A son is born
she was so unstable that - I shit you not - her and her elderly mother went out to the graveyard at midnight to put a curse on my unborn child and myself.
In honor of my son’s 30th birthday - I shall tell the story of his birth, lol.
I was working at Bannister mall at Salad’s N’ Such at the food court, yup it’s as ‘80’s mall’ as you can get…but this was 1990 and I was a fucked up 20 year old who was doing all the wrong things - but somehow managed to have a job at this particular moment in time.
Jeff and I had been together for a year and our relationship was always very….what’s the word I’m looking for…
explosive
There were lots of fights, lots of bruises, lots of tears and tons of cocaine - but damnit I thought I could fix him, or myself…if I could just do this thing or that thing, it would be better and he wouldn’t be so controlling or he would know that I really did love him.
Yeah, it was one of those relationships - like every other relationship I’d ever had.
I was predictable.
I’ll skip ahead…
I worked in a salad joint, but I couldn’t stand the smell of lettuce.
Weird, right?
I mean, lettuce doesn’t really have a smell - until it does.
Literally every single person I worked with knew I was pregnant except for me.
On a break one day I went to the clinic that had opened in the mall and took a test. I WAS PREGNANT!
I was ecstatic! I was running down the mall telling every single person there the great news.
I was finally going to have something that was mine. Someone that would love me no matter what, no matter what a fuckup I was. Someone who wouldn’t leave me or hurt me or judge me. Someone that was safe, that would love me and that I could love.
For the first time in my life I had a purpose and had hope. It was a life altering moment for me.
Let’s just say that Jeff was not as thrilled as I was at the news.
When my grandparents found out I was pregnant they kicked me out of the house.
again
Shocking, I know…
Jeff wasn’t stepping up and I had nowhere to go so they arranged for me to go live with my birth father, Mirl in Climax, GA.
(Don’t let the name fool you - it was a dusty dirty wasteland in Southern Georgia - there was nothing there, NOTHING!!!)
Now, I hadn’t seen much of my birth father, he was around very sparingly - if you’ve read my previous posts then you know all this so I won’t rehash all that, so you can imagine it would be a little awkward to move to a state you’d never been to to live with a man and his wife that you barely knew.
Mirl tried to make me feel at home as best he could but his wife, Greta, was deeply insecure about me being there. She freaked out anytime we were alone and talking.
She tried to convince me that my real father was the unstable one who had multiple personality disorder and I was not allowed to say ice cream or hamburger in front of him as it would trigger one of his child personalities.
Greta’s mother lived with them too. She was about 80 and from Cuba so I found her and her stories fascinating for about a day until her and Greta would intentionally bang pots and pans on the wall right outside my bed just to keep me awake. They would try to poison me with random things in my food. They would avoid telling me if anyone called for me, it went on and on.
Greta was so unstable that - I shit you not - her and her elderly mother went out to the graveyard at midnight to put a curse on my unborn child and myself.
SHE PUT A FREAKING CURSE ON ME AND MY SON - Who the fuck does that?!?!?!
Needless to say, when an opportunity came for me to escape that insanity I did! One of my oldest friends made a detour to come see me as she and another friend were on their way to Ft. Lauderdale to go live for a few months as she went to a scuba diving school.
Umm….Florida, beach, sun, sand and zero Greta and her mother - I was fucking GONE!!!
I jumped in the Jeep and headed down to Florida for a while. Of course I had no money, no job, no hope. I was 4-5 months pregnant and was completely at the mercy of my friend, who - God love her, tolerated me for who knows why. It was a welcome break for a month or so.
When my friend went back home for the holidays I ended up back in Georgia with my birth father and his two crazy women.
One of Greta’s daughters came for a while and we started hitting up some parties and being social. I started dating a guy, he was a body builder so the majority of his time outside of work was spent at the gym but it kept my mind off the reality of shit at the house. It was during the Iraq war and Operation Desert Storm was heating up. He was going and discussed marrying me before he left, but I didn’t love him and he didn’t really love me, it just wasn’t an option.
I finally got a call from Jeff saying he missed me and that was all it took for me to scramble to find a way back to Kansas City, but who was I going to live with? I was coming up on about 7 months pregnant and had nothing.
I found a church and asked them to help me as I need to get back to Kansas City and I was stranded there in Georgia. They kindly offered to get me a bus ticket.
