Originally written 12/2015

I can't remember a time when I wasn't in trouble. It seemed I was always given the back hand or the belt because it was just easier to discipline me than my siblings when it came to him. Being told there is no steps in this family didn't mean anything. Clearly I was the floor and my family stepped on me continuously. I always dreamt of better beginnings but felt I would always have that tragic ending.

"This dish is still dirty." he said. As I grabbed the plate from him, he started to pull every dish out of the cabinets and told me to redo my dirty work. It wasn't like I could just pick the dishes up and place them back in the cupboards when his back was turned. Nope, he was there watching me like a hawk ready to catch it's prey for supper. I had to do every dish over again. By the time this is all done, I have to prepare dinner for my family. A mothers task being done by a well experienced chef at 10 years old. My little sister is tugging at my shirt by now, asking what's for dinner. This was the normal routine. The kids knew that if they wanted anything or needed anything I was the person to fulfill that wish. My mother was so self involved in her life that I really think for a moment there, she forgot she had kids.

"Dinner will be done in a little bit, go watch TV." I told my little sister as I was directing her out of the kitchen. I never thought that by age 10 I would be pulling steaks out, tenderizing, spicing, dicing, and broiling. An hour later I had steaks, baked potatoes, and vegetables ready for a family of five. Don't get this confused with Party of Five. This was no party, not in the least. "How was your day, Tina?" he says condescending. "Good." I say quickly with a cringe. I hated family dinners. It was hard enough to prepare the food but to sit in front of a man who was the root of all evil, was sickening. By now, every one has finished their dinner and migrated to the living room. Leaving behind me, as usual, to clean up the plates. As I look down at all the empty plates before me, I can only think of how full my plate was, I grew up fast and there was nothing preventing this.

Originally written 12/2015

I wake up around 7am and my cousin, who was visiting from Paradise, CA, was awake getting her swim gear on. "Where are you going?" I asked with great curiosity. "Going to fill the pool in the back and go swimming, wanna join?" my cousin replied. I took an assessment of the weather and how much I was willing to get in the pool. I went along with it, jumped in, and played until my stomach started to ache. "Ugh, I don't feel good." I said as I was grabbing my stomach and getting out. "Get dried off and I will get you something to eat." she says with hustle. A few moments pass and here comes my cousin, smiling with a plate in her hand as she waves with her other hand. "Here you go, I got you something that will help. I also brought some water." Mind you, I am 9 years old when this is all occurring. As the plate gets closer I see what my cousin brought me. Candy. Not just any candy, the candy you get from farmers markets, those mint pastel looking candy.

Reflecting back, and you think in your adult mindset. What an idiot, you don't bring candy! But, I know that my cousin was being nice, thoughtful, caring, and observant to my feelings. This was something that I was lacking in my life. Confidence in my feelings. In the household I grew up in, anytime emotion in the form of tears, whine, whimper, crying, sadness was all just in my head. If I felt sad, I was not allowed to. If I cried, I was told to stop. I don't know, I don't know why still to this day why it mattered if I felt down and why it mattered how I expressed such emotion. I'll never understand. What I do know, is that now as an adult, I appreciate the true meaning of feelings. At the end of the day we are all humans. We all experience the good and the bad.

So even on a upset stomach, I took the candy because my cousin cared. A little appreciation and understanding can really make waves on a person's mindset. Will that wave be good to surf on? or Will that wave throw you in the rocks and break your board? Keep a positive mindset, and the wave will always be a great ride!

Originally written 12/2015

On my list of top five pet peeves one of the bulletins are dirty socks left about the house. Oh man, just thinking about a loose sock running around the house in it's filth just boils my blood. One memory in particular that takes me back to a dirty socks dilemma, a memory not all too delightful.

"Mom, I can't find my game-boy. I left it right here on top of the glove box." I was asking my mom as I was shifting through a pile of stuff. With little care my mom replies. "Maybe you left it somewhere else." I have to always tell myself to keep my cool, because I know what kind of trouble my rage can get me into and at this point in my life, I wanted absolutely nothing to do with those consequences. "Well, if we weren't living in a car and maybe if I had my own room, I wouldn't be loosing all my stuff in a pile of dirty socks and underwear." "Hey, you can take that tone down a notch, I am doing the best I can right now Tina. I don't need your attitude mixing things up." my mom said as she was waving her finger at me.

I was so over my life. We lived in my moms car on a wild chase to keep the repo men from taking our car and our home from us. I always questioned why I was given the mom I was given. I mean, I had a lot of questions growing up, but why I was given THIS mom was the question I asked over and over and over and over. I resented my siblings growing up, because when our mom fucked up they got to go live with their father and because my dad wasn't in the picture, and because HE didn't like me, I was left with being at my mom's side. Although, you give me an option to be with a mother who cares for drugs more that her own kids or be with a step-father who resented ever taken care of you and made sure you knew how much money was being wasted on you, yeah I'd go with my mom too. It's one thing to feel like a piece of shit but it's another thing to be brainwashed into believing you are a piece of shit.

