Damaged

***AUTHORS NOTE*** This is a biography about me and my estranged mother. I never call her "mother" in this story, because in my eyes, she never earned that exhalted title, and doesn't deserve to be called anything but, Belinda.

Belinda was only 15 when she got pregnant with me, my dad was 18. They were married in March of 1977, I was born 3 months later. My life as a child was very difficult. I didn't really get to do any of the things a normal child got to do. My mom was a huge part of that problem.

According to my grandma, Belinda's problems started before I was born. She had very violent fits of jealousy. Just because my dad would smile at another woman, she automatically accuse him of cheating on her, or that something was going on between them. My father never had peaceful moments with Belinda.

I don't remember much before I was 5. We tend to remember more bad things than good things that happen to us when we are at a young and impressionable age. It was right after my sister Jillian was born, this was in July of 1982. Belinda was fine for awhile, she actually took care of me most of the time, and Jillian too. But, sometimes I was still stuck with changing the diapers.

In 1983 I flunked first grade, I blame that on Belinda too because she is the one that is supposed to sit down with me and teach me things and to help me learn. Taking care of Jill didn't bother me much at first, but then she had another baby which was Sheila in July of 1985. Belinda had put all of the weight and responsibilty of caring for my sisters on me. She stopped taking care of me, and then I ended up with having to take care of not one but 2 kids, a toddler and an infant. I was only 8 years old. It got to the point where I was taking care of my 2 sisters, and myself. I had to wake myself up for school, make my own lunches. Yeah, like an 8 year old is going to know anything about packing a nutritious lunch or making it.

The teachers and principal were starting to wonder if I was being abused or not. I was more neglected than anything else. But there were times when Belinda would hit me for no reason. She actually chased me into the kitchen, and I slipped on the floor and slid into the refrigerator, and she started to kick me non-stop, I eventually escaped and locked myself in my room just to get away from her. Dealing with Belinda was a nightmare. I don't remember any massive bruising or anything like that.

Before we go any further, I want everyone to get something straight. My dad was totally innocent, he was a victim too. None of this is my dad's fault, he worked a lot when I was a child, and he had the grave yard shift, he couldn't help what happened, because he didn't know anything about what Belinda did to me. He never cheated on Belinda. I know this, because my dad has wonderful parents and they raised him to be a good man. After their divorce, I told my dad about the evil, and nasty things Belinda had done to him and I.

Dad and Belinda fought like a couple of wild dogs. Belinda instigated of all of the fights. She hurt my dad so many times, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally too. I hated her because of it. I still do. This tore like a dagger in my heart to be witness to these events.

In the 80's, she spent a lot of weekends at her friends' houses' getting drunk, puking, and passing out on the front lawn. She would always drink the hard stuff. My dad would have to leave work early to come and pick her up.

In 1986, Belinda met these people down the street, they had 2 sons, one named Lester, and the other named Pat. Pat was the older of the 2 sons. They had just moved in.....my parents were always the type to meet and greet new people in the neighborhood. I started to notice that she was spending a lot of time with the older son Pat, I didn't take that all too well. I know this because he was always around, and he was always there after I came home from school.

In 1987 I began to suspect that they were sleeping together. I was 10 years old, and not stupid. One night I was going to ask Belinda about something, and I caught the 2 of them in bed or at least I thought I did, or I had a strong premonition that they were doing something. When I saw this, I freaked out and ran from her screaming and crying. I told her that I was going to tell dad what she did, she cornered me in the bathroom and told me that if I told dad, she would kill me. And, I think that she meant it too. Then Belinda panicked and called Pat, and he came down and they were mulling over what to do. They came up with what they thought was a brilliant idea...........running away. I guess if Pat came from his home, they weren't in bed together at that time. OOPS. But if they were innocent, why run? One thing that I learned from myself is that kids are not stupid. They know more than we think they do. Belinda and Pat packed up the majority of our stuff, mainly our clothes, and they took off in her car.

The car ended up breaking down in Kentucky, we were stranded overnight. Some how my mom and Pat convinced a truck driver to give us a ride to West Virginia. We ended up at some strangers house and stayed for a few days, then they had some of their friends set us up in this dumpy house in the mountains, where we had to eat beans and cornbread all of the time. Being from the north, I was not used to that kind of food. Now to a 10 year old, this is pretty scary stuff.

Pat, as you've probably figured out by now, was a scuzz bag and a pervert. Especially if he takes someone else's wife and abducts 3 small children. He even tried to peak in at me when I was taking a bath, how sick is that? I believe that we were in West Virginia for at least 2 weeks. But to my surprise, I found out that we were about to be rescued from that hell hole. I found out that my dad and my grandpa Tom were on their way to come and get us. I was so relieved to be back with my dad, I missed him so much.

When my dad and my grandpa arrived we left, and headed toward South Carolina, where Belinda has family. I later found out that that was the destination that she was trying to get to in the first place. Oh yeah, I almost forgot to mention that we left Pat behind, when he was supposedly at work. We probably stayed in South Carolina for at least a week. I got to meet some cousins and some aunts that I had never met before. As for that little kidnapping adventure that Belinda took us on, I wanted to put that whole experience behind me. Too bad that they didn't leave her there to rot too.