I sat on that awful Greyhound bus for about 2 days with no food or anything just trying to get back to something familiar.
I arrive at the bus station late at night and Jeff finally shows up. He wasn’t really interested in getting back together with me but said he would drive me out to Independence, MO to where my real mother was living so I could crash there.
This is where it gets weird…
My real mother, Georgeann, who went by the alias of Connie, was living with her husband, my 2 youngest half-sisters and her boyfriend (yes, her boyfriend - who was younger than I was) in the basement of her husband’s parents house.
I know, right? She was living with her husband AND her boyfriend - in the in-laws basement!
Her husband Duane was a really nice guy, I genuinely liked him and his parents were the kindest souls. His mother Dorothy took me under her wing and helped as much as she could. His dad, Jack, owned a small real estate company and they did taxes and stuff so he gave me a little job helping out so I could make a few bucks.
I had a rough pregnancy and struggled with preterm labor, every time I’d have contractions and need to go to the hospital my real mother would take me and drop me off.
Just boot me out of the car. Not go in with me and hold my hand, no comforting me or anything. Just BOOM, gtfo.
I was terrified of having the baby. I got no guidance or wisdom from anyone. I had no idea what to expect or even had the first clue of how to be a mother.
I would go in the hospital and they would hook me up to drugs to stop the contractions and then I’d call to have someone come get me again and go back to the basement.
I hated that basement. just mattresses all over the floor. My mother drugged up and nearly comatose most of the time with her weird boy toy. My two half sisters who were like little wild things. and it was so dark and, ultimately, so fucking lonely.
Eventually the real day arrived (I should have known as I’d spent about 20 hours scrubbing everything in sight with a toothbrush prior - Nesting is real, y’all)
I was in labor all day but nothing was happening so they sent me back home until things progressed further.
After I was dropped off again the next morning I had dilated a little further and they decided to keep me. I called Jeff to let him know, hoping at least someone would come.
Because I was on Medicaid I was not given any drugs or any comforts at all really. The day drug on and finally into the evening things finally started to happen.
No words will ever be able to describe what it truly feels like, the pain of contractions with no drugs, your body preparing to force a watermelon out of you…Jeff calmly leans down and asks if I can make it go any faster.
Women, you know how that went over.
As we get closer and closer to midnight a wave comes over me that was hot and intense. I thought I was going to throw up but the intense urge to bear down was so hard that I had no choice but to go with it even though the nurses were telling me not to.
They roll me out to a delivery room, give Jeff a hospital gown and we were finally ready.
After a few screams and grunts and the worst pain in my entire fucking life - I hear the doctor say “We got a nine pounder here” about the same time I feel the heat of my blood run down from the incision he makes to help get the baby out.
After his head was out, they tell me to push again to get his shoulders out - Jeff leans down to me and says that he thought that was it.
Like wtf, Jeff - the kid is gonna come out and just unfold like a roly-poly?
A few more pushes and it’s over and then the most magical sound you can ever hear happens - he cries. My son is born!
They clean him quickly and tell me I need to push once more to get the placenta out.
Jeff looked over, turned 8 shades of pale and left.
He literally left.
Left the hospital.
Didn’t say a damn word.
I didn’t care. My life had just begun, in that very moment, nothing else in the entire world mattered.
36 hours of labor. 8 lbs 12 ozs. 19.5” long - Jacob Patrick, I knew from the beginning that was his name, before I even knew if it was a boy or girl.
He was here, he was mine and he was fat and perfect.
24 hours later and they sent me ‘home’. I took this most perfect angel into that awful basement to find that my two half sisters had stolen all of his clothes, diapers and everything I had gotten for him.
I had nothing.
I was alone, with people who didn’t give a shit about me with a baby I didn’t know how to take care of and was fighting an uphill battle trying to keep my shit together.
I didn’t know I needed to burp him, or that what I ate had an effect on his tiny tummy since I was trying to breastfeed him like a mother should.
I was failing miserably.
Word got to my grandparents that he was born and they came to lay eyes on the little monster that I had created.
They took one look at him and told me to pack my shit and they took me home. Thank you Jesus.
You know my history with my grandfather - but honestly I could not have gotten through any of it without him. My grandfather loved that boy more than anything in the world and was a rock when it came to helping me take care of him.
I know this is long, I’ll cut it off here but I want to say that Jacob made me an adult, made me a better person, cleaned me up and changed me for the better.
