THE CARDS OF LIFE

Trafford Publishing

Contents

Acknowledgments...........................................................................ixPreface...................................................................................xiIntroduction..............................................................................xvChapter 1 Hell before Five...............................................................1Chapter 2 Stability at Home and School: Washington Shores Elementary.....................13Chapter 3 A Lesson Learned...............................................................29Chapter 4 Fourth and Fifth Grades........................................................39Chapter 5 Carver Middle School...........................................................51Chapter 6 Fed up and Moving Back.........................................................61Chapter 7 Teenage Pregnancy..............................................................68Chapter 8 Life after High School.........................................................75Chapter 9 Gone Too Soon..................................................................80Chapter 10 Pressing through the Storm....................................................90Quotes That Helped Speak to Me............................................................93Scriptures................................................................................101Sources...................................................................................121

Chapter One

At the tender age of four years old, I learned several lessons. First were stability, trust, and family—the character of people—plus forgiveness and unconditional love. I was forced to face many life lessons at an early age. When talking about getting the wrong deck of cards, I think I might have been cheated. I was the product of infidelity, and my mother was addicted to drugs for most of my life. I remember very little of being in her care. I assume I was removed from her prior to four because the first memory that I have is living at my grandmother's house. She had already birthed thirteen children of her own. I never saw her because she worked long hours at a large hotel. Whenever she would get home, she was tired and sleepy. She would get a beer and then go into her room and close the door.

In that home, it was overcrowded and we slept wherever we could. I remember walking to the candy ladies house and drinking sugar water and eating mayonnaise sandwiches with no meat. I had no clue where my mother was or how long my sister and I could stay.

Something about that situation felt very temporary and uncomfortable. Not that I really knew what comfort was at the age of four. I knew I never had my own room and I didn't feel a sense of security or stability. I wanted my mother, and I didn't know where she was. My sister was five years old and we were very close. My brother lived with his grandmother on his dad's side; he was definitely in a better living situation. At night when I would go to sleep, I was awakened by older family members who touched me and made me touch them in places that I knew was not normal. I wondered if my older sister was being touched too.

I remember being offered, or bribed with, treats like food and snacks. I remember crying at night and being so confused and alone. I was told not to tell. I was scared with no stable adults around, and I didn't know what to do or where to turn. I realized that this was not a good living environment. I would go to my great grandmother's house on weekends. She was a lot older and wiser, and I would always ask her if my sister and I could live with her. She would always respond, "Babe, I would if I could, but I'm a poor creeter and I can't take on no more children. I've raised my child, my grandchildren, and I've got your cousin who is six years old. Baby, Grandma loves you, but you can't live here."

When I would visit my great grandma's house, I went to Zion Hill Baptist Church twice every Sunday and then again on Wednesday nights for Bible study. I guess that's where I learned about God and began to pray. After the weekend was over, I was back at my other grandmother's house.

I am not sure whether the school reported me to Department of Children and Families, but I had all types of people pulling me out of my kindergarten class and asking me questions. They called my sister and asked her questions too. They asked me about who lived in the house with me and where I slept. They asked me if people had ever made me feel uncomfortable or touched me in my bathing suit places. They made me show them, using dolls, what was done to me, and that day I was taken from my grandmother's house and placed in a foster home called Great Oaks Village, which was for children who were abused and neglected. It turned out my older sister was being touched too by my uncle, and once by one of my mother's boyfriends. As I got older, I learned that this is called molestation, and it happens all the time, usually by someone you know and trust.

I already didn't have family, and nobody wanted to take care of me. I still didn't know where my mother was or when she was coming back for me. I do know that whatever she did before I was four years old, she did it well because, for some reason, I loved my mother to death. I made excuses for her, not sure if she was in jail or just in the streets, but I longed for her. I longed for family and a normal childhood and upbringing. Prior to being taken from the home, I am not sure of who fed me, clothed me, or comforted me. I think my sister and I took care of each other. So far, I had learned how to judge character. It amazed me how people can harm you when no one is watching and act so perfect in the daylight when all eyes are present.

Thinking back, I still wonder how someone could place a child, who is already having such a hard life, in harm's way. Whether you are the predator or the prey, you need to get help, speak out, and speak up. I wish I had the voice back then that I have now.

To be honest, I should have stayed a ward of the state. I might have been better off, but I didn't see it that way. I wanted whatever piece of family that I had. I think my biggest fear was that my mother, wherever she was, would probably never come looking for me if I wasn't where she had left me. She had a hard enough time getting it together for family to trust her with her kids. How on earth was she to prove herself to the judicial system?

The next day, I woke up in the foster home as the officials took my sister away from me. They no longer had room for her there. At that moment, I was completely alone in a new living arrangement, in a new school, and with a new caretaker. At the age of four, I didn't even know how to process my thoughts and feelings. I remember thinking, Why must I suffer like this? Why does all this bad stuff happen to me and my family? I would pray for my mom every day. I would ask God to find her and tell her that all of her children have been taken away and separated. In my heart, I knew that she would find the strength to do what was necessary to get her kids back together. In order to process these thoughts and feelings of a four-year-old, we must first find a working definition of these terms.

* Character—The mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual.

Know that kids can see right through you, no...