jessmede-blog

[jessmede-blog]

Eucalyptus

I'm so tired of trying to fix my brain. I'm so tired of being told councling wont work and it's their job to not fix you so they'll keep getting money...so I dont go. I've tried to ask God for help and to rely on Him, but that takes trust and Hope and I'm not good with commitment. Now I just pray that I have a brain aneurysm or I get hit by a car, or someone accidentally shoots me...anything that will relieve my pain and suffering.

I told my now husband back when we were dating to leave me alone he didn't want to be with me I was broken and would only hurt him...I bet he wished he would have listened. Instead he fought for me. I thought wow he really does love me, but now hes tired and I'm still broken...very broken...he no longer fights....hes done...so...so am I. Everyday wishing something would just come take this pain and agony. I look at Lana, we're so much a like. I'd like to think if I wasn't broken I would have been more like her. Lana is nice and confident. Lana knows she is loved. I wish I could be like her.

I'm just broken. I cant simply wait and die old, so I pray for something to take my life. I cant do it myself it'll hurt others way too much...so it just needs to be something else that takes my life. Lord please let it come soon...its the only way.

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Epiphanie

I realized I only want a relationship with my biological mom so I can hurt her, not physically, but mentally...so I can tell her over and over what a crapy mom she was and is. She figured this out before I did because she stopped talking to me. Now I'm at peace with the silence between us, because all I want to do is tell her what a piece of crap mother she is and was to me.

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Titles

My mom is no longer my mom. My grandmother is no longer my Grandmother. My uncle Eddie is no Longer my uncle. My sister is no longer my sister.

They have these titles simply because they were born and I was born of them.

I strip them of their titles now because they have done nothing to keep them. They don't do what people with their titles are supposed to do for their Daughter, Granddaughter, niece, and sister. Their lack of duty has lead them to become no ones...the saddest part is they don't care.

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Little sister

I don't know how to make you understand what life has been like for me. You had it good compared to me. You did have some trauma when your dad yelled and hit our mom. He used to beat me too. You think things are all black and white, but they'er not. You feel betrayed because you didn't know your Dad raped me...a lot. Mom wouldn't let me tell you. So for once in my life I listened to our mom. Now you take all your anger out on me because you were left in the dark about our families dirty little secrets. They were all kept from you to keep you safe. When the day came at 21 years of age I told you. Then your world made a little more sense. In your mind you had it so rough...I understand your a little hurt and worried about continuing the cycle and end up finding yourself with an abusive man. I was there too. Terrified I'd make the wrong choice and end up just like mom. Then I found the greatest man I know to call husband and my worries were lifted. Then I got pregnant. I begged God for a boy so I would know he wouldn't go through what I did. I found out my baby was a girl. I cried and screamed! I cursed God for giving me a girl. My mind swirled with what if' s. I didn't want her to go through what I did. How was I going to protect her? My own mother didn't care to help or protect me. How was I going to protect mine? So little sister when you've actually live life and have some experiences I'll be waiting to talk. Once you've had your own family I'll be here. Things are not black and white. Life is messy, family is messiest.

[jessmede-blog]

So after all my abuse and experiences that were concidered wrong I was placed in fostercare. I thought what I went through was a rare occurrence for a child to go through. Back then there were no smart phones, no Facebook, and no graphic stories about the sexual abuse of kids...so I thought it rare for the events that happened in my life. It wasn't until I started working At Hope Network Behavioral Health that I discovered what happened to me happens to so many kids or people daily. The kids I worked with came from way more horrific situations than I had gone through. The staff...probably 80% of the staff had gone through some sort of abuse...some sort of trauma as a child and thats why they were working there. They want to be the person to help the kids by supporting them and letting them know they're not alone and that they're safe now. As an adult with three beautiful girls I have huge anxiety about protecting my girls from the abuse and neglect I received. I have first handedly delt with the results of kids being abused, and neglected. Trying to reprogram them...to repair the damage that was done. The process is so long so time consuming that they'll struggle with it for the rest of their lives just as I have. The thought of this is daunting to me. I try so hard to put it out of my mind, but some days it just sticks. I've decided fpr now its vest I just avoid working with kids I don't already know. So far it has worked. I know it's not a permanent solution but its all I got.