I am so proud of the man he has become.
Good Grief
It's not really sadness that I feel. I guess it's remorse? I wish that we had had just a moment where it felt like she cared. Maybe I just wish I had had that one 'motherly' moment with her. Or a moment of her opening up and telling me she regretted things. Or missed me, or thought about me, or was proud that I turned out okay...you know, all that kind of stuff. No more maybes, right?
NOTE - I never published this post, written two days after my real mothers death, as everything was so crazy and up in the air and changing every few hours, but as I reread it today I felt as though I needed to post it. At some point I will sit and write out my thoughts and feelings of the journey we took back and those final goodbyes to not only her but to much of the pain of the past. Until then....
Well, I thought I was going to KC. I thought I was going to do this whole "closure" thing with my brother and 4 sisters. I thought I wanted/needed to do lots of things...but in the end, I think maybe I was wrong.
When I got the news that my birth mother had died I was so surprised at the emotions I had over it all. I really didn't think I cared that much.
Link To The News Coverage KMBC
It seemed to be the same with my brother and 2 of my sisters. We were all a little taken aback I think. I honestly don't think any of us thought we would give a shit, but I've said all that in my previous post so I won't be redundant. Go read that rambling mess for yourself.
After much back and forth with my brother and sister #1 we all decided we needed some sort of closure. I was going to fly to St Louis and my brother and I would drive up to Kansas City and we would all get together to view her body and go to her apartment - just find some form of closure in whatever way we could.
The nice thing was that we had never all been in the same place at the same time. Not only that but sister #1 and sister #2 have never actually met in person, so it would be extra special.
I scrambled to get a plane ticket, made the purchase, packed a bag and was ready to leave - nope. I was told not to come because the coroner wasn't going to release her body till maybe later in the week. No point in coming if it won't happen.
I called the medical examiners office to find out the details and to get an idea of when we may be able to come by. I spoke to a couple people who told me that the body was ready to be released but there would be no way we were allowed to view her there. Wait, what?
Apparently television shows and movies are complete fucking liars and there is absolutely nobody allowed to see, or identify, bodies in the morgue. No glass you can stand behind while they wheel the body over and fold down the sheet exposing the head of the deceased. Lies - all fucking lies. The first person I spoke to, btw, had me on speaker phone and I'm like 87% sure she was working on a body at the time - and probably eating a sandwich. I mean, movies can't be ALL lies, right?
(side note - I have to admit I was just the slightest bit disappointed at that. I do tend to have a pretty morbid fascination. I know, I know...it's totally inappropriate and wrong and I'm ashamed. This is the wrong situation to be thinking about going to the morgue and seeing all the lockers with bodies in them. Shame, Sharon, shame.)
I cancelled the flight, left my bag packed, and waited. Should have got trip insurance I guess, huh? But, you know, when the flight is leaving in less than 12 hours you pretty much, usually, know you are going to go. $200 penalty, yuk
There was not going to be a funeral because nobody was going to pay for it, so they (siblings 4 & 5, and maybe the estranged husband?) were going to donate her body to science. The coroners office told me that the only way to actually see her body was at a funeral home. The science people would take possession of the body via a funeral home and would then allow us to have a small viewing before they took her body away but it had to be done within 5 days of death, which would be Tuesday. I would need to fly out by Sunday to have Monday to get together.
Only, they wouldn't take her, because her tissue sample came back positive for Hep-B. sigh....
So, we are back at square one.
But really, at this point, I'm not sure I need to do all that anymore. I don't need to keep dragging it out. I can't keep putting my life, and work, on hold just waiting. And, honestly, I don't really know if laying my eyes upon her face is going to somehow make me feel better. I don't know if standing in her apartment among all of her things is going to really make me feel connected to her - and really...do I need that? I didn't have it before and I was doing just fine....
Sibling #5 is, apparently, having a fairly hard time with all of this. Understandably. She was the one who had the closest relationship with her mom. Even though GeorgeAnne was a shitty mother, #5 still loved her. I get that, maybe more than anyone else can. Even through all of the things that happened with my grandfather, I loved him more than anything. He was all I had and I knew no better. I was completely devastated when he died. I totally understand it.
I also understand that all of our experiences with her were vastly different. Some of us really had very little interaction with her during our lives. I think, besides siblings 4 & 5, I might have had the most interaction with her, and it was all mostly as I was coming into adulthood, so I was keenly aware of just how completely fucked up it all was. I mean, I had issues, but I looked like a saint next to her at that point.
