Surviving Out Loud

                As I sit here staring at the computer, ready to write the next chapter of this blog, I am in bed next to the one person I at one point in time loved. As I look at him now, I can only wish our marriage would end. He has moments where he can be sweet, but they don’t last long. It makes me think back on all the times he promised me when we first met that he would never treat me badly due to my past. What a crock of shit. There are no fairytales and happy endings. Just titanic scenes and survival skills. If you have ever seen The Seasoning House, that is what part of my life has been like. Besides my narcissistic husband, there have been times I have wanted to just up and leave and disappear due to others in my family. Let’s go back a bit.

When I was about 10-12 yrs old, I lived in Fenton, MO. I hung around with the same friends since I was small. I had a crush on the same boy since I was little. Nothing really changed. It was a bland but eventful childhood. Be home by the time the streetlight came on, or your ass was grass type of childhood. We built a club house in the woods, played house, got felt up a time or two. Got kissed for the first time and then at the age of 14 I was invited to a seniors Hockey game. Met a few of the high school players and I was invited to their house. I went thinking it would be fun and ended up losing my virginity in a basement while watching little rascals and listening to Usher. Like, thinking back on this, I want to smack the shit out of myself because I was dumb.  My family ended up moving to Arnold, MO. That’s when the trouble started. Being 14 yrs old and having friends of variety was trouble for me. I made good grades and was the good child even though my parents favored my brother. I didn’t care; I was accustomed to it. I also took the blame for my brother a lot. I would end up getting into fights at school over him.

I did however keep ONE friend from my old neighborhood. She would come over sometimes to stay the night and hang out. She did seem like she started to change a bit. I noticed it when she got skinnier and her flirting with my stepdad got out of control. She was being odd. I tried to ignore it, but I couldn’t. After dropping her off at home and coming back to go to bed, the whole family was woken up by the police busting into our home. Dragging me and my brother out of bed. Checking our arms and legs and in between our toes. I was just waking up and didn’t know what was happening. They had drug dogs in the house searching everywhere.

Finally, after hours, we were told what was going on. My lovely friend decided to go to the police and tell them my stepdad raped her and forced her to shoot up heroin. Apparently, they had been doing drugs with each other for a year while I was sleeping and he didn’t have any to give her this time, so she flipped out and went psycho. Did I know he did drugs? At one point I knew he did them, and he went to jail and came out clean from what I know. That’s a flashback for another day. So, after this all occurred, is when I finally spoke up about all the touching he had been doing. My mom called me a liar after I told her it had been occurring for about 3 years. I’m assuming it was while he was on drugs. She said I was making it up and just wanted attention. So this is when my life really hit the garbage disposal…..