This is 34

 

For my 34th birthday, someone told me to think about how far I have come in the past 17 years after they wished me a Happy Birthday.  I have to admit that I didn't give it much thought until yesterday when while talking to my husband I ended up pointing out what I had accomplished in just the last decade.  Then I thought, what had happened the 7 years prior to that? And I decided to make a list only because I feel that there are others out there who might be in similar positions as I was and it might help them keep the fight.  Another reason was that it would be a healthy reminder to myself and others that I should never be underestimated. 

So, how far have I come in the past 17 years?  Here it goes...

When I turned 17, I had already graduated high school and I was living with a man who had brought me to this country years prior with the promise that he would pay for my college studies.  That promise never came.  As a matter of fact, once I graduated high school at the young age of 16 he told me that I had to figure out how to pay for my own health insurance and that the only thing he would give me would be room and board along with $500 for college.  During this time I was still waiting for my residency papers so I couldn't start school but I could work, the problem was that I was a minor and minors were supposed to be insured by their parents.  This was a concept he did not understand, but that is part of him being abusive.

The household I lived in consisted of my biological father and his wife.  Both had previous marriages and both had children from those previous marriages.  Every time they fought, which was often because Mario never liked being late for anything and she was always late for everything, the family was divided by him.  He would call on HIS children and take them with him while calling her children HERS and blaming her for how "bad" they behaved.  This happened every single time something fun was planned, as well as every single holiday. 

There were too many instances when I had to walk in the dark through alleys because he refused to get in the car at 10pm and drive two miles to pick me up from work.  I always felt I was already taking care of myself, the only thing that I was not doing was paying rent because I was even buying myself food outside the house every time I worked.  By the time I turned 18, he forced me to buy a car on his terms.  I was going to pay for it, it would be financed under just my name (which was not a bad thing) but he got to tell me what car I would be allowed to purchase.  It had to be certain years old, had a certain amount of miles, and a certain price.  I agreed because he said that he and his wife would help me with a downpayment, they would give me, I believe $1000 for the downpayment with the notion that I had to save too.  I did, but I remember that something happened that I was forced to use some of that money, and guess what? Suddenly they would not give me any money for a down payment cause I didn't save enough, however, I was still to buy a car under their terms.  

My then-boyfriend offered to help me because he knew what had happened was out of my control and said well, if I lend you the money then they will have to give you the full $1000 right? then you can get a better vehicle.  It turned out that no, they would not do it because it was not the money I had saved.  Mind you that up until this point I was a child who didn't get into trouble and was often focused on my studies.  I mean, I would have to do well in school in order to graduate by the age of 16, right?  I ended up buying the car he wanted me to buy, which broke down just a year later because well... it was a Ford.

After getting the car, my boyfriend and I decided to move in together.  At this time, my biological father's wife was pregnant and made the announcement.  When I told him that I was moving out, all hell broke loose.  Suddenly, I would never meet my baby sibling, I was a selfish person for leaving the house, and my boyfriend would realize how terrible of a person I was and he would abandon me because of it.  After that, he told me how I would then come back crawling for a place to stay and he would say no, then went on to throw me out of his house.  I left his house that day but the day I left to move out of the state as planned, I was told to come to say bye.  When I arrived, he pretended that he had said nothing and was "wishing me well."  There was no apology, no acknowledgement that he had done anything wrong only him gaslighting me by now telling me he wished me well and how he was proud of me.  

During this time, I never knew that all he was doing was actual abuse.  I ended up living with that boyfriend for about a year, I went on to buy a brand new car, have different experiences from not having a place to live (mostly cause I didn't really want to), leaving in a hotel room, being raped by a coworker and then being fired because they didn't want their best employee to get into trouble.  By the time I turned 19, after having another altercation with my biological father because my grandmother, who was visiting the United States wanted to be dropped off at his house that night after I had gotten out of work at 9pm.  It was a 3-hour drive and she threatened to grab a cab to his place which I would not let her do.  She couldn't wait until my day off, so there I went... In the middle of the night, driving her to his place.  I didn't have a key and I had to go back because I had to work the next day, he went ballistic again and told me to never ask him for help again.  I was not welcomed at his house.

A few months later I ended up meeting my second abuser.  He quickly became my first husband and I was easy prey.  I had no support from my biological father, I had trouble at work, and I was ready to just have some stability.  I didn't love him but he looked like he was stable, with his own place and wanting to have a family, which I wanted also so I said: why not? and I married him after I had told him no like 6 times.  A few months into the marriage he was already controlling, he was a slob, and after having my wisdom teeth taken out he decided he would steal my pain killers.  Being raised so sheltered, I had no idea that people could get addicted to those or that they would sell each pill on the streets for $25 to $100 each.  When I found out, he told me that he had sold them because we needed extra money.  I wanted out, but then I find out I am pregnant, so now I had to stay. 