Unfortunately that stunt Belinda pulled didn't make my dad's relationship with her, stronger. My dad tried everything that he could to make it work, simply because he loved her. But that wasn't the only time she had cheated on my dad. She did it several times after that. While in West Virginia, Belinda caught Chlamydia from Pat, but I didn't know about that until I was in my 20's. I was later told by my Grandma Betty, and my Grandpa Tom that when my dad came home the night that she and Pat kidnapped us, that he was beside himself with grief, and was crying. I had never seen my dad cry before.

In 1989 my sister Molly was born, as you could probably guess, Belinda got pregnant almost right away after dad brought her home. And once again, I had the responsibility of taking care of Molly too. This time it was different, because I was 12 years old. So now, I wasn't only changing diapers, I was making her bottles too, and feeding her. Taking care of Molly was kind of fun, probably because I was older. I still had responsibility of taking care of all 3 children. I never had time for myself. To this very day, I still resent Belinda (not my sisters) for making me do all of the stuff that adults are supposed to do.

The abuse continued. Belinda and my dad were always fighting, and the fights would always take place in the middle of the night, and wake me up. She started all of the fights. One day, my Belinda accused me of sleeping with a guy, she claimed that she could smell sperm on me. I was twelve years old! I was a virigin until I was 26.

Belinda was completely delusional in her thinking. She continued to make other accusations toward me, in the middle of the night, one night, I woke up and she was hitting me. She accused me of using her make-up, I was probably 14 at the time. I didn't use her make-up, I had my own anyway. She tore off the railing on the bunk bed, I slept on the top section of course.

The weird thing is that she never went after my younger sisters'. I could never understand why my dad and I were always the target of her abuse. Belinda spent the majority of her life as a worthless sloth. All she ever did was sleep. She never did any housework, she never took care of Molly while I was gone at school. When Molly was able to walk, she got into trouble. I would come home, and Molly would wreck the entire house, then I would have to clean it up, and I wasn't very happy about that, once I saw my room, I almost dropped dead from fright. Molly had totally demolished my room while I was at school. I would have it all nice and cleaned up, then when I came home, I couldn't see the floor. If mom had been watching her like she should've been, this would've never happened. There was another incident........I came home and Molly had toilet paper stuck up her nose, and it was bleeding. I went into the bathroom and she had been playing in an unflushed toilet, with fecal matter in it. I had to clean her up, and plunge the toilet because whoever used it before did not flush it. When I peaked into mom's room, she was doing what she did best, sleeping, like always. I was so angry with her. She was never fit to be a mother.

Belinda always called me a lot of mean names too. Some of those include; bitch, whore, and slut, which I wasn't any of those things in the first place. The word "Bitch" was used more than the others. In fact, it was the most over-used word in the household. When I got old enough, I was able to defend myself to a certain extent. When she would hit me for no reason, I would hit her back. I never felt bad about defending myself against her either. I think that I was 14, when I first hit her back, after that she rarely came after me. She would even avoid me. At 14, I was probably the same height as her if not taller.

In 1992, I had just turned 15. We were at a friend's house for a birthday party. This was one of my dad's co-workers that was having the birthday party. Molly was almost 3 years old. I was off playing with my friends and my other sisters'. This friends cottage was on a lake. I was in the yard talking to my sister Jill, then I heard some lady scream, "There's a baby out in the middle of the lake". I came out and looked, and it was Molly. She had found a blow-up bed, you know, one of those skinny flimsy things that you lay on in the water. Well, apparently she grabbed it and took it out to the water and fell asleep on it. She eventually drifted out to the middle of the lake. Belinda wasn't watching her. She yelled at me to go out and get her. I had to swim all the way out there and get her. And of course, as soon as I was almost there, she fell off and into the water. I had to hurry and get her out of there. I had to hit her back to get the trapped water out. I took her back to shore. I had another thing to be mad at Belinda about.

A couple weeks later she ran off and put herself in an abuse shelter. She was not abused, my dad and I were abused. She made these outrageous claims about my dad and my grandfather sexually abusing me and my sisters. I later on recalled a session that I had with a therapist. She was trying to coax me and my sisters' into telling her that we were molested by my dad and my grandpa Tom. That day I couldn't figure out what Belinda was up to. Her friend Julie was in on it too. A couple months before, Belinda talked my dad into buying her a new car. And on another occasion she bought a 32 caliber pistol. I remember thinking, "Why does she need a gun?" I later figured out that she had been planning on leaving my dad. Meanwhile, I was staying at my grandma Mary's house for the weekend. We were planning on going to the family reunion that they had every June, Jill was with me too. She called my grandmother up and told her that she was sending a Police Officer to come and get my sister and me. She already had my 2 youngest sister's, Sheila and Molly with her. The officer came up to my grandmothers house and tried to get us, but my grandmother convinced the officer to let us stay and go to the reunion the following day, and that we could be picked up there. The very next day, at the reunion, probably around 2pm or so, my mom came with the cops and protective services and dragged us away. I was screaming and kicking the entire time. Fifteen year olds don't usually act like that, but I felt that I didn't have a choice. I was in the same car with Belinda, she tried to talk to me but as stubborn as I had become over the years, I didn't say one word to her. The only thing that came out of my mouth was; "I hate you!" And it was the truth. I hated Belinda.