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Mother's Day

I don’t like Mother’s Day…some of it is because my own mother left me, abandoned me as a child. Some of it is because I don’t feel close enough to my foster mom to really believe she actually loves me as much as her biological kids…a lot of hurtful things were said when I lived there. The other part is now that I’m a Mom of three beautiful girls I’m always hopeful for a wonderful Mother’s Day gift. You know the ones you see on movies or read about. It just doesn’t seem to happen…I feel like such a selfish jerk for feeling let down about it, but I do. I feel hurt because no one thought to go the extra mile to show me they apperciate my mommy skills. They apperciate me getting up several times at night to tend to kids who peed everywhere, barfed everywhere, had a nightmare, legs hurt and they need medicine, and the list could go on forever. Then I wonder is because my husband doesn’t think I’m a good mom? Is it because I yell too much at my kids? Is it because some weeks I’m so tired and depressed that nothing gets finished?

A hand made card…that was made while I was in the shower and The kid’s Easter candy(that I bought)…doesn’t make me feel special and I feel like an A-hole for feeling this way…so only Tumblr will know how I feel today.

[jessmede-blog]

When I'm gone.

When I'm gone will I be seen as the end of inconveniences? Will I be seen as no more dirty dishes piled in the sink and on the counter? No more clean clothes in baskets stacked in the laudry room or on the floor of the bed room? No more clutered counters? No more piles of dirty clothes in the bathroom or on the floor by my side of the bed? No more half done tasks around the house? Will you feel a sense of relief from the inconveniences I caused...when I'm gone?

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Monotonous

Having to say the same thing over and over when they already know what you’re telling them…is insanity….yup I snap…I get mad…I get annoyed…and angry…and eventually yell…then told I’m over reacting and “geeze they just asked where it goes”. Yup they know where it goes, they do this three times a day…..

I can’t do this anymore…I’m going insane…I’m stuck…I dont get to do anything of my own…I don’t get to have meaningful conversations with adults anymore…my interests and hobbies don’t have a place in my life…I’m slowly turning into this ugly human that I dont want to become, but can’t find a way to stop it.

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"Mom"

I don't know what its like to have a mom. I mean as a young adult. I don't remeber being hugged and kissed and snuggled with as a kid and most definitly not as a young adult. I was taken away from my "mom" and placed in foster care at 12 years old. My foster mom I ended up with kept her distance...kept unattached to me. I kind of get it, but even now as an adult my foster family is still around. I still go and visit them, but still I feel on the outside of them. I see all this stuff they say about their kids and what they do with their adult kids and grand kids from them and think....what about me? What about my kids? No comes over to my place unless it's one of my kids birthday parties. They all even my "siblings" have been told my house has an open door policy, but noone ever opens the door except me...to their house. However, Jared's parents take advantage of that open door policy. They drop by to say hello and chat. They drop by bearing gifts in the form of pies, peaches, strawberries, and tomatoes and whatever else they know we like. She stops by asking if she can take the kids places...of course we say yes. A grand parent relationship is so important. She buys things for my kids from garage sales...clothes toys...whatever and my kids are always greatful. They take usbout to eat and invites us over and to do things with them. They let us borrow anything and everything without the tinest second thought. Luckily Jared's parents veiw me as their daughter and treat me with just as much love if not more than their own childeren. I will always love them for it...just for the love and care they shower me with. As great as all that is...I still long for a mom who is like me...who is how I am with my girls...a love that only a mother can have with her own child...even an adopted child because they wanted that child and invested in that child....I just don't have that...I never will...it makes me very sad to realize this....I dont think that wound will ever heal it's self. I asked to be adopted by my foster family...I was told no...you don't know enough about the family history... I remeber my foster Dad was putting together his family tree and I was in awe at how far back he could track his ancestors...I had thought to myself I want to be on that family tree because I didn't have one of my own. I am starting my own family tree...

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Mean Girl...woman

I said out loud to Jared "I'm nice"...then I said yeah right...just saying that made me double over laughing inside..."I'm not nice" I said. Of course the silence spoke volumes! I can't remember when I started to be mean...maybe in preschool....? I never stopped....I don't know how to stop being mean. Now I fear my meanness will be taught to my girls because of me. I believe my heart is hardened and I don't know if it will ever go away.

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What am I doing?

