True Stories Of The American Dream From the Hearts and Minds Of Real Americans Part II (2 of 2)
May 15th 2009 11:50
“If you ever questioned why women stay with their abusive spouses you might be surprised to know the answers.”
My oldest daughter stayed with me a little while longer but she also went to stay with her dad in September 2006.
Shortly thereafter I sent the younger children to live with their dad.
At this point I was homeless, without any children and jumping from house to house…
I was lost.
I fell into a very deep depression but I never did drugs nor have I ever abused alcohol besides the experimenting that kids do in their younger years.
I did everything the way society told me to and never got in trouble but when I decided to stand up and not be abused anymore I lost everything.
You might ask why the younger children were sent to live with their dad if he was so abusive…
My thought process was simply this: If they went there, there was a chance that I could get them back.
He had never been abusive to them besides the abuse that they watched with me, which is its own form of abuse, but he was never hurtful to them and if they were sent to foster homes I felt this would be more detrimental in the long run.
They loved their dad.
The power of unconditional love sees no wrong.
To them he was just as good as me.
I fell hard.
I had nothing left to give and nothing left to offer.
Yes I went out, drank alcohol, lived from house to house and had relations with different men (please note that I didn’t sleep around with every Tom, Dick, and Harry).
I always called my children tried my best to visit with them when I was able to.
Many times I was abused by the younger kid’s father when I visited.
Sometimes I just didn’t go because it hurt too much.
After all isn’t that the reason why I left so they didn’t see the abuse anymore?
I never truly think I recovered from the abuse.
I went to counselors, talked about problems and took medications but the only real medication I needed was them.
I needed those kids.
I provided for them all by myself for all those years suffered, made sacrifices to my body and lost it all.
On Mothers Day in 2006, I overdosed on Lunesta, a sleeping pill that was prescribed to me.
I had finally hit rock bottom and I was done.
I called the kids father as I begin to drift off.
I asked the younger kids father to tell them that I loved them and I told him that I wouldn’t be around but I would always be with them.
He said “*** you” and hung up.
I called the older kids father and said the same.
He asked what was wrong and I fell asleep.
A few hours later I was in a hospital and had been resuscitated with my stomach pumped.
I had still had the remnants of charcoal in my mouth that I ingested to make sure my organs weren’t too messed up.
I walked out of the hospital the next day alive and I was never the same again.
I always wanted to live but I wanted to go to sleep until the personal hell that I was in was over.
I wanted my punishment to stop because I wasn’t sure why I was being punished.
After a short stint in the hospital and a few long years of medical management and therapy I got me back.
Yes, thankfully the children were with their fathers through all of this.
To this day I am not confident that they know what happened that day.
To be honest neither do I.
What I can tell you about that day is that I changed and something did die that day.
It was the old me.
The meek, meager, form of me that thought it was ok to get abused and just take it one more day.
That me, she died.
I lost my job at the good company after 10 years of working there.
I had gotten an efficiency apartment just before find out this.
The children would come and stay on the weekends with me.
If not every weekend then at least every other weekend...
In January I got another job in Manassas and began to commute to and from work.
From the early part of 2006 through 2008 I was in another bad relationship.
I found out that I was pregnant right before we split up.
In August of 2008 I moved in with a friend from work.
She said I could stay with her, try to get the kids back and she would help in any way she could.
This was only 15 minutes from my job and a real opportunity for me to get back on my feet.
The goal was to leave by June 2009 and be in my own apartment.
So in November of 2008 I went to pick the younger 2 kids up and told their dad they would be living with me.
He couldn’t contest it because we hadn’t established custody.
I filed for joint custody and full physical custody and was granted this motion in December 2008.
I got my groove back.
2 down 2 to go and I was ready to battle.
These kids were my lifeline and I had nothing better to do with my time but be their mother.
I attempted to get my oldest daughter to come back and live with me in November 2008.
She and I had not been seeing eye to eye and her step- mother was her new best friend.
After a 20 minute hearing about how unfit I was (per her father) and that I was mentally unstable, the judge granted full temporary custody to her father.
A child that I had raised alone for 10 years and after 20 minutes of hearing about the way a 12 year old doesn’t want to listen to her mother, the judge decided this is what was best for her.
I didn’t get to talk to the older children on Thanksgiving.
I didn’t get to see them on Christmas.
Only the weekends that I had visitation, this thankfully fell close to the holidays.
At the permanent hearing in December I was granted joint custody with her father having full physical custody.
I did this because this is where she wanted to be but I continued to state that she was best with me.
I currently get visitation every other weekend.
When I left the court room that day, he father acted as if everything was great and began confirming arrangements for the upcoming weekend.
I was amazed.
Remember I was mentally unstable?
Why would you want your kid with me?
These hearings are supposed to be what is good for the child but that’s really not the case.
How can someone who just takes a glimpse into your life really know what was good for the child?
Maybe if I had a lawyer then I would have seen a different outcome…
If I had money for an attorney I wouldn’t use it for that.
I would buy my kids the things they needed.
I would get better transportation so I could make sure that I could be there to visit them.
I would get an apartment so we could all be together.
So either way I lose and my children ultimately lose as well because I decided to leave an abusive situation.
So now ask yourself why women stay in relationships and continue to be abused?
If you think this is the end, it’s not.
Much more has happened and you will continue to be amazed at how the system continues to work its magic.
Yes from January 2009 until this day there are still things happening and at the end of this long story you’ll have to remind yourself to pick up your jaw, because it will drop.
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