Its a New Day

It is a new day with new challenges. I am getting better at facing each day... I think. I have some sense of normalcy with taking classes, but also a sense of being overwhelmed. Life is such a roller coaster, but I am learning that after every uphill there is always a downhill, and it will be that way until I take my last breath. It will never be just uphill.

I really should be here everyday, sharing my thoughts, relating to others, but sometimes I feel like what I say doesn't matter. Don't confuse my thoughts with a need for affirmations... I just feel like this blog has lost its importance and so I must remind myself to do it anyway for myself.

I have been thinking about writing in general lately and about how much I still want to write a book. It is another thing I need to do for myself. I get inspired easily, but I lose my motivation just as easily. I am good at ideas, not so good at following through. I haven't even finished my 30 day challenge that I started, oh, back in June I think?

I guess it shows that I have been questioning myself a lot. This new anxiety feeling that has been happening has been paralyzing at times. My Dr. insists its a medication reaction, and I sure hope so because it is HORRIBLE. I have actually wished death on myself when it was at its worst and had to go to sleep to get through it. I wonder if I am a worthwhile parent, partner, or even person. It is that bad.

Today is a new day and I am not feeling anxious so I am going to enjoy this moment, because no life is worth succumbing to feelings of hopelessness.

"Shawna'a Christmas Meth Carol" Part III ~Ghost of Tweaker Future

(Trigger Warning~ this is a warning that is very raw as it relates to drug use and suicide)



This is the most painful and frightening of all of my ghostly experiences. Tonight a talk dark demonic type apparition, pulls me suddenly from my slumber, and throws me through my bedroom wall. When I open my eyes I see no one, no thing, it is dark. I feel his cold ugly breath upon me.

I hear the sound of a projector, clicking and reeling from somewhere behind me. Before my eyes, begins the story of.....


There I am walking out of jail. My kids are not there to meet me, they are not allowed to see me until CPS can analyze my situation. What situation? I am homeless, jobless, and have just gotten out of jail. I have no money at all. No one ever came to visit me or put money on my books in the three years I was in jail.

Next thing, I am in the basement of my ex's cousin. The one that started making illegal checks. The one that stole people's identities. The only one that would answer my collect call. I am crying and then I see the pure evil he is holding. The loaded glass pipe. Please tell me I don't do it, please! 

I do it. I can't believe my eyes. I cry, I inhale, the room is filled with that wretched meth stench and smoke overwhelms the scene. It fades away and I see myself alone in a ratty motel room. There are burns on the comforter, the table, the floor. It is disgusting. I try to call the kids. My grandma reminds me that she is court ordered to keep them from talking to me until I have somewhere to live and CPS approves it. She says if I call one more time she is going to report me. I hear them talking in the background. It kills me inside.

All the shelters are full. I only have the backpack and few clothing items that I got at the Community center, and my motel voucher for this place runs out tomorrow. I don't even know what happened to Bryson. He went to jail when I did, but he was only the co defendant. He had much less charges and he got out before me. He was not allowed to contact me since we committed the same crimes together. No one else that we knew together is still in the same place. Most of them are in jail or prison.

I feel hopeless. I am in pain. I am depressed. I can't afford anymore drugs. I do not want my kids to see me like this ever. How can I ever stop? How can I go on in the pain I am in? I cannot afford anything to kill myself with.

 I see myself roll out of the bed and almost slither to the ground. I look like I am in so much pain. I crawl on all fours to the table and chair. I switch on the light and grab the chair to pull myself up. I grab a pen and begin writing.


This is what I write:

Ive been here too long. Ive already spent more days here than I should have been allowed and my time has come. Destin and Aliviya…. I never should have brought you into this world knowing how I felt about myself. I thought that having kids was the answer to all my problems. I thought that kids would love me and give me what I never had. It isn’t your fault. You are the best kids anyone could ever ever ask for. You gave me the best memories I could have imagined. You taught me what love really is. You showed me that to really love someone you have to give of yourself and not expect back. You have to love from your whole self and expect nothing. I wish I was capable of that. Maybe in another lifetime…. Maybe if my mom was here to love me and give me that wholeness inside I would be able to stay with you and give it to you. 