So I've been told my kids are so good because they are disaplined. Then I'm told that I'm too mean...mean all the time. You know, I'm not perfect...I'm human. I do have a temper...I can't control it all the time with my kids...I'm human. I can only take so much...I'm human. When you're the one who stays home all day long, 24/7 I'm mom. I don't leave for work anymore. I don't have someone else to care for my kids so I can go to work. My kids are my work....24/7. Yeah I sometimes get a few hours alone...maybe once a week. A kid wakes up in the middle of the night...it's mom who goes to their room to calm them down before they wake the others in the house. One starts puking in the middle of the night...it's mom who cleans them and everything else all up...it's mom....mom this mom that.....I have a limit...so nope I'm only human and cannot be nice all the time....am I too mean? Yeah probably sometimes....I'm human...I'm far from perfection and when I'm wrong I do apologize...even to my kids....I would love to be shown some apperciation instead of only being told what I'm doing wrong....or what I didn't do....or what I still need to do....some apperciation can go a long ways.

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Fight or flight

As a kid going through the trauma that I did I was in a constant state of fight or flight and I did both. Doing whatever worked best for that situation. I didn't realize this until I was an adult...25ish, haha. Whenever anything that felt too challenging came up in my relationship with my husband my mind would wander to "if". "If" he got so mad that he hit me what would I do? Where would I go? Who would I stay with? Would I move to Arizona? Would I move to California? Would I move to South Carolina? Would I just go alone and stay in Michigan? Jared would never hit me and it has never come close to that and never would. I find it interesting that my mind goes there. I think of the worse senario and then figure out what I would do and where I would go. Im unsure if this is normal or if it's the result of the trauma. When I was in foster care I was forced to go to this program that paid me to learn how to fill out applications, make a resume, how to dress for an interveiw, and how to answer interview questions. There was a lady who would bring me to and from the program. She told me once...because you're a woman you always need to have money set aside for yourself in case you need to leave. You need to always have a plan of where you can go or what you would do if you needed to get out. I understood what she was saying. Had I planned my get away from my Mom's house better and had my mature mind at 12 I would have left my mom's in an entirly different way. This lady only cemented that thought process into me. It became part of who I am and how I think. However, I don't have money set aside that my husband doesn't know about. Our accounts are combined. I love and trust my husband, but that thought process of "if" still happenes. It may always happen, but I hope it doesn't. I hope it will fade away with time.

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"Trigger" photo. 1998

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Trigger

Today I was surprised to see a photo posted to my Facebook page from an old friend. When I looked at the photo so many emotions whooshed over me. I literally gasped out loud. The picture was not a bad one for being taken with a run of the mill camera from the 90’s. The Image of me took my breath away. I could see the worse part of my life frozen in that photo. It was the darkest of my days and you could see it all over the photo. It triggered a memory of that day and what happened after that photo was taken. I went on to talk with a man that I was “dating” at the time… yes I said MAN(that’s another story for later). In this specific picture there is great sadness on my face. An emptiness in my eyes. I wasn’t at home. I had left home and found refuge with a friend of my fathers. Dennis and his wife Barb. I had been being verbally abused and repeatedly raped by my mother’s boyfriend. I went to my dad’s and was verbally abused and sexually assaulted by my Father’s girlfriend. I ended up with Barb and Dennis Watkins for a few weeks. I had asked my father if it was alright to stay there awhile and he said yes. So Barb came and picked me up. I was there for what felt like a month… not sure how long exactly, but no one was looking for me. No one asked me to come home and no one came to pick me up, even though plans were made to do so. My mother and her boyfriend stopped by one day and asked Dennis and Barb if I was there. They didn’t give me up, I hid upstairs. I eventually decided to come down so Dennis and Barb wouldn’t get in trouble. I went home with my mom. My dad told my mom he didn’t even know I was there and he was the one who said I could go in the first place. I was just dumbfounded that my Dad didn't remember.

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First Christmas in Foster care, 1998

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Mother's Day

Mother’s Day is a loaded holiday for me. I hate picking out cards. They all talk about how wonderful mothers are and how when you were a kid Mom was great…well thats a big fat lie in my world.

