Everyone keeps telling me that I should write a book about my childhood. Unfortunately, I'm neither that eloquent, nor willing to dig quite that deep into those memories.
However, this past week, I was forced to face those memories head on. It wasn't easy. I had to rely very heavily on my friends and my wonderful husband and children to get through it.
I grew up in a living hell. I've talked about my past before but I never realized just how detached I was from it all until I had to face it again. I've talked about living in a shack. I've talked about how filthy and disgusting the house was. I've tried to describe the living conditions, the horrors, the nightmares.
And I've failed. I know that I've failed because even I was shocked when I finally went back to my childhood home for the first time in years. I've talked to several of the adults that were in my life at the time to make sure that the house was actually that bad when I lived there. They've assured me that it was.
So now, I'm angry. I'm beyond pissed. It was one thing to live there as a child. I knew it was horrid even then. But to go back to that place as a mother? To see the living conditions that no less than 9 adults in my life at the time were not only aware of, but that turned their backs and allowed me to stay there pisses me off in a way that I can't even begin to describe.
How could anyone allow a child to live in those conditions? How could they think it was even remotely ok? They wouldn't live there. They refused to. It was just me and my grandmother in a shack on the hill while the rest of my family lived across the highway in an actual house. One where the floorboards weren't falling out and the roof wasn't caving in. They had a house that wasn't crawling with bugs and who knows what other infestations. The conditions that they forced me to live in are appalling. They refused to live there. So the burning question remains, why me? Why did my own mother hate me so much from birth that she sent me to this nightmare?
I'll never have the answers. There is no explanation that makes her actions, their actions, ok. The adults in my life failed me. For the first time ever, I can truly see that.
I'm hurting right now. I've bottled up and repressed so much through the years that the reality of it slapped me in the face this week.
I've always hidden the harsh realities of my life. I've talked about my life, but in a cold and calculated way. I didn't know how to express or describe the brutality, the horrors, the pain.
I am tired of hiding. A picture is worth a thousand words is what they say. So here's my story. Here's my life. The first 9 years of it anyways. This was only the beginning of the nightmares that I endured growing up. But this is where I came from. It's also where I will make damned sure that my own children will never ever end up.
I can't change the world. All I can do is beg of you.. If you even think that a child might be abused, neglected, etc, please please err on the side of caution and report it. It's amazing to me how many people knew the conditions that I was living in and they all turned a blind eye. No one helped me. Please please help a child if you can. No one deserves the life that I lived and you can make a difference.
However, this past week, I was forced to face those memories head on. It wasn't easy. I had to rely very heavily on my friends and my wonderful husband and children to get through it.
I grew up in a living hell. I've talked about my past before but I never realized just how detached I was from it all until I had to face it again. I've talked about living in a shack. I've talked about how filthy and disgusting the house was. I've tried to describe the living conditions, the horrors, the nightmares.
And I've failed. I know that I've failed because even I was shocked when I finally went back to my childhood home for the first time in years. I've talked to several of the adults that were in my life at the time to make sure that the house was actually that bad when I lived there. They've assured me that it was.
So now, I'm angry. I'm beyond pissed. It was one thing to live there as a child. I knew it was horrid even then. But to go back to that place as a mother? To see the living conditions that no less than 9 adults in my life at the time were not only aware of, but that turned their backs and allowed me to stay there pisses me off in a way that I can't even begin to describe.
How could anyone allow a child to live in those conditions? How could they think it was even remotely ok? They wouldn't live there. They refused to. It was just me and my grandmother in a shack on the hill while the rest of my family lived across the highway in an actual house. One where the floorboards weren't falling out and the roof wasn't caving in. They had a house that wasn't crawling with bugs and who knows what other infestations. The conditions that they forced me to live in are appalling. They refused to live there. So the burning question remains, why me? Why did my own mother hate me so much from birth that she sent me to this nightmare?
I'll never have the answers. There is no explanation that makes her actions, their actions, ok. The adults in my life failed me. For the first time ever, I can truly see that.
I'm hurting right now. I've bottled up and repressed so much through the years that the reality of it slapped me in the face this week.
I've always hidden the harsh realities of my life. I've talked about my life, but in a cold and calculated way. I didn't know how to express or describe the brutality, the horrors, the pain.
I am tired of hiding. A picture is worth a thousand words is what they say. So here's my story. Here's my life. The first 9 years of it anyways. This was only the beginning of the nightmares that I endured growing up. But this is where I came from. It's also where I will make damned sure that my own children will never ever end up.
I can't change the world. All I can do is beg of you.. If you even think that a child might be abused, neglected, etc, please please err on the side of caution and report it. It's amazing to me how many people knew the conditions that I was living in and they all turned a blind eye. No one helped me. Please please help a child if you can. No one deserves the life that I lived and you can make a difference.
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