I was very ill during the first few months of pregnancy and lost a lot of weight, therefore I had to quit my job and depend on him solely.  I ended up finding out he was addicted to drugs shortly after because he had taken my car to his work due to his driver's license being suspended and him not having money to get it reinstated.  That day he went off on me because the car wouldn't go over 20 miles an hour, there was an issue with the computer transmission but somehow that was my fault.  According to him, I had gotten under the hood of the car while I was five months pregnant and done something to it so he couldn't use it and now he was late for work.  It was not that he was late for work because he was looking for drugs, it was because his pregnant wife had done something to the car.  His mother had to pick me up to take me to where he had parked the car and asked me what happened.  When I told her, she said that she had given him the money to fix his driver's license... After that, he was forced to tell me he had a drug addiction. 

He was supposedly going to work on that and make sure he did everything the rehab facility told him.  I found another job once I felt better and his mommy gave him a job at an apartment complex she and her then-husband owned.  He ended up stealing from them both, they found out after the baby was born and she threatened to take my child away if I didn't leave her son.  It all went downhill from there, we had already moved three times since I got pregnant and we would end up moving another three times in the first nine months of the baby's life.  I ended up losing my vehicle because he wouldn't pay for it and said I could either make enough to pay for the vehicle (which I knew he would end up taking that money from me, he used to say that he needed me to make $500 a month which was the same amount he would say he spent on drugs each month) or give the vehicle up.  He didn't think I would just give it up, but I know it was the right choice.  I ended up with an eviction on my record because he never told me that the apartment complex we had moved into had started the process and the day we had to go to court, he decided that looking for drugs was more important.

When I finally decided to leave him, I had no money, no job, no phone, no vehicle, we were living in a room that we were renting, he was telling me how much I could eat and would yell if I ate more than that, and he was pawning my computers so I did not have an alternate way of communicating at all.  At this point, the only person who could help me was my abusive biological father.  When you ask why victims do not leave, it is often because the only way they can do so safely is by switching from one abuser to another.  When you ask if he helped? Yes, my biological father did help, he helped because it fed his ego to help, not because of anything else.  I was well aware of that though. 

What would follow? I would end up being gaslighted and emotionally abused for months until the law caught up to my then-husband.  He had committed insurance fraud and they were looking for him.  My biological father had one of his tantrums and ended up hitting me while I was holding my then-18-month-old.  He told me that he would be my worst nightmare while his wife to this day will tell people that I am crazy and threw myself down the stairs.  He didn't know that when I moved in with him, I had already made a plan in case this happened.  A plan that he hated because he couldn't stand that someone else would help me.  During my stay there, I had a job as a nanny and the woman I worked for was the best.  Once I was gone from this other abuser, we found a way to get me to keep working.  Then my mother-in-law offered help.  I didn't know that she was another narcissist and abusive person. 

Ohh the cycle of abuse, the more you are around it, the more you think it is normal and therefore you end up attracting people who behave the same.  My mother-in-law tried to take my child away from me again, this time she decided to call Child Protective Services, she bailed her druggy son out of jail and made a plan to keep my child.  Child Protective Services showed up and saw that it was all a scam.  I ended up having to leave her house in a rush because she threatened to keep me there against my will by using her son and the power of the courts.  More emotional abuse happened from her and him.  Karma is good though because, in her focus on trying to make me the bad guy and trying to hurt me, her son ended up stealing from her and she ended up getting a divorce.  

What happened next? I got another job as a nanny, it lasted a year until I had a disagreement with my boss.  Then I decided that it was time for me to find a way to get myself back on my feet, get a job that would offer me benefits, and would let me work from home.  I found one in less than a week after I had already put that in my head.  I would make enough to rent an apartment for my daughter and I, and eventually would allow me to possibly do other things.  During this time, I had other altercations with Mario (my biological father), but I was still not clear on how abusive that man was.  My grandmother would always tell me he was just a little crazy and she didn't know why he was that way since she never treated him that way.

Oh well... We finally moved into our own place and to a different city.  Shortly after, I decided to completely cut ties with Mario and his family and things became a lot better.  This is when I started to meet some of the best people in my life.  My adoptive moms, adoptive dads, adoptive uncles, sisters, grandmas, etc... The abuse still haunted me but it was not something that was constant.  My first husband was in and out of jail, his mother was trying to get on my good side and I was giving her a second chance only because I felt that most people deserve that after they apologize and change their behavior.  I was wrong to do that... but that's a lesson learned. 