Which is also probably why sibling #5 really hates my blog posts about it all. So, Sibling #5, I'm saying this directly to you - this is my life, these are my experiences and feelings. Yours may be different - and that is okay. You may tell your story how ever you'd like. And honestly, what a story you have to tell. I can only hope, that one day, you do tell it. I wish you nothing but peace and hope that you take all of those experiences and turn them into something positive.
All I can do at this point is to reflect on the times I had with GeorgeAnne, but I swear to God, every single one of them was just really fucked up. I'm not even joking. But, this is not the time to tell those stories.
I will stay in Los Angeles and I will work through this in my own way. It's not really sadness that I feel. I guess it's remorse? I wish that we had had just a moment where it felt like she cared. Maybe I just wish I had had that one 'motherly' moment with her. Or a moment of her opening up and telling me she regretted things. Or missed me, or thought about me, or was proud that I turned out okay...you know, all that kind of stuff. No more maybes, right?
My grandmother was not cuddly or motherly like that either so I think it's just a thing I yearn for.
UGH!!!!
Fuck this sappy shit, damnit.
I hope we all find our own peace with it, I hope that GeorgeAnne finally finds peace. I honestly don't know if she was ever at peace on this Earth, or ever truly happy for that matter. I never got that impression from anyone I've ever spoken to about her.
It's just really sad. I feel very sorry for her. Nobody should go through life like that. I wish she knew she had value and that she was worthy.
I do always try to find the lesson in each situation - I really feel that the lesson here is that avoiding my real father is not the right choice to be making and that it would cause me to regret it later in life - I'm thankful to have this chance to build a relationship with him while I can.
EDIT -
I did end up in Kansas City, we did end up having a funeral for her, and through it I think we may have found a bit of closure. The entire trip back was a "closing" of sorts.
My husband and I drove out from Los Angeles as we decided since we were going to KC we should finally go empty out the storage space we had been paying for for 6 years.
We visited Grandview, my house, my schools, my friends houses, the hangouts, the moments - it was all right there. My house was for sale. It was empty! I absolutely could not believe it.
I sat on my steps, looked into the windows, and I cried. I cried a LOT! Hell, I'm crying about it right now. Everything in my world was tied to that house in one way or another, the good, the bad and the very very ugly. I was at ground fucking zero.
It was the beginning of a very emotional journey. One I will continue to tell about at another time.
The Mechanics Of Love
As a very young child I was taught that nothing was given for free. There was a price for everything. If I wanted to go to a friends house, if I wanted someone to come over, if I wanted a new toy, if I whatever...I just had to be there to give in order to get.
Love was not based on emotion, it was just a word. "Love" was what you did to get what you wanted.
NOTE - There are explicit details contained in this post that may be emotionally difficult for some people.
PLEASE do not go there if you are not ready.
This is written to document my own personal journey.
I don't remember when it began. I've racked my brain so many times. It had just always happened. Maybe it started before the incident with the cousin. Maybe not. There is no beginning. It just was...
As a very young child I was taught that nothing was given for free. There was a price for everything. If I wanted to go to a friends house, if I wanted someone to come over, if I wanted a new toy, if I whatever...I just had to be there to give in order to get.
Love was not based on emotion, it was just a word. "Love" was what you did to get what you wanted. It was even thrown around almost as a way to kill the silence. I love you.
My grandmother would say it a thousand times a day. I know, I'm so lucky, that's such a wonderful thing... You know what, I don't ever remember sitting on her lap. I don't ever remember her comforting me. And, when I needed her the most, when I was at the end of my emotional and psychological rope, at 15 years old...she turned her back on me. Refused to protect me. This thing she "loved" so much. This child she took as hers, she believed that I was the monster. I was a fucking CHILD!
I'm getting ahead of myself....please pause as I recompose...
Sorry, some of this stuff is still really hard to wade through...
I was super close with my grandfather. He did stuff. My grandmother just sat and read and watched shows or talked on the phone. My grandfather cut wood, seined the ponds for fish, worked on the truck, he built stuff. I was a total tomboy, getting dirty was my favorite thing.
