being beaten, verbally abused, mistreated and neglected. I stayed.
I made it until I was 18. I met my 1st husband at a “college aged singles group” that the school actually had let me go to because I had reached level 5+. I met him and we all hung out at functions and at the singles groups where wed study the bible. He was the sweetest, most attentive, caring man. Or so I thought…That was a journey that turned my life around 180 degrees. The day that I decided to leave school for this man was the day that he had written a note and handed it to our mutual friend Pam to give me at Church one night slyly. It said he was moving to Texas and wanted me to come with him.
At the time I thought no man would ever love me the way that he did. So, with 4 months left until I graduated “high school” and the Program at the boarding school, with a somewhat decent job at a dentists office, I left it all behind for him…a choice that would forever change my life.
It was a chilly day the day I took a chance and ran away….I knew that if I didn’t, then I would have to go back to that house and be belittled and abused and mistreated… It was a work day for me….I told the one woman that was my supervisor, after I made her coffee for her, something I did for her whenever I made her a cup, that I was taking my break. For a moment, I sat in the kitchenette area, staring at the clock, counting down the seconds until I could dash out the side door unnoticed…I sat, pretending to look at a fashion magazine, looked at the clock one more time, waited until the coast was clear and took off…I sat waiting in the bushes for him to come…I watched for his car. When I saw it, I looked around, saw no one and high-tailed it, jumped in and slouched down.
That was the beginning of the most wonderful time in my life....
I was loved, I was cared for, he treated me like a queen for a very long time………it was the first time in my life that I knew what it was like to be loved and not screamed at or mistreated. I was happy…Of course, he was controlling and dominant, but, because of my mother and the way that she was, it wasn’t that much different except for the fact that this man ADORED me. He loved me, treated me with respect and gentleness and didn’t hit or scream at me. We moved to Texas and it was wonderful. Sure there were some rocky times and there was some fights and some struggling times but ultimately, we were happy...
Until we moved back to New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Things took a turn for the worse and this is the time that I still have trouble dealing with and talking about so I am going to skip it…for now. Just know that he ended up in jail….and I didn’t know what to do or how to take care of the money or what…it was tough, but, I made decisions that I wish hadn’t had to have made....
Shortly after he was arrested, I met a man who I’ll call “Chris” (changed his name too)…I got introduced to drugs and for a while it was all i did…sleep, dance, ecstasy, weed, drinking….I barely ate.......i was partying the time away because I still was in so much pain from everything….and it wasn’t long before I realized that this man was abusive. He belittled me, berated me, mistreated me….i was blind and wasn’t strong enough to stand up to him….until one fateful day when I realized I was pregnant, and told him the next day…What happened next was horrible. He assaulted me….After I told him that I refused to have an abortion, that I would be having this child, he assaulted me and told me that if I didn’t have an abortion, he would find us, and kill us both…I was scared out of my mind, but while on the phone with a friend of mine telling her where I lived so that she could come up from MD and get me, he was assaulting me and I was fighting back. I had to. For the life of myself and for the life of my unborn child…and Im glad that I did.
That child is now almost 8 years old and has the biggest heart of gold on the planet. She’s my second in command and I adore her. Without her, I really don’t think that I would have lived had I stayed in the situation that I was. If I hadn’t gotten pregnant with her, I more then likely would be dead.
After I left “Chris” and moved to MD, I was only there a short time before circumstances brought me back to NJ. I didn’t WANT to go back to NJ but unfortunately, I had to.....I hopped from one persons house to another before ending up at a homeless shelter for women and children...the best thing that could have ever happened to me. October of 2002.
This was another turning point in my life....I shared an apartment with two other women that were in the program and it was where I started learning to be on my own, take care of my child and getting the therapy that I needed for so long....I had Lilia two months later, on December 13th 2002 and it was the best time in my life. I adored her, she was my world and I did anything and everything for her. I got a job at a pizza place and worked 36 hours a week trying to get off welfare and saving up for a place for us to move into on our own. I met many good friends there, one of which is my best friend to this day. I grew and learned how to truly be a woman and a mother.
I worked at the pizza place for a couple of months before i found a better paying job at a law firm in Haddonfield NJ in July of 2003. I LOVED working there and could feel the twinges of independence coming out of me. I was making my own HONEST money, and not even a year after getting ON welfare, I got OFF of it. I had found a place that I was going to move into with Lilia and it was the beginning of a beautiful life...
Two months after starting that job, I just happened to be walking back to my office from getting lunch and it was dreary and rainy. I was walking along the street that was lined with trees and I got pelted in the head with a raindrop. I looked up and another smacked me in the eye…After I shook my head and rubbed my eye, I looked up and one of the most beautiful men that I had ever seen was standing 20 feet in front of me giggling. I asked him “You saw that didn’t ya?” and he giggled “uh huh…” 10 minutes later, I was digging into my purse to find a pen to write down my phone number. The days before cell phones!
This beautiful funny, man, became my husband, love mate, soul mate and best friend in the whole world. That man was my Cameron. We met on September 3, 2003 and he was taken away from me, 2 years, 3 months, 11 days later. But, in the two years that we had together, we made two beautiful children together, Holli and Julia. I have two beautiful reminders of him, two gorgeous living reminders of the love that we shared…the incredible whirl wind romance.
Our lives haven't been perfect since we lost him, but, we've had love, weve had fun and I strive everyday to make him proud as i know hes watching over us and protecting us. He inspired in me to do the best that i could, love with ALL my heart, do what I want to do and not to live for anyone but our girls. Like he did....He taught me to love, he taught me to trust and with everything that I am, im trying. He also taught me not to give a shit what anyone thinks or says and for a while, i did live like that...As time has worn on, its been adjusted but, everything he taught me, healed me from alot that ive been through...
I enrolled and finished beauty school as well as bartending school...I have dreams for myself and for my girls that without my perserverance and strength in life, i wouldnt have. I have made it through things that most people only read about or hear about on the news...but, ive made it through and i think im a pretty damn awesome chick.
So, there ya have it, there's my story...........I dunno why i felt compelled to write it but i did. I hope ya'll like it.