I ended up moving out of the state of Florida a year later with the promise to never go back to live there.  I was making my way out, my goal was to live by the mountains and get a car.  The specific car? A Pathfinder! I didn't want anything different, I had sold me on the idea when I realized that American made vehicles (after having two that had too many issues and one of them was brand new) were just not made to last.  My first husband kept telling me how the Pathfinder was not put together in America and how good the car was.  My daughter and I ended up in NC, not the place I wanted to stay for sure, but the place that for now would work.  Three years later I received an offer to work with the Colorado Crisis Intervention program.  By then, I had been working as an independent contractor for a company that dealt with non-profits.  This was my first experience of building a business.  I was able to go from just taking calls, to doing quality assurance for several clients and training new agents.  With this new project, I would be able to make enough to find a better place to live and eventually get a car.  All I had to do was move to where the time zone worked in a way that I could match the full-time hours that the group was opened. 

My now ex-husband and his mommy couldn't have that and it was not a surprise being that several times she always said she would not stop until I was destitute.  So, after I moved, what did they do? They joined forces again to force me to live near them and take my child from me.  They succeeded, they succeeded because we have a very corrupt justice system that works for those who have money to give to judicial campaigns and that favors abusers over protective mothers.  This guy had never been involved in my daughter's life (yes, she is my daughter, I raised her without his help and when he showed up to taker her from me, he told the judge he was still not ready to be a father). 

After she was taken away, I continued to do what I had set out to do.  I met my now-husband, who is not perfect but I adore him.  This man has the ability to learn from his mistakes and while we don't agree on everything, but when we disagree is done in a respectful way and we come to a happy medium.  I bought my brand-new pathfinder, no my husband did not help me.  You see, I had learned that what I had gone through was domestic abuse and I was still learning to deal with what were my triggers, what were my needs.  One of them was that I needed to accomplish a lot of what I wanted on my own and guess what? I did.  I was living in a place that is 20 min away from the mountains, I had gotten the car I wanted, and I had started my own business separate from what I was doing before... Less work, more pay, and work that I really enjoyed doing.  

A little over a year ago: got the bigger place, a year before that we got a dog (which was part of what I wanted), I started to write my story in the form of a book which will contain more details of what I have written here, and I started the process of forming a non-profit that would tell my story along with the story of other women who have been victims of the family court system in the United States. The non-profit will help empower them by helping them file grievances against judges who ignore evidence and refuse to take abuse into consideration when making custody decisions.  It will also empower them to speak up and help defend themselves from civil rights violations that happen on a daily basis due to these corrupt judges.  That non-profit is still a work in progress but make no mistake, it will be big and well-known... I can already see it. 

And so, here I am at age 34 and I have gone from being an abuse victim who didn't know she was being abused, to learning so much about abuse and mental illness that sometimes even the people who have studied in the field get new information from just speaking to me.  Going from being an abuse victim to helping other people through my work, because that is what I do when I coach others.  Going from being an abuse victim without a place to live, to having a nice house with a yard big enough that we even planted a garden.  Going from having people who would often doubt my abilities, to being surrounded by people who know that as soon as I say I want to do something they know that it might take me a little bit, but that I will surely get it done. Going from having to ask for help to being able to cover all our (I say our because I can cover my husband's expenses too if I want to) expenses with just what I make.  No, I am not money rich yet, but I am rich! I have good people by my side and let me tell you something while there was a time when I would be looked at as someone who everyone would step on, as someone who was not as sure of herself as she should have been, that person does not really exist anymore.  The person that all my troubles helped shaped is the one who now says: DO NOT underestimate me, I might take a little while to get there, but I will get there because I don't go back down the stairs, I just keep going up. 