I had a few friends that lived nearby. My best friends when I was little were Jan and Angie. We'd play Charlies Angels all the time but I'd always get stuck being Sabrina. Jan was the prettiest, and blonde, so she was ALWAYS Farrah and Angie always got to be Jacklyn Smith cuz she was, well, I don't know why...I had to be Sabrina cuz I had short brown hair. I hated Sabrina.
After they moved it was Julie, she moved across the street (Read the Door To Door post) then it became Sandy. She had a pool and her mom was everything I had always wanted. She was beautiful and could play piano and did these cool crafts and cooked super cool fancy foods. She'd brush my hair and make me pretty. Sigh. I'll tell the story about them another time.
My grandmother worked as a teacher, then the librarian, at a school in Belton and she'd stay after classes ended doing stuff, so it was me and my grandfather most of the time.
If I wanted to go somewhere after school I knew there was a price. And I did it. I didn't think anything about it as a child. It was what it was, I thought it was perfectly normal. Everybodys daddy was like that, right?
He'd lay on the floor in the living room, or on the bed, or in his truck...I'd unzip his pants and masterbate him. Sometimes he'd put me on top of the freezer in the basement or lay me down and put it between my thighs till he got off. He never penetrated me. Not that it makes it any better, lol.
It was the price you paid to get what you wanted. It was how you showed love. It was how you earned love. It was just that thing you do.
We had a farm, my grandfather loved going there for the weekends, I think because my grandmother didn't like it. There was a shitty single wide trailer there with no air conditioning. It smelled of old people and rotten vegetables.
He grew nightcrawlers in the bathtub, right next to the toilet where his mom died, lol. (I vaguely remember it, I was really young but I do remember driving out there late at night cuz she'd called him and wasn't feeling well.)
He loved the farm. He loved to take me too. Maybe that's why I liked to fish so much. I'd spend all my time running the 10 acres and 4 different big ponds. I'd make mud slides into the water, sit for hours in the minnow pond and let them nibble on me, catch crawdads...
He'd get the entire weekend to fuck with me.
I loved it when my cousins came down. Not only did I love being with them because they were older and so much cooler than I was, but I could relax and not have to worry about anything while they were there.
Here's the thing though. Until I got older I didn't realize it was bad. I knew it was a secret but I didn't understand why. And I loved my grandfather. He was my dad. I knew I didn't like it, but I also didn't like green beans or liver - I still had to eat that shit.
By the time I was about 12 I knew. I knew it was wrong, I knew I hated it, I knew I wanted it to stop. I knew I was fucked up. I was dirty. I tried to avoid situations, I tried to stay away, but what could I do?
I was having severe stomach pains, like doubling over intense stabbing pains. Doctors said it was stress. I got shingles, again due to stress. My grandmother put me in therapy. I didn't say anything...I couldn't do it.
I didn't want my grandfather to go to jail. I didn't want to go away and live with my real mother - though I tried to reach out to her. I found out where she was in some shitty hotel but she was too doped up to even answer the door. The unknowns were a far greater risk than continuing to live the way I was.
When I was 13, my uncle and his wife were in town visiting us for about a week. At one point he invited me to come along as he went to some market to get stuff. During the ride he asked if I would like to drive. Well, duh! I was 13, of course I wanted to drive!
The trick was that I had to sit on his lap, just in case...so he could still control the car. As we got going he reached between my legs and began to rub me and grind against me. I told him to stop but he said he just wanted to show me what the boys were gonna be doing to me soon.
I broke down. I told my grandmother and grandfather about it.
My grandmother's response, I swear to God....."DJ wouldn't do that, he'd never do that" and that was the end of that. It was never to be brought up again.
I knew right then that I was completely alone. Nobody was going to save me. I just buckled to it I guess. This was what it was and it was not going to change and I just had to make myself accept it. I did sneak into the bedroom and stole his $300 in cash though. Motherfucker. Funny that he never said anything about that.
That was really the tipping point for me. I think that was the point I really started to act out. It was also when I first started cutting myself, though that didn't peak till later. I hid my pain well, kept my secrets and moved through as best I could. Little did I know what laid ahead.
Loss of Innocence
I know, without a doubt that everyone will fuck you. Every One. I don't care who you are.
When you are young, you don't see people as different races, you don't see rich vs poor. People aren't born evil, racist, hateful, abusive, etc. They are taught that. Children learn from those they are surrounded by. Children trust their caregivers unconditionally.
They trust.
Unconditionally.
Devious little shit, wasn't I?