You are probably going to feel like I’m selfish and that I don’t love you, but I’m taking this moment to write this to let you know it isn’t true. I’m tired of being alone. I have nothing to give the two of you and I keep making the mistake of giving what little I do have to men whom I believe will complete me… complete us and make us a family, but make bad choices with me. In the end they only take from me and I don’t have the strength to build myself back up one more time. I have done it for the last time. If this life were fair…. God would have taken me gracefully from you instead of your father. Your Dad loved you and he had strength deep within that I am not capable of. Unfortunately suicide isn’t very graceful and I wish I didn’t have to let you see that. Death never really feels good to the people left behind to experience it, but it’s something that we all must come upon eventually. I want to come upon it now, while I still have memories that are good and my heart is full of love for the two of you… before all the wrong I have done catches up to me and your memories become filled with my mistakes and you become full of hurt and hate. Do not hate me for leaving. I want to give you a chance to have love. It is the only thing that matters in life. 

Do not make important to you the material things that everyone will make you think are important. You always look out for each other. You are family and you two are all you have. I am so thankful I was graced with the ability to have two children to be there for each other and I do not bare the burden of leaving you alone. I know that you two will be loved and taken care of by someone who will be able to help you remember that I loved you as much as I could and will remind you that I left because my strength ran out… not my love. Always be kind to everyone. The people who need it most are probably not strong enough to be kind to you. Keep your heads up and your minds open. Do not let drugs and alcohol ruin your vision. You have to stay aware of what reality is in order to get through it and when you do drugs and drink alcohol you don’t know what is real anymore. Don’t let people steal your heart…. like I did. You make them earn it and take care of it… it is where all of your love is and it’s all that you are.

Don’t forget me please. Look at pictures… take time to remember all the good times we had and know that all I ever wanted was to give you good memories. I have run out of the means to provide you with any more, so treasure the ones you have, and make it important to give each other many more. As time goes on I’m sure that other people worthy of your time and love will come along. Give them good memories too. I love you with all of my heart. You are so beautiful and I am so lucky to have been in your life for this long. Maybe a miracle will save me from the hate that has consumed me… but if not know that you are so special and please do not regret that I am your mother. I did the best I could.

  

LOVE ALWAYS,

MOM xoxox

Then before my very eyes on the screen ahead of me in this darkness, I crawl to the bed. I call my grandma and tell her to send the police for me and I give her the address and room number. I pull back the blanket and nasty burned bedspread and reveal the sheet. I pull it off as well, and drag it along with myself to the bathroom to seal my fate the same way my mother did. I briefly see myself hanging from the shower and then everything turns black and cold.

**** This is probably one of the hardest things I have faced. It is also one of the most personal I have shared, because that is my actual suicide note, that I wrote, high out of my mind, 5 years ago. A miracle DID save me and I am instead here, happy, healthy, clean, writing this tale of what my future would be like if I hadn't stopped when I did.

Remembering where I came from and sharing it

I am kind of in a complacent place in life. I am taking in more than I am producing. I feel like reading more than I feel like writing. I have periods of time in my life filled with all kinds of different writing.... journaling, poetry, stories, my book.

I am going to share some different pieces through the next couple of posts. They represent me at very different emotional times, but almost all of them are from when I was in a time of despair, either from reflecting on the event I write about, or swallowed up in depression, mania, or addictions. They are all significant in my life journey and have helped create the person I am today.

Suicide Changes Life

Wanting what I couldn't have developed into idolizing what I didn't know. Everything my mother was intrigued me. I was so little, but I knew too much. The truth is at seven years old, I really knew very little, but I already had seen so much. Every moment with my mother was like an emotional adventure. There were no guarantees and I never knew when I would see her next. The only promising sign that she was coming was the sound of her keys in the front door of my grandparent’s house. That sound. I can still hear it, but only in my head.

The last time I saw her, she came over unexpectedly which was not so unusual. She was there to visit with her Mom for grown-up reasons and so I didn't get too much time with her. I still loved seeing her. She always smelled the same. She never looked the same. She always had something different on. "Cool" clothes, long earrings that I only dreamed of being allowed to wear, cute and sexy outfits. I never wondered why she cared so much about herself and so little about me. I knew she was a "dancer" and it made sense to me, as told to me by her, that she had to look good if she wanted to make money.

Whatever time she had left over for me was always good enough. That day it wasn't much. I was doing a great job of being my doll's mommy when I heard parts of her conversation with my grandma. Something was wrong. She and her boyfriend were fighting... blah blah blah. Same problems, different boyfriend. The details didn't matter too much to me. The last time I had spent the night with her she had told me again about how things were going to change. They were getting a bigger better house and they were going to get married on Valentine's Day. Then I could come live with her. She always told me these fairy tales. I loved her no matter where we lived, even if it wasn't together. She told me because she needed to believe it. I know that now.

