Always and Forever

Prologue: Where I've Been

My life has never been simple. It has been problem after problem. When I was eighteen, I moved away from the cold, dreary state of Minnesota which I lived in my whole life, not knowing where I was going or what I was going to be doing. When I lived at home with my parents, there was always the question they nagged me on, what was I going to do with my life? I never had the answer to it. I never knew what my future had in store for me. I never knew what I was going to do five minutes from then, then why the hell would I know what I will be doing five years from then.

I ended up in the bay area of California, in a somewhat small town, with a population of about 50,000. It was a forty-five minute drive to San Francisco from where I was staying. I had a cheap, small, old, studio apartment which I shared with Brent Dame, my boyfriend. At that point we have been dating for two years and we decided to move in together. I went to a state college nearby. Brent didn't go to college, instead he wanted to pursue his dream of being a musician. He was in a band which played local gigs. On occasions I played with them and helped them write some songs. For some gigs they asked me to join them, and sing the songs I helped to write. My main job was working at the Coffee House which had a five minute drive from our apartment. The pay at the Coffee House wasn't very good, but I made a lot extra money in tips from the costumers.

In July of the year 1998, on a Friday, Brent and I decided to get married. We eloped, and we got married in Las Vegas. We didn't have a long engagement, it lasted only the few hour drive that it took to get to Vegas. I ended up keeping my last name because I was so used to writing it and I didn't like how his last name sounded with my name. We ended up staying there for the weekend then drove home that Sunday. We didn't tell our families right away because we didn't know how they would react. We switched the answering machine to say "Hey, you have reached the newlyweds, Brent and Hayden. Please leave a message and we will get back to you sometime, thanks." We didn't completely realized our families would find out when they tried to call us. They freaked out right away, and kept calling us. They were mostly upset at the fact that they didn't get to see our wedding, but they eventually got used to the idea of Brent and I being married and were happy about it.

Later the next month, while Brent was at one of his gigs, I took an at home pregnancy test. I was only three days late on my period, and I usually wouldn't worry until I was a week or more, but this time something was different, I felt like it wasn't coming. Believe it or not, I was right, it wasn't coming; the test was positive. I didn't know how to feel right away, I was happy, sad, excited, but mostly confused. How could I be pregnant? I thought. We always used protection. That night I waited up for him to get home from his gig. When he got home, he knew something was up. I told him everything. He seemed okay with the whole idea of being a dad. We set up an appointment to see a doctor right away. We wanted to know for sure if we were having a baby. We went to the doctor and found out that I was six weeks pregnant. After all the grief we got about not telling them about getting married, we decided to call them that day to tell them about the baby. They were mostly shocked. We couldn't tell if they were happy about it or not.

It was a long and somewhat stressful pregnancy. Brent and I worried a lot about money and how we would pay the medical bills. I had morning sickness for the whole first trimester. I wasn't only sick in the morning, I was sick all day long. On April 9th, 1998 the baby was born. We named her Sienna Jean Dame. We gave her the middle name of Jean after my grandma and my cousin. Brent and I agreed her last name would be Dame after him and his family since her middle name is after my family. She was a beautiful. She had dark brown hair and the brightest blue-green eyes. She was a small baby that weighed only seven pounds and three ounces. Even though we were really young, me being only twenty and him barely twenty-one, we loved our baby and our little family that we had created.

About five months later, in September, Sienna was growing so fast. She was already sitting up on her own, she was also trying to crawl. One morning, I realized I was a week and a half late for my period. I started freaking out. Taking care of one baby was hard enough while still being in college, and having a job to go to everyday. I told Brent I thought I was pregnant before I even took a test. That night he went out and came home with six home pregnancy tests. And sure enough all six tests came out positive. We were in a bit of a shock. We saw the doctor a week later and it was confirmed. We're having another baby. The doctor told us I was eight weeks along.

That meant I had only thirty-two more weeks before I have another mouth to feed. Brent got another job so we could afford all of our expenses. I ended up dropping out of college, so I could work more shifts at the Coffee House. Brent didn't like me working so much while I was pregnant. So he took on another job. He was working nonstop so we could pay our bills. I still ended up working from the time the Coffee House opened to when it closed and then I also stayed to clean the place up. Most nights I didn't get home until after ten at night.

I had the baby after sixteen hours of labor, on May 17th, 1999. The baby was a handsome baby boy. He had light brown hair and blue-green eyes. We named him Kade James Dame. We decided to do the same thing with him as we had with Sienna. He has his dad's last name, and his middle name is James after my grandpa.

Life with two kids, both of them under the age of two, was hard. We struggled financially for a little while. We ended up getting money when Brent's grandma passed away. She left all of her life savings and everything she owned to Brent. We got over one hundred-thousand dollars from her! It helped us a lot, and he really appreciated it. Considering he got all of it when he always assumed she like his brother more.

We didn't need childcare anymore. Brent only kept his place in the band and the other jobs he quit. He played his gigs at night, so he watched the kids when I went to work during the day. I took the day shifts at the Coffee House, so I watched the kids at night. For a while it worked fine, but I felt like I was missing out on the kids' life, and Brent got annoyed and didn't necessarily like the responsibility of watching them all day long.

Years later when Sienna was seven and Kade was six, Brent and I started having problems. Brent started staying out later and coming home drunk or high. After months of this going on I told him "enough is enough. If you come home late and high one more time, I'm taking the kids and were leaving." Two days later he does it again, he was late and high, and I was done. The next morning while he was at work, my best friend came over and helped me pack up all of mine and the kids' stuff. She let us stay with her and her husband for as long as we needed. He called me, he was pissed off, but I could tell he was drunk, so I told him I was done.

Later after he stopped calling and trying to see the kids, I decided things weren't changing. I wanted a divorce. I made a court date with a judge and he didn't even bother to show up, so the divorce was granted. I got full custody of the kids. After eight years of being married, it was all over. He never called to check up on the kids. He sent them a birthday card on their next birthday, but that was it. He didn't even send them cards after that year.