And Justice For All

Oh the legal system in the United States... We think of this country as one that is the most just but the reality is that it is not.  When it comes to family matters, the United States legal system is anything but... the law in every state suggests that when looking into family matters a judge should always think about the best interest of the child.  But what is the best interest of the child?
Each child is different and every person is different; when a case goes in front of a judge, the judge assumes based on presumptions that every child is the same and then makes a decision based on that assumption.  The judge also makes an assumption that because two parents show up to court they are both equally interested in the well being of the child.  Then we have this whole: get dressed for court... Another assumption is made here, dress nicely otherwise you are going to look like a crazy in front of the judge and well, more than likely the judge will prefer the other person.
Then we have the time a judge spends hearing arguments, sometimes it is just 15 minutes, sometimes less.  How can you possibly make a good decision based on that small amount of time? It's simply not possible.  What about those who are not able to afford an attorney that knows the law? Parties that go in front of a judge on their own, and do not really know their rights, or what they need or do not need to say.  The best interest of the child is rarely looked into in that case, no one is allowed to state what the child is feeling or explain the child's nature.  The presumption that a child is resilient and that they will eventually be fine no matter what situation you put them through is always there.
Then what about those that come in with attorneys and are in front of a judge and suddenly the judge says you better reach an agreement or I will have to.  Then attorneys go back behind the scenes and they use the "this is what the judge will do and you don't want that, so you better" in order to make the parties compromise into something that is more than likely not the best situation and definitely not in the best interest of the child, it's all merely legal bullying because even after being told to look at the benefit of the child and the child's emotions are put first, that is never the case, the child's emotions never come up in the discussion. 
Let me put it in a better way, there are two parents, one that has been gone for the entire life of the child and suddenly decides that they want to go ahead and be around.  They want to be call mom or dad, and they want to come into the child's life from one day to the next without easing themselves into being around them and getting to know them.  Their name on a piece of paper grants them legal right to do that it appears and because the basis of this system is still set up under the presumption that a child needs two parents in order to thrive, well we go ahead and grant the request.  A judge assumes that unless said parent is violent or has a psychological condition that is obvious to the world well the parent should be around. 
It never matters that the child has been happy and stable for their entire life, it only matters that someone that left and has never been around the child now comes in and says this is what I want and so it is granted because I have a right, a right that should not be called a right but a privilege.  The best interest of the child in a case like that would be to force the other parent to ease themselves into the child's life.  This is when we are faced with another presumption that judges make: if the case reaches their hands then it means the two people hate each other, that's why they cannot agree.  The judge never hears what went on and what each person was offering the other before they came in front of them, if they are there it means they hate each other.
We all proud ourselves in saying that we must protect children, they are the future of our country.  We assume that the law is there to do this for the children, but the truth is that the law is only there to serve the adults.  The children's feelings are never taken into consideration, it is hear say.  The children's stability and home environment being disrupted is not a big deal because hey! They are resilient and it is thought better for them to have two parents and not just one.  The law never looks at the rights of the children, they look at the wants of the adults and if one adult is wanting to speak up for the children, the adult is not allowed to do so because hey! That adult is related to the children therefore they want what they want for them not for the children.
The system is so flawed that we have put children to be with parents who are abusive and neglectful.  We send these children with a parent thinking that because they are related to the child by blood they will protect and care for the child.  This is how we put children in situations that they should never be put in, but that is the system and it will take a lot to change it.  Maybe it will be the new generations that will actually change this for the better.  The new generation that will shed light into the fact that a child does not necessarily need two parents, that if a child has not known anything different than having one parent in the house then it is not in the best interest of the child to suddenly force the child to be around someone they do not know.
The system we have put in place to protect children does not protect them, it rarely does.  It is a system that uses the word right when it should use the word privilege.  It is a privilege to be a parent not a right, and as such a parent should not be allowed to walk in and out of a child's life however they please.  There should be a limit to how many times a drug addict gets their children back, a limit of how many times a convicted felon gets a child back.  How many times must we send back and forth a child to an abusive or neglectful parent before we understand that at that point we are putting the rights and wants of the adult before the rights of the child.
In order for this system to work we have to move it forward from the thinking of our ancestors.  We have to have people who actually take their time making decisions for children and that make an effort to not just look at what the adults want but that actually look at the best interest of the child.  The best interest of a child is to life in a stable environment, happy and thriving, not to be put in a situation that they don't want to be put.  Every case should have a third party present, one that has looked into the child's life and that can speak objectively for the rights of the child, especially being that a judge assumes that two people hate each other and that's why they are in front of them, and if that is the case then send them to counseling.  It will not just help the child but it will help them.  Then look at the track record, if a person has not been in the life of a child and suddenly out of the blue wants to, what are the reasons behind it? Why now and not years ago? Has there really been a change, make it hard on them to get what they ask.  We make it too easy and there is not many people that are out there willing to change the system to truly protect the children.
We spend so much money protecting people that do not deserve protection, making sure that those who have broken the law are treated "fairly".  But when it comes to children, the future of this country, the people we can shape into good citizens, we do very little for.  Then when they turn into criminals we wonder what we did wrong.  It is like that throughout the country and it is a damn shame.  Maybe one day things will change and we will stop seeing news of children being abused and neglected by the same parents that the system sends them back to. Maybe one day we will have people on the bench that are not so closed up and caught up in an old way of thinking, one that does not work anymore.  Maybe one day we will truly see a just system, one where in every case the child's rights and feelings are truly taken into consideration.  Until then, I guess we just need to settle for a sub-part system; the one where convicted felons get a slap in the wrist only because we don't have the money to give them a nice well ventilated and lit cell with three meals a day.  The punishment that for most is not a punishment, they seem to actually not mind it and that is why they keep on committing crimes.  The system where children are constantly sent to abusive and neglectful parents or parents that really could care less about them and are only around because of some other ulterior motive.  Maybe one day we will see justice for all and not just for some.  And maybe one day we will actually truly protect the lives of children and not just pretend that we are doing it.