It was already time for her to go. Nothing seemed any better or worse than any other day. She was in a hurry and had to go. I got a hug. I felt satisfied with her smell left lingering on me for a short while. Back to playing with my doll.

I had complete and predictable discipline during the day when my grandma was home and trying to balance her meticulous housework and getting some sleep before she went to work at 5. My grandpa worked Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and got home around 3 in the afternoon. He would begin his yard work and take me outside to play while my grandma got ready for work. The evenings were filled with sweet manipulation because I was Grandpa's little girl and I always got my way when Grandma was at work. The next morning was a Tuesday and so I woke up to both of my grandparents. This day there was new tension in the house.

I heard my grandma on the phone earlier, but hadn't paid much attention. I started listening to the grown up conversation she and my grandpa were having as I was getting my cereal. They were talking about the quick visit Mom had paid the day before. They were talking about what people they could call... who might know something or have heard from her. I decided I belonged in the conversation and asked what had happened. My mom was missing. Missing. That word was new. I had gone weeks at a time without hearing from her before, but she had never been missing.

Knowing that I just seen her in the last 24 hours, it seemed ridiculous that they would call her missing. Missing is what kids on milk cartons are.

Grandma explained that Mom's boyfriend, Geoff, had called and he hadn't seen her since they had been in a fight on Sunday night. She hadn't been to work. He had called anyone who might have seen her or been with her, and no one had. Taking in this kind of information is hard when you have a big girl mind at 7 years old. As many ideas as I was getting, my grandparents had their own agenda of worry. I was quickly being hustled around the house because there were phone calls to be made and things to consider. My questions were not so welcome anymore; likely because there were no answers.

I have never heard our phone ring so much. I heard "missing persons report" among the same questions and answers I had heard all morning on every other phone call. Each phone call was met with anticipation, eager for my mother's voice. A disappointed shrug and a disheartened head shake let me know she was not the caller. I guess people started running out of questions and answers and the phone quit ringing. The day grew into evening. My grandparents were talking like I wasn't there, discussing what I might be thinking or feeling, seemingly unaware that I could tell them if they would just ask me.

We would be participating in a normal daily activity, talking about anything that wasn’t my mother and then abruptly, one of them would have a new consideration. These contemplations ranged from uneasy worry about horrifying what-ifs, to encouraging, self-assuring explanations of how and why she would be okay. Neither of them could remain functional for long and they finally started talking about how to protect me from all of the uncertainty. They wanted me to go spend the night with our two elderly neighbor ladies, Blanche and Carol. I didn’t want to go. Why did I need to go somewhere else? It wasn’t going to make anything better or worse.

It was already getting late when my grandma made the phone call to ask Blanche if I could come stay the night. I liked the company of these two old ladies in moderation. I spent every Wednesday evening over there, watching Highway to Heaven and drinking my ginger ale in a cocktail glass while Blanche and Carol sipped liquor in theirs. Why did I have to go spend the night on a Tuesday just because my Mom was missing? The only way I was going to go was if my best friend Sebrina, who lived up the street with her grandparents as well, could stay with me. I don’t remember the details of why not that night, but it was decided that the next night would be spent with Blanche and Carol, Sebrina included.

Still Tuesday… still the longest Day of my life yet… still no phone call from Mom. Evening worry turned into night time exhaustion and brought bedtime with it. I had no more thoughts to think and I was tired of seeing everyone so upset and so confused. Sleep came easy and morning came quickly. The distressing atmosphere remained, but little was said. The night had brought no answers. Grandma was getting ready to take a shower with me to get ready for the day. I sat unfeeling on the steps, with my night gown still on, my towel in my lap, waiting for my cue to get in the shower. The phone rang; the first phone call of the day. All the anxiety in the world suddenly captivated my previously unfeeling heart and I just HAD to answer the phone.

“Hello?”

“Hello, who am I speaking with?” the man on the other end asked.

“This is Shawna.”

“Shawna, are you Cathy’s daughter?” was the next question.

“Yeah, yes… I am.”

“Shawna, this is Detective (somebody).” “Can I speak with your grandma or grandpa please?”

“Yes, hold on.”