The definition of trust, according to Merriam-Webster is the belief that someone or something is reliable, good, honest, effective, etc.
I've always said I don't trust anyone, but really...if we go by the definition, I do trust some people - but never unconditionally. I never have. I've come close. I trust Gary in as much as I've ever trusted anyone, maybe even a little more. But I know, without a doubt that everyone will fuck you. Every One. I don't care who you are.
That's not to say that I am always waiting for it - because I am a hard believer in the power of positive thinking. Positive energy works miracles. No bullshit.
What you believe you can achieve.
Trust is a hard thing. I have faith and hope when it comes to people, not trust.
Christmas, obviously. My new doll is up on the couch. I loved her.
It's funny how certain things take you right back to a moment. I recall I had this doll, she was tall, one of those walk-with-me types. She wore the same size clothes as me basically. So, that would put me at about 4 yrs old maybe.
I had this shorts set on. It was white with these tiny little green flowers on it. My doll could wear it too, though it was a little big on her. It was my favorite.
I remember being called into my grandmother's bedroom, I remember sitting on the edge of the bed. I remember the sound of his zipper. The shadows on the wall in the late afternoon sun. I can still hear him tell me to be quiet. To touch it. To kiss it.
She watched from a safe distance.
My doll.
She never told.
Neither did I.
It was a "cousin". Everyone was somehow family but I never understood who came from where and how we were all connected. His name was Willie, or Bill.
Thankfully I didn't see him very often. Thankfully it never happened again. He was just the first.
One little fucked up footnote to this story. When i was about 12, Willie came to visit. He had married a Vietnamese woman and they were getting ready to have a baby. They named her Sharon. I swear to fucking God. I wished so badly that I would have spoken up. But, in the grand scheme of everything else at that point, it wouldn't have mattered.
It begins with a baby on a bus
Don't get me wrong, aside from the dark and dirty secrets, my grandparents were good to me, they provided well for me, and I loved them because they were all I had and I knew no different. They were FAR better than the alternative of growing up with the people who gave birth to me.
Georgeanne and Mirl, my real parents
I was born in Minot, ND on the Air Force Base. My real dad was stationed there, married to my real mother. He was 18 and she was 16 - super young and dumb.
The story goes that my father came home to find me alone in the apartment with nothing on but a dirty diaper and a high fever, I was 5 months old. Apparently my mother was next door in bed with his best friend...Many stories have circulated about what horrific acts transpired after that revelation, none of them were good.
Ultimately, he shipped me on a bus to live with his parents, giving up full legal rights to me. I arrived in Kansas City in the middle of the night with pneumonia and no provisions. My grandparents found themselves parents again. He left for Vietnam.
My Aunt Helen and Uncle Don and 2 of my cousins, my real dad and my (grandmother) mom. This would have been shortly before I was born.
Dude looks like Gomer Pile, lol. It's okay, you can laugh. He was/is a really tall, lanky guy and should be instructed to never, ever, stand like that.
I was known as the "black sheep" of the family. I was Georgeanne and Mirl's daughter. Two fuck ups that had another fuck up, that was now going to fuck up my grandparents life.
Don't get me wrong, aside from the dark and dirty secrets, my grandparents were good to me, they provided well for me, and I loved them because they were all I had and I knew no different. They were FAR better than the alternative of growing up with the people who gave birth to me.
My grandmother was a school teacher who later became the librarian at a Junior High - in a different school district, thank God! And my grandfather, he was retired from something that he got a pension from. He was always doing different things. He had inherited a farm when his mother passed away (I was like 6 maybe, but I remember she died on the toilet, lol.)
Anyway, people would pay to come fish at the farm. He stocked the ponds with catfish from Arkansas and would clean and prep fish for various restaurants around. I was the ultimate tomboy. I ran around in cutoff shorts with no shirt. I had super short hair and everyone swore I was a boy. I was a hellova fisherman too.
I'll save the dirty truth of the farm for another post....
My grandmother had 2 grown daughters that were well into their own lives and in their 30's. My Aunt Barbara (Florida) despised me but my Aunt Judy (Michigan) was always nice to me. I had an Aunt Helen and Uncle Don and their 3 kids, my cousins, Rhonda, Terri and Debbie. I loved them. They were the family I wanted...and needed, but they didn't know that till much later in life.
