First Traumatic Experiences as a Toddler

I was born 8 pounds and 11 ounces and was very healthy. My parents got their own place in Buena Park, CA when I was 6 months old. It was a small studio apartment on Commonwealth Ave and it was very cheap rent. It was across the street from a small airport. I was developing normal as a baby. I started talking at 6 months old, and started walking at 11 months old. My parents really enjoyed having me as a baby and they did a lot of things for me when I turned 2 years old. I went to Disneyland, Sea World, and my aunt and uncle came over and we all went together celebrating my 2nd birthday. They also got a cat and I loved playing with her. She was a gray and white cat named Shawney. I have a lot of pictures they took from their old camera. Everything was going fine until one day my parents took me to go get my first set of vaccinations. It was the MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccinations and I was 2 years old at the time. My mom noticed something fishy about the way they vaccinated me. They put both shots in the same leg instead of one in each leg.

Six months later, I stopped talking and became mute. I declined in my health and started crying and screaming a lot. My parents had to take me to the doctor to see what’s wrong with me. I remember I was playing with some toys in the patient room. I heard the nurse behind me had come in the room and asked my parents “did you know that your daughter has Autism?” Then my parents were shocked and my mom asked “What is Autism?” and the nurse gave my mom some papers of information about Autism and I was officially diagnosed with Autism in 1998 when I was 2 going on 3 years old.

I was in preschool when I was 3 and 4 years old, even though I barely remember those years. The only things I remember were that my mom was pregnant again, and I remember she ate tons of rocky road ice cream and I sat on her lap and she was sharing some with me. I wasn’t completely mute anymore but I repeated everything my mom said at one point. Everything she said, I said and it was bothering both of my parents. I was almost 4 years old when my mom gave birth to my brother on August 20, 1999 in the same hospital I was born at. I wasn’t allowed in the hospital because of age restrictions for watching a woman in labor, so my dad took me out to Taco Bell that night. I was excited to see my brother when he was a baby. I loved being around him a lot and he got along with me too. My mom got her tubes tied after that because she didn’t want any more children.

I was a loud screaming and crying toddler and it was stressing my parents out. My dad disciplined me the correct way by spanking me and covering my mouth but it wasn’t working at times. When he was drunk it was a whole different story. My dad got drunk every night and he kept blaming me for his drinking even though I was a toddler. The actions he did and the anger he had when he was drunk was out of control. It was worse when my mom was out working at night. He was physically harming me and was violent towards me every time I screamed and cried. Then when he’s sober he wouldn’t remember the things he did when he was drunk. He was fine when he was sober because he only spanked me and covered my mouth, but when he was drunk it was way worse pain inflicted on me. I was being physically and emotionally abused by my dad when he was drunk and I remember being afraid of my dad at times. There were harsh words he spoke against me out of drunkenness and I was a confused toddler. I felt safer when my mom was home because it wasn’t as bad when he was drunk when my mom was home. I was going through the abuse throughout my childhood because my dad was addicted to alcohol and he would drink at least 6 bottles of beer every night. This was going on for years as I was growing up.

My dad was a good dad outside of the drunkenness. He would teach me things when I ask him questions, take me to places like the park etc, and I had fun with him in the apartment sometimes when my mom was at work. When my brother was 2 and I was 6, I remember we went to a lot of outings as a family. Some of the places we went to were Disneyland, Adventure City, other kid amusement parks, and the beach quite a few times, etc. They had more money at the time because my mom had a good paying job as a security officer. The studio apartment we lived in had a parking lot outside our door so my brother and I couldn’t play outside at all. We had to always stay inside the apartment. I grew up playing with toys, watching TV, and playing games on the computer. I had no outside life even though I wanted to be outside so bad but I wasn’t allowed outside. My brother was also diagnosed with Autism when he was 2 years old, and my parents knew it was coming because I had Autism too at the time. One day when we went to Adventure City, my brother spoke his first word for the first time. His first word was “car” because we went out a lot to places. My brother and I had different types of Autism, mine was crying a screaming a lot and having uncontrollable temper, and his was the sensory type where he was walking on his tippy toes and flapped his hands a lot, and he was very calm and hardly ever cried.