Grandma was already coming in the bedroom door, with a questioning look on her face as I yelled upstairs for my grandpa to pick up the phone. I am not sure if she was questioning why I had answered the phone, or what had been said since. Either way, my Grandpa had already picked up the phone upstairs and so I hung up the one in my hand. My grandma reached out her hand, never asking me anything. I took it and we went up stairs together. Grandpa sat in the kitchen chair, not saying much, still listening to something being said by Detective Somebody. Grandma pulled out the kitchen chair on the next side of the table and sat down, pulling me onto her lap as she did. We sat together and waited. It was only moments I’m sure. Moments of that special time… that never ending time that feels like an eternity in just moments. I saw the color drain from his face. The last thing he said into the phone was, “Ok, Thank You,” and he was shaking before he could hang it up. This time he didn’t shake his head. He nodded and slowly the words fell out of his mouth.

“Cathy’s dead.”

I felt like the life had been sucked out of me. The thoughts suffocated me. How could my so perfectly imperfect mom be DEAD? I hadn’t even considered this option. Missing… missing was not dead. I cried. She could have run away. I cried harder. She could have been in an accident.The tears came so fast I felt like I was drowning. She could have been kidnapped. She could bemissing, but she could not be dead. I was hyperventilating and crying. If I cried hard enough it felt like I could cry the pain away. I remember my grandpa trying to hush me the way you hush a crying baby. Trying to tell me it would be okay, when he knew it was not okay. He got me a little glass of water and told me to take a drink. I cried harder. My Mom could not drink water anymore. Why would I want to drink water? I knew it would make my grandpa feel better if I drank the water. I picked up the glass. I realized the whole kitchen looked like it was under water. I cried and cried and cried.

A temporary reprieve from the crying came. It was long enough for me to hear my grandpa explain that Mom had killed herself. She had hung herself in a shower… in a hotel room… by herself… with the bed sheet… no note.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Not MY Mom. I cried. I screamed. Nothing stopped the pain. I hadn’t even accepted dead. I surely could not accept that she had made herself dead. No way. I kept insisting it wasn’t her. It was a mistake.

“She had on her unicorn necklace,” he said.

Someone put it there. She was in trouble and had faked her death. Surely a stripper could get in enough trouble to need to disappear. Any minute she would call and tell us where she really was.

Now that other kind of special time came… the time where an eternity is gone in moments. So much crying and talking. Pain swallowed me up and I ran out of things to think. I sat waiting to be told what to do, because there was no feeling left in me for me to decide for myself. There were calls to be made. Plans to be made. Maybe it was a good idea if I went over to see Blanche now so they could “take care of things.” I didn’t want to go see her. I couldn’t. She was waiting for me and it was time for me to go over there. Somehow I put one foot in front of the other. I made it down the stairs. I got outside the house. I looked back at the house and wondered what “plans” meant. I made it to the sidewalk and there they were. Those words. Right out of my Grandpa’s mouth and into my head. Cathy’s dead. I looked at Blanche’s house. It looked like it was under water now. I looked at all of the houses and I knew all of the people in them. I knew I was supposed to walk to Blanche’s house. I knew I was. I couldn’t. I had to tell someone. I looked to my other neighbors’ house. I ran as fast as I could to their door. I rang the doorbell as many times as I could. Everything looked like water now. My friend’s Mom opened the door and before she could even ask me, I told her, “My mom is dead.”

Simply Complicated ME... a story

the short version ;)

Putting my random thoughts and feelings down always proves to be very therapeutic and thought provoking. I have started putting a lot more thought into what I hope to set forth in my blog, as well as what I might like to look back on a long time from now. I never had a real complicated plan for doing this. As I read through blog after blog today I can see the vast array of blogging conceptions.

I guess my blog was sort of an unplanned for development, as are a lot of things in my life. I realize now that if I do not fill in with some of my everyday life and background, it might be easy to assume I am much more deep and dark than I am light and happy. Most of my deep and dark comes from my past, but surprisingly enough it isn't my present state of being. Although, get me going after a few drinks and an emotional movie or a deep conversation and I am guilty of being emotionally overbearing.

All of that being said, let me introduce you to my background...

My upbringing was anything but traditional. My mother was an only child and she had me at 18. In the late seventies that was a huge shame to a family. She chose a life of drugs, men, and stripping- stringing me along for an occasional wild ride to her work or a bar on our visits.

In her constant absence, I lived with her mother and stepfather, my grandparents. My grandpa had raised her since she was a baby and so he was my real grandfather as far as I knew. He was of Navajo Indian and Spanish decent and my grandma was German and Irish, so I had many cultural influences despite my lack of parental influences. They were also practicing Catholics, and so I was schooled at a strict Catholic school until 8th grade.