We got into a huge argument when we got to the shelter. I told her that I wanted absolutely nothing to do with her, and that I was eventually going to be back with my dad. I repeatedly told her that I going to go live with my dad. She told me; "No you're not, he molested you." I told her that she was full of bullshit and that my dad would never do anything like that. She also tried to tell me that my grandfather did it too, which was a total farce. We once had a meeting with the social workers, Belinda, and I. She told me that she wanted to be really close with me and be my friend. I told her that I didn't want any of those things from her, and of course the social workers asked 'why'. And I just told them that it was because she was always mean to me and never did anything for me, but make my life miserable.

One week later, I took one of the ladies that worked at the shelter aside and asked if I could have a private meeting with her. In the meeting I told her that I would much rather live with my Grandma Mary than live with my mom. I also told the lady what Belinda accused my dad and grandpa of doing. And the social worker tried to say that sometimes the victims of abuse will be very close to the people who hurt them. I told her that I would never lie about something like that and I would certainly tell someone if my dad and my grandfather had done something like that to me. Belinda finally released me into my grandmothers custody. The shelter told me that I could stay with my grandma for 30 days. I wasn't supposed to go with my dad as part of the agreement. Thankfully, my grandmother had the authority to tell me who I could see and who I couldn't see. My grandmother phoned my dad, and he was so excited that I was away from that psycho. He wanted to see me so badly. He asked my grandmother if it was okay if I went with him and some of his buddies to Lake Michigan to have a BBQ and to go swimming. And of course my grandmother let me. So I guess that you could say that I broke the rules a little bit. But I had a lot of fun. After the 30 days was over I was back into my dad's custody. Thank God! And eventually, Jill was back, and then about a year or a year and a half later my 2 youngest sisters were back as well.

In March of 1993 my dad's divorce to Belinda was final. With my dad, I was able to at least recapture some of my youth back, and he let me be the person that I was. He trusted me, which was something that I wanted for a long time. I could go to my friends whenever I wanted. When I was 16 I went to a lot of IHL (Minor League Hockey)Games. I was doing better in school. My dad wasn't drinking as much as he did when he was married to Belinda, he also lost quite a bit of weight too. I still helped with stuff like the cooking and cleaning. Most of the cleaning was up to my sisters though. I had enough of that in my prior youth. Belinda ended up moving back to South Carolina, she got into a lot of trouble after my dad divorced her. She was with this guy, he was very abusive, he shot her in the hand, and beat her up several times. Maybe its her punishment for what she did to my dad and me over the years. I also found out while she was in South Carolina that she had joined the Ku Klux Klan, which is another group that I am totally against. The ironic thing is, is that she started dating black guys after she moved from SC.

The abuse didn't stop when I was 18 either. In 1996 she came over for a visit once, and started trouble with me, and called me a slut, whore and a prostitute. I was so pissed off, because I was neither of those things. I took off in my car and went over to my grandma Betty and grandpa Tom's house. My grandpa wanted to strangle Belinda after he heard the names that she had called me. I later found out that she was living in Hammond, Indiana. It's kind of on the border of Indiana and Illinois, near Chicago, a very sleazy area. She started dating black men. Well I thought that she was just dating them....I later found out that they were her pimps.......she was stripping and prostituting herself, and she had the nerve to call me those terrible names! I also found out that she was arrested for public intoxication. She also had several sexually transmitted diseases. She was a total embarrassment to me and my family.

Years after these things happened, I tried to make amends, but every effort had failed. I was 22 at the time, and my mom eventually got remarried, and had 2 other children. They were half black, and that didn't bother me at all, I loved them as I loved my other siblings. I thought that would bring us closer together, because I was there for my sister Rain's birth, and I cut the umbilical cord, and made a care package for her, a diaper bag filled with all kinds of baby supplies. Eleven months later, my half-brother Elijah was born.

In January 2003, my grandma Mary fell very ill and was hospitalized. I will go into greater detail on that in another story later on. In May of that same year she died, and 13 days later grandpa Charles died. I thought I was finally going to make peace with Belinda. I went to church with her, and talked to her on the phone. Things blew up yet again between us because she was behaving like she always does. I didn't talk to her again until Septeber of 2006.

In September of 2006, I fell ill and found out that I had a golfball-sized tumor in my brain. My dad told me to call Belinda because she was really upset. I was reluctant to call her because of the bad blood we had between us. We had somewhat of a civil relationship after that for a little while. It didn't last very long. A little over a year after that, my dad tragically passed away, and she tried to collect money off of his life insurance. Knowing what she was trying to pull, just re-hashed every bad feeling that I ever had for her. I know now, that things can never be good between us, and this is her fault. She has no one but herself to blame. I hold her partially responsible for my father's death. It would have been a lot easier if she had died, instead of my father. In my eyes, Belinda is dead to me, and my father still lives on in my heart.