My mother was not a good mother. I was left alone to fend for myself. I was a kindergartener getting my self ready for school. Walking alone about 200 yards to school. I always went early so I could play. The cross guards were never there. All the adults driving were in a rush to get to where they needed to be that day. My little 5 year old self skinny and short. They never saw me when turning right at the light. When the little white man was shown I’d go to walk and suddenly feel the hard shove of a fender to my side knocking me off balance and out passed the white crosswalk line. Alone I would quickly make my way to the other side. No one came to help or to stop the driver who just bumped me with their car. This would happen a few days every week. Sometimes the bag lady would be out and about. Walking forwards and backwards and in circles till she stopped at the light to cross the street. She was kind. I would wait for her to cross the street because I knew the cars could see her.

My mother never played with me. Never did things me. Perhaps it was because she was tired and depressed, but as a kid I didn’t see that. I just saw her as having other things that were better to do than play with me.

Once in foster care and placed in my foster home. I had a stay at home mom and six brothers and one other foster girl. This mom was kind and stern. Somehow she knew all my sneaky tricks. This mom would sign her boys up for sports and we’d all go to the games to cheer them on. Baseball, basketball, and football. This mom would make dinner and make sure our homework was done. In the morning she would get up and stop the bickering of the boys and would send us off to the bus stop yelling at the top of her lungs across the yard for all the neighbors and our class mates to hear…“BYYYYYEEEEE, LOOOOVVVVE YOOOUUUU!” Ugh! It would embarrass my brother Jeff. I thought it was funny and delighted in having someone yell their loudest that they loved us, but I kept that too myself.

As a kid I didn’t realize my “love language” was gifts…things, meaning buying me things showed me that you loved me….well I was bought things for my birthday and Christmas, but they were meaningless things…things that were not my taste or my interest, which made me feel worthless and unloved because no one invested time or money into who I was as a person. My Brothers would open up lavish gifts…snowboards, cell phones, stereos, name brand BMX bikes, name brand clothes, portable cd players, video games and systems. I would get horrible looking clothes that didn’t even fit. Nick-nacks I didn’t care about. Soaps and conditioners….stupid random stuff. I never remember asking for things because I felt it was not my place to do so. I had brought it up a few times that the boys would get whatever they wanted and my foster sister and I would get what was donated to the foster care agency. My foster moms response was well you girls are just to picky I don’t know what you like…you’re just to hard to buy for…..I gave up and once I got a job I bought my own name brand clothes, my own conditioner, tooth paste, and personal toiletries because what I preferred was too much. I even would buy everyone christmas gifts. One year I didn’t know what to get my foster mom. At the mall they were advertising this great potpourri. Ot looked beautiful and spelled great. I bought some for my foster mother for Christmas. She opened it looked at it and turned it in her hands…I waited for a response of excitement and thanks….I was given nothing…a few minutes later she looked at me and said (I’ll never forget) “Really? Really? Jess…potpourri?” With her face twisted in disgust. She put her head and slowly shook her head side to side. I had never felt so low a demeaned.

My foster mom was also responsable for me not receiving therapy. After my first session I came back with a keycahin lizard we had made in session with beads. My foster mom had said “is that what I came downtown for? To make this? You dont need to see a therapist do you? Did you even talk? I guess driving into town to get help for my trauma wasn’t important.

There was another time when I was wrestling my fost brother and he had folded me inhalf too far and it hurt my back…I couldn’t stand up straight…my foster mom thought I was faking. She eventually took me to see the doctor for the foster kids. He wanted me to get x-rays done. I was so relieved so she would physically see that there was something wrong. But once in the car she said “yoj feel fine right? You don’t need x-rays. Once again I felt unimportant. So I said yeah sure and we went home.

The best thing though (sarcasticly) was when I would get upset and finally blow my top my foster mom would say “you better stop! Or else I’m going to call the doctor and get you on some meds! I didn’t want that…I didn’t like the thought of not being in control of my own body. So I stopped because being on Meds was made out to be super bad….mental illness was seen as bad….I made the mistake once to ask to be sdopted…her response was you dont know enough about our family history…i opened my moth to speak but just nothing came out…

I have since brought up all these examples to my foster mom and she claims to remember non of this. I’ve asked grown up friends if they remember me going to church in crap clothes. They all say yes the boys all had nice name brand clothes and I have crap from the basement at the agency.

Since my foster mom claims to not remember along with my birth mom I have kinda let go of it. I really just want a "yeah you’re right, I remember”. That will never happen. So yeah thats why I hate Mother’s Day…because I have crap Mothers. And I just feel like a big fat liar face when picking out cards. Can't wait for it to be over.