This all could have been quite an acceptable upbringing except my mother lost her battle with drugs and depression to suicide in 1986. I was 7. She hung herself, so it was particularly painful for me to understand. This horrible time of sadness intensified when my Grandmother died suddenly of a stroke a very short 34 days after my mother had passed away. Since I was an only child, I was always that very adult socialized child that knew too much and experiencing those deaths with too much adult perception was really hard.

Where did that leave me? With my (step) Grandpa. To me that was the only logical place for me to be. They had owned their house since I was born so it was the only "home" that I knew. What I didn't know is that everyone else but me knew my Grandpa was not my blood. There were immediate fears of it being inappropriate for an older man (he was 68) and a young girl to live alone.

Thank GOD a judge cared enough to ask me where I wanted to go and of course the only place in the world I wanted to be was with my Grandpa. We had just gone through the most devastating loss imaginable and I knew he couldn't read or write so we needed each other. I of course had too much responsibility for a child of (now) 8 years old. My grandpa could not afford to retire because the Race Track had let him go a year short of getting his retirement, so he still had to work. I took on most of what a woman would do. I helped with cooking and cleaning and I wrote out all the checks for our bills and balanced his checkbook. I also was 100% responsible for my school work and papers that came home. He was afraid if people knew he couldn't read or write they would take me away.

My adolescence was really anything but that. I lacked the love and attention of a normal family. My grandpa was afraid to show affection for fear it would be misinterpreted as sexual. he remarried to a family friend that was recently divorced- but it was for my benefit. He thought a woman in the house would solve my problems. It was too late. It didn't take long before I was looking for sexual attention. As you might have read, I was pregnant at 14 and lost the baby late in the pregnancy. It was really hard because everyone was happy for me, but me and the father wanted that baby. We had moved in together. He worked full time (he was 16) and I worked part time and went to beauty school in addition to high school. We had furnished the nursery and had everything we needed by ourselves long before she was born. In retrospect I can see now how hard it would have been, but I was used to taking responsibility so I am sure I could have made it.

We stayed together for 3 years after that. I had gone on to a Lutheran Highschool and they had made me leave while pregnant. I came back after I lost the baby, but me and my boyfriend had gotten out own apartment by the time I was 15. The school found out and demanded I get married as soon as I was legal age. I was still naive enough to think he was the one. So on my 16th birthday, I went and took my driving test and got my license... I drove us to the Justice of the Peace and we got married, I dropped him off at work, and I was back in school by 3rd period.

After I got my license from beauty school, I was instantly offered a job. I started out making around $25 /hr including tips. At 17 this seemed like it was all I would ever need and I thought I could only go up from there. I dropped out of high school with 3 lousy credits left.

We moved to a nicer 2 bedroom apt closer to my work. We had saved a lot of money so I was enjoying furniture shopping and decorating the new place and also loving my new independence from my job and all of the wonderful clients I was meeting. It all ended when I came home early and couldn't find my husband, and moments later he came down form the woman's apartment upstairs high on cocaine and smelling of sex. I wanted to die.

I moved out the next day while he was at work. I never even looked back. My grandparents house was over an hour away from my job and my lack of motivation was compounded by the depression of what had happened. Four years gone.

My next four year relationship started about a year later. His name was Thomas. We were common law married within a year and filed taxes as married- we just couldn't afford a wedding. We had two children. I was on bedrest from 22 weeks on with my son and from 12 weeks on with my daughter. I sat around eating and keeping my babies safe inside. I wasn't going to lose another one. I ballooned up to 316 lbs. I am 6' tall (and no I don't play basketball!).

Our relationship was pretty typical for a Hispanic man who believed a woman's place was in the home and a strong woman who had big dreams and goals. We fought a lot. He belittled me to keep me from thinking I could ever live without him and I resented him for it. Wanting 2 parents for my kids is what kept me there. My grandpa was already 78 and although still working, I knew he would not be there for long. His wife was gold digging nightmare, so i had no hope tehre either. I saw me and Thomas as all my kids had.

My will to have a "family" broke when Thomas hit me. I didn't know what I was going to be, but I knew a lot of things I wasn't going to be. A battered wife and mother was where I drew the line. It's a longer story I will get into in depth one day, but just for the sake of connecting people and events... Thomas died suddenly within a year of us separating. He was 27. Our children only 2 and 4. His death was weight related and besides the overwhelming grief and loss I felt for my children... I now feared I was headed for the same fate.