My cousins, Terri, Rhonda, Debbie and Me (2yr old) Notice the saddest, ugliest Christmas tree in the history of EVER! It looks like it has cobwebs all over it!
The REAL Parents
Like so many others, my real dad came back from Vietnam all fucked in the head. He moved to Leavenworth, KS and got a job at the penitentiary there. He married some woman who had 5 kids of her own, one who was the SPITTING image of my real dad....it was never admitted to me though, but come on! She was Latino, her kids were all Latino and then there's the young boy who was a scrawny built twig with eyes exactly like me and my real dad....but whatever.
On the back of the photo it reads:
1305 hrs, Thu 23 July '70
V.C. Prisoner Of War Camp, East of Pleiku A.F.B.
(my real dad is the one holding a gun)
On far right, a POW interpreter, on my left, AIC Tarloton, a guard for POWs. On his left, two V.C. who was captured up on Monkey Mountain which is not shown in this photo.
Mirl Hobbs
They'd all come over once a year on Christmas Eve for dinner and he'd play "Dad for a Day". He was a stranger, he wasn't my dad. But I'd wonder why he never took me with them. If he was my dad, why didn't he want me? Why did he want all those other kids and not me?
I'd hide in my closet (that was my safe zone) and cry about it every fucking year - on Christmas Eve....ugh. You know what else, I don't ever remember getting a present from him. Not once.
He's currently living in Florida, in some back wood, nothing town, I think, with a different wife who is legit psycho. We never speak. I'll have to do a separate post about that whole fucked up situation. Seriously, like graveyard curses and multiple personalities....it's quite a tale.
No idea who the woman was. But, he did come visit at some point when I was about 2.
My real mother...wow, this one's good. How much time do we have? I'll try to condense it as much as I can.
So Georgeanne, eventually went under the alias of Connie, was 16 when she had me. She divorced my real dad and married multiple times and ultimately had 6 kids by 5 different men.
The funny thing is that we all grew up within 20 miles of each other and never fucking knew it.
I remember I met her one time when I was about 7. She came to the door one night and when I opened it she said she was my mother. She had a baby with her, my sister, Michelle. I don't remember anything else about that night and didn't see her again.
At one point, when i was about 12 we drove out to some shit-ass no-tell motel she was staying at in Independence, MO for me to meet her and she was so fucked up she couldn't even answer the door.
I finally met her, for real, when i was 18. After a long string of shit, my parents decided I should go live with her - a total stranger, in New Hampshire...they flew me out there and I was left standing in an airport not having a clue who I was looking for or if anyone would actually show up.
She was an alcoholic and a drug addict. A professional liar and had no basic respect for anything or anyone. She had two of my sisters living there, the only two that hadn't been taken away or given up. They were about 7 and 8 at the time and had been raised to steal everything they could get their hands on and run the prescription scams for her. They'd never had rules or boundaries of any kind, they were out of control. It was heartbreaking.
We ended up in jail together one time - that was one for the books. Got arrested with my real mother, lol. Stealing, of course. Not that I'd never been to jail before, but this time I actually hadn't done anything.
This is one of the few pictures I have of her. This was in 1991, surprisingly she's really lucid in this pic and looks to be doing well. Well, aside from living in the basement of her husbands parents house - with her husband, the two girls, and her mentally deficient boyfriend - who was younger than me....omg. I'll get to that one eventually. The girls had so many issues. I tried to be there, I did, but at some point I had to cut ties to protect myself and, ultimately, my newborn son. (another story, of course)
I recall one night, would have been in '91, sitting at the dinner table with mom and dad (grandparents). The TV was always on in the living room and they'd listen to the news while we ate. Anyway, they did this story about prescription scammers and I shot out of my seat and yelled that that was what my real mom was doing and sure as shit! By the time I got in there they were flashing her and her husbands pics on the screen! You know what, I called the tv station and tried to turn the bitch in lol.
I don't even know if she's alive currently. I went to a grocery store she was working at once and went through her line just to see if she'd recognize me. Nope...not even a glimmer.
Anyway - after all is said and done, I suppose I am glad I had the life I did. Maybe in my next post I'll talk a bit more about the reality of life with my grandparents. Maybe I should wait...we'll see.
My mom(grandmother) and me. I'm guessing it was my first birthday. I believe in the back that is "Aunt" May. She lived to be 103. My mom passed away about 15 years ago.
The plan was made, that night we would go out and ….