"I am so tired of living in a car mom, when are we going to get a place?" I was asking as I was tossing stuff from side to side on the hunt for my game-boy. "Tina, I don't need you asking me when all the time. I will happen when it happens. I'm going to the bathroom, want anything from the vending machines?" She replied as she was exiting the car at a rest stop. "No, I just want my game-boy" My mom didn't tune into anything but herself and her needs and her wants. At this exact moment, as the air is filled with the scent of dirty socks and stale cigarettes, I felt completely alone.

The most alone I felt, and all my heart could beat for was to find that damn game-boy. The device that let me temporarily let me escape my reality and live in a fantasy. I didn't mind that my fantasy smelt like an abandoned laundromat. I was just wanted to be able to escape, and I couldn't do this because my escape is being suffocated by a mountain of dirty socks.

"Ugh, I can't take this anymore. What did I do so terribly wrong to be given a life like this? If I was a serial killer in my past life then I get it. But I feel like even a past serial killer would be given a second chance to change the cycle. This cycle, there's no leaving it." I vent out loud while looking for the game-boy. "There's no leaving what?" "There's no since in use leaving all these dirty socks in here, I tossing them. I don't with them. They are gone. Don't stop me mother!" with the quickness I reply. "All. of. this. trash. garbage. filth. dirt. needs. to. go. You want me to live in your car with you mom, fine. But I will not live in your trash. I won't do it anymore. Look, your guy is here, go deal with that and I will clean the car out." I tell my mom as I push her away from the car and into the hands of her drug dealer.

45 mins later, my mom returns and is in shock. Not only did I get rid of all the trash and filth. But, I got rid of it all. "To hell with everything mom, I got rid of it all. The trash, the romance novels (her fantasy land), the TV guides (what's a guide without a TV anyway, a book?), the clothes that even a homeless person wouldn't take, and yes... those damn dirty socks. It's just stuff right mom? I'm the only think you need to worry about. Oh and hey, I found my game-boy. I'm hungry, you got any change for the vending machine?" I put out my hand as my mom is still standing in shock. I think she was more in shock that at the age of 13 I basically just schooled my mom on parenting.

But, I'll tell you what after that day she never questioned my questions. That day, as alone as I felt, I also felt that my mom finally was taking me serious. And now my fantasy land didn't have that lingering dirty sock smell, it's started to smell different won't know if it's a good or bad different, I just knew it was a kind of different that I needed.

Originally started in 12/2015 and finished 01/2023

I am really really close to my childhood weight again. I've found myself back in the hands of bullies and stress that's caused me to shrivel up.

Over 15 years ago...

I was always defending myself to my peers about my appearance. I looked frail and fragile and visually broken inside. I can't stand another pass of hurtful comments, so I hid. Instead of going to school, I climb into a space in the carport of our apartment complex and wait out the day. I wait until it's time to walk and go pick up my siblings from school. It was my job to get them to school and get them home. And at 14, this was just a normal thing for me to do. I had no friends, no family close by that cared, I just had myself, my siblings, and my drug zombie mom.

The hardest part about being that young and going through the things I went through I had to figure it out on my own. There wasn't someone there waiting to instruct me with a manual how to survive your mom. A huge part of why I would spend most of my time waiting for school to end was because of the bullying I was around. In 9th grade I probably weighed 70 lbs and no taller than 5 feet. I was nicknamed Tiny Tina by nearly anyone and everyone, it was just easier to call me Tiny Tina than Tina I guess. I remember having a crush on a kid in my class and finally building up courage to say something.

This day was filled with red flags but I just didn't listen. The first red flag was my siblings not getting ready for school on time as this was a day I planned on attending school. The second red flag was running late to school, it was odd anxiety because I hardly went to school so why was I even nervous about being late? I make it to class and the next red flag leans over and takes a big smell off me and says, "I love when you come to class because you smell like the cigarette I just put out." while exhaling the air they just saturated in for 10 seconds.

That, that should have told me to run, don't walk just run home. But I stood in place waiting to see a familiar face. When I saw their face walk in the class it was like my mind was doing ninja kicks and flips to the flags that kept waving in my face. My heavy feet walked to their desk and I said, "Hey Chris I like you and I was curious if you liked me too?" suddenly I felt like all the eye were on me at that second. Chris without hesitation and quicker than I could run out of the room says, "Ha, Tiny smelly Tina likes me? Never in a million years would I like you." And that's pretty much the end of my dating life, normal life, friend life, life life.... the end. It felt like it was the end of me.

And as I write this (in 2023) remembering what I went through and how I got through it, I probably would have done the same thing. The world tells you, be you and don't apologize. That's why I would do it again. I am who I am, I can't change that I am a product of my environment. I can't change that my mom wasn't there for me when I needed a mom. I can't change that I didn't have a father to show me how I should be treated. I can't change that I grew up with a step father who hated me and reminded me of such. I can't change that I grew up hungry wearing clothes that didn't fit, that wasn't clean, that smelt of burnt dreams. But I can change what I teach my kids and they will know a much better life than I was given, a much better life than I could have ever imagined.

They will never have a vision of bones.