By this time I was in college full time and working part time. I pursued weight loss surgery with every ounce of my being. It was my only hope. When my grandfather died 8 short months after Thomas I was even more determined. My life was not not going to elude me like evryone else I knew and loved.

I did finally get approved for weight loss surgery. I was at an all time high of 380 lbs. I lost 200 lbs. I had reconstructive surgery (a body lift) to remove 16 POUNDS of extra skin and I also got implants to replace what were once the only sexy thing on my fat body... my boobs. I also had many complications and ended up having 6 surgeries that year. All with a 3 and 6 year old, school and a job, and only a loser boyfriend I cared very little for as support.

Once I was somewhat healthy and stable I kicked him out. I made the stupidest choice ever, and gave up all of my stability to move in with my step-grandma, who was saying she would have to sell my grandpa's house if I didn't help. She promised that if I finished school she would quitclaim the house to me so I could raise the kids there. Lie.

I was getting survivors benefits for my children, so I decided to go to school 15-18 credits at a time. I had failed almost the whole year that Thomas and my grandpa had died and I needed to catch up. My step grandma consumed my life, my time, AND my money. She paid the mortgage- an undisclosed amount, but the house had been bought 25 years earlier. I paid everything else and bought and cooked all the food. I had the kid's in daycare while I was in school and she would only babysit on rare occasion if the kids were asleep first and I came home right away if one of them woke up.

Somehow I still managed to meet Bryson. He was only 21 and not at all anything on my "must have's in a man" list. Somehow we connected right away and within a week we were together all the time. My grandma was very jealous and demanded that if I were to continue seeing him, I move out. So we did. It was kind of scary for me because I was very protective of my kids. He was very caring and helpful and I was still struggling with a lot of physical pain from all of my surgeries and complications. I wanted to jump in head first and enjoy this feeling, but my body would not cooperate and I started abusing pain pills so that I could function.

Pain pills make me sleepy and a sleeping Mom doesn't accomplish much. It wasn't long before we were abusing meth together. We just wanted to have every possible minute together and it was always just "one more time." One more time spiraled quickly down hill into a year. I was down to a disgusting weight of 155. We were living off of my survivors benefits and desperately trying to break away. What I didn't know until it was too late, was that pretty much all of Bryson's immediate family were on again off again meth users.

I blamed him and my paranoia started making me believe he actually conspired to get me to use the drug before he met me. He felt the same way about me. It had come to the point where I knew I had to leave because I could not do to my kids what my mom did. We had lost everything and were living in a hotel room and I was going to take the kids and leave the next time he left. I had asked my step grandma to give the kids a ride to school and pick them up and I was going to trick him into leaving when the kids would be getting back. I was going to plead my case to my grandma that she was all I had and that I needed treatment, and leave Bryson to find his own way.

I didn't get the chance. We were arrested and social services called and my kids taken away and placed with my grandma. It was the hardest time of my life yet. It also changed me and everything about my life. They found drugs in the room and that alone was enough to take the kids. I accepted responsibility for my drug use, but I was NOT going to lose my kids. That day was the last time I ever used meth. I was not allowed at my grandma's house and so me and Bryson came out of jail homeless with only each other. The survivor benefits were immediately transferred to my grandma for the care of the kids.

We lived in motels, then in a tent, then in a homeless shelter for a month. I was sure that without the drugs and money that Bryson would leave. Instead he petitioned the court to be a special respondent in the case and so he met all the same requirements that I had to as a parent. 6 intensive months of classes and therapy, monitored sobriety, supervised visits, and recovery and rehabilitation, I was given back full custody of my kids. I was asked to be a parent partner and help other parents who have lost their kids due to addiction.

We have both been clean since the day we were arrested. Almost 4 years.

Within a month of the kids coming home, we moved into a house and I found out I was pregnant. It was an even more complicated pregnancy than my first two and following more bedrest our daughter was born premature. Today she is a happy healthy toddler, about to turn two. My older kids are extremely caring and bright, helpful and independent. I will always have guilt about what I did. I will always envision a little social worker that believed in me, sitting on my shoulder, telling me not to let them down- ok and maybe sharing space with my grandma, my mother, and my grandpa :) I have had far too much time taken away, lives lost, and caused the most painful 6 mos of my life living without my children, to take anything for granted. Bryson has worked at the same place for 3 years (restaurant and bar industry) and I am a stay at home mom.

Wow can you believe I am done? If you are still here.... thank you... and I hope you will come back.... My adventures are just beginning :)