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Chapter 2

After my great aunt got guardianship of me life was kind of a blur. I loved school, I had a ton of friends there & in the apartment complex. All of the adults in the complex would refer to me as the leader of the pack & honestly weren't a big fan of me. I don't blame them, I was kind of an asshole kid & trouble maker. I mean, I never had any true supervision so.....🤷🏼‍♀️
I excelled in school really well for having such a late start and practically being raised by wolves. My end of the year tests were so high they in turn tested my IQ and it was genius level, this was in kindergarten.
I was 5-6 years old walking around correcting everyone's southern twang and slang.
"It's WASH not WORSH!" 😇
Over the next year I saw my mom a handful of times. She would make promises, I would believe her, only to be let down over and over again when she wouldn't show up.
From what I can remember I was not consciously aware that my dad wasn't in the picture until I was around 5 or 6. I started noticing that some of the kid's dads that my great grandma babysat would pick them up. After that I started asking questions.
Shortly after that my aunts informed me that they "found" my dad & he was going to come visit me.
As an adult I can look back on that now knowing my dad's side of the story, which was that he had always paid child support so he was never really unavailable or "lost." As a child I didn't know that.
With that said here's a little bit of a quick backstory on my dad:
My dad moved to Oklahoma from Illinois or Indiana I forget exactly which one. He met my mom and she got pregnant. I believe they were 18 & 19. My dad tried to "man up" & do the right thing so he married her and joined the Marines. He had to go to boot camp & eventually got stationed in California but she decided she didn't wanna leave Oklahoma.
So she kept me & they got divorced. The situation made it hard for my dad to be apart of my life in a nut shell & honestly I think there was a lot of petty pawn playing involved on my mothers end.
And naturally there has always been A LOT of he said she said. But I trust my dad's word over hers & anyone else's, so there's that.
I was about 6 1/2 years old when I met him for the first time. He was awesome and still in his early 20s, definitely a "cool dad" lol.
Little did I know the chaos that was my world was going to be turned upside down.
I don't remember how long after my dad and I first met that they broke the news to me that he wanted to "take me away" from them.
It wasn't too long because I was 7 years old when I moved to California to live with him.
I do remember that it was complete chaos & everyone was freaking out before all of the custody trials. So bad that my great aunt tracked my mom down and moved her in with us in the two bedroom apartment. My mother was the only one that could fight for me to stay in Oklahoma so they were trying to make her presentable & look like a fit parent for all the court hearings.
My dad wanted me because he found out what kind of mother she was when he visited and he wanted to give me a better life. I didn't realize this until I was an adult of course. They painted a picture in my head that he was "the bad guy" my entire life. And as a child I naturally played both sides of the fence because that's what children do when you put them into adult situations.

Children want nothing more than to be loved, feel like they belong & be accepted by their parents no matter what the parents have done to them. It's actually quite heart breaking to think about.
And also why healing & nurturing your inner child as an adult is so important.

Within the small amount of time that my mother lived with me and the aunts I remember she managed to run up the phone bill calling psychic hotlines, taught me to steal people's mail and packages and just royally pissed everyone off not caring about what was happening.
I'll never forget when she had me steal the next door neighbors package that was lying in front of her door because it was a beautiful purple gemstone ring. My mom loved it but I feel like a complete piece of shit for it to this day.
Thanks mom.

I want to end this chapter with a little advice thats worked for me in my healing journey.
When my best friend shared her healing journey with me she kept talking about "healing her inner child." It made sense but I always thought, how the hell am I supposed to do that? I don't get it. It seemed a little weird and too spiritual for me. I have issues with spirituality and religion but I'll get into that later. But I did finally figure out the inner child healing.
Meditation is key. I sat in the bath one evening while my husband and kids were distracted. I closed my eyes and imagined me as child. I imagined meeting my childhood self, grabbing her hands and kneeling in front of her. I told her that she was kind, smart & beautiful. I told her that she was loved and that she belonged here. I told her that she did not deserve those bad things that happened to her. I told her that it's okay to be angry but that we need to let go of the hurt and release the negative energy that was weighing us down for so long. I gave her a hug and told her that I was going to be the person that we needed when we were younger. Lastly I told her that I loved her, that she was strong & brave & that I was proud of her.

After I did that my mind opened up doors and memories that had been locked away I totally forgot about. Most for good reason.
Healing for most of us is not going to be an overnight process. But I encourage you to sit with those thoughts and feelings and events in your life. Validate yourself and your feelings especially if no one else does so you can release the bad energy and cut ties with those things.