...A police officer came to escort me from my 3rd grade classroom and my daddy picked me up and took me across the parking lot to my mamaw's house. I visited my mom on the weekends and she eventually moved to Texas with her mother. There we lived with mamaw until my dad met Jennifer. AKA "BC" I remember my daddy sitting down with me and asking me something. He was dating two women at the time. An unattractive redhead lady named Dora. I liked Dora. She wasn't rich and wasn't pretty, but I knew she was a good person. Then there was Jennifer. An attractive, baton twirling, 28 year old woman, 15 years younger than my daddy. I didn't like her, but I knew daddy did more than Dora. He told me he was going to marry one of these women and asked me who I liked the best. I chose Jennifer, only because I knew that's the woman HE wanted to marry. So he did. We moved into her duplex, she taught me and my best friend to twirl baton, she had a big sweet dog, and a niece that was my age, and I started thinking, maybe she isn't so bad. Eventually Jennifer and daddy bought a house and I started middle school.

I started 6th grade in a Christian Academy. It was the worst school year of my life. We had to wear uniforms and still I was ridiculed and picked on because my skirt was too long and my shoes weren’t the right shade of brown. My hair was curly and not straight like the cool rich girls and my socks didn't have my initials embroidered in them. What it all came down to was that I didn't have tons of money. Every kid that went to that school was rich. I lived in a 3 bedroom one story house in a middle class neighborhood and I rode the bus. I was a loser. Everyone picked on me, some even hit me. I had one guy punch me so hard in the stomach that I vomited. I sat in class crying and told the teacher. She told me to be quiet. Even the teachers though I was a big nothing. I tried joining the cheerleading team, and the other girls made me feel like such an ugly idiot, that I quit. I stared seeing the counselor at school who didn't believe anything I was telling her. She'd tell the principal that I was a "bad kid" and he called my dad, who told Jennifer and I'd get told how worthless and horrible I was then get a belt taken to my ass. I tried to tell everyone what was happening at school and no one believed me. Jennifer would call me a liar. I was miserable. My granddad died and Jennifer refused to let me attend the funeral. I never got to even see him in the hospital. I loved my granddad. Almost every picture of me as a baby included him.

My grades started slipping and I was bringing home D's and F's on my report card. Jennifer would tear my ass up with a belt for bringing home the bad grades. Nothing I did was right to her. Dad was so stuck up her ass, that whatever she said went. He quit paying attention to me, and I felt he didn't love me anymore. He and Jennifer both would tell me I was ugly, I looked like “Fido’s ass”, a bitch, and other hurtful names. Whoever came up the little saying, "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" should be shot.

I started taking my anger out on my best friend. I would shove her, push her and call her names. I eventually lost all my friends and my only outlet was riding my bike two blocks to my mamaw’s house. I was never sad there. My mamaw always loved me and I felt it. Mommie and Papaw lived just next door so when mamaw’s house was full, I'd just run across the yard to mommie and Papaw’s quiet house and talk with them.

We moved that summer out of the city and into the country. We moved into a nice house with a big backyard, I had a new best friend across the street. I started the 7th grade and wasn't picked on. I actually liked school. My grades were still bad and Jennifer would still beat my ass for them. She would still call me names and my dad would still side with her. My mom’s mother had said one time that Jennifer told her I went after my dad with a baseball bat. Nothing close to that EVER happened. She would tell lies on me, throw away all my belongings, and ground me for months at a time. She took the belt to me one time for using her shampoo. Eventually my entire family seemed to hate me, including my mamaw. I still loved my mamaw though. The only person who didn't make me feel like I was "BAD" was mommie. She never got angry with me and always told me she loved me. I think knew Jennifer and understood how I felt without ME having to say anything.

One summer I gave a boy a pack of my dad’s cigarettes. He got caught with them and his mom told Jennifer. She shipped me off to stay the summer with my mom, who was still in GA at the time, and I volunteered at the Red Cross. I spent over 400 hours at that place and received all kinds of awards. Jennifer turned her nose up at all of them and dad just sat on the couch with his book, never looking up, like he always did.

I went through middle school and into high school. I was one of the semi-popular kids. You know, not the cheerleader type, but the next in line. Everyone knew me and no one though I was ugly anymore. I learned to straighten my hair and wear makeup and the boys started liking me, but I didn’t like them. I had little crushes on girls, but I never thought anything about it. I was starting to treat my friends like shit again, and was losing them one by one. Jennifer and dad sold the house and moved into an even bigger one, with a mini-farm. I didn't stay there long.

Jennifer wanted to send me to a boarding school. She was getting information everyday in the mail about different schools all over the country. My aunt Pan and Uncle Dave heard about this and offered to take me in. They were extremely nice and quite rich. I moved into their HUGE house and had my own HUGE room upstairs overlooking the HUGE neighborhood in old historic Savannah. If you've ever watched the movie Forces Of Nature with Sandra Bullock and Ben Affleck, the neighbor hood where they’re running in the rain at the end is the neighbor hood I where they lived. My 9th grade theater teacher's son played Sandra Bullocks son in that movie. Forest Gump and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil were both filmed near by. I was now one of those rich kids I had always envied in 6th grade.

I stared The Savannah Arts Academy. It was the best place with the coolest students and teachers. I auditioned for theater and even with a failing grade average I made it in. I made friends fast. I dyed my hair black and started dressing outrageous. I could dress how I wanted and be who I wanted. I was acting in plays and singing in the choir. I was also doing drugs, shoplifting, and other things. My friend would get acid from her brother and we’d do it at school. I really thought I was something. Thankfully I never got into drugs bad. I got everything I wanted for Christmas, all the clothes I wanted and even a TV in my room, which Jennifer never allowed. It all went to my head and I started acting out. I would go into rages and the police had to be called. After going through tons of therapists and doctors Aunt Pam and Uncle Dave got tired and sent me back with my dad. I never got a chance to say bye to my friends and the Arts Academy. When I got back to my dad’s, Jennifer and I got into a fight and I called my therapist. I told her I wanted out of there. She said the only place I could go was Charter, a psych hospital. I told her fine. Anywhere was better than here. She told me all I'd have to do was tell her I was going to commit suicide and I could leave. So I did. Next thing I know, I'm at Charter Hospital confined to a bed. I was actually happy.

Dad turned me over to the state and I was sent to a girls home. It was called Safe Haven. I got into a fight with this big black girl my first day there. She picked a fight with me and I WHIPPED HER ASS! She got a chunk of my hair and I scarred her face with my fingernails. We became the best of friends, even roommates, after that. We'd sneak out and beat up the other new girls. We'd skip school share medication, cause trouble and everything else. All the girls had to take showers together. Some of the girls would get together and beat up the Judith, the 7 year old who lived there. I left her alone. I was mean, but not THAT mean. Some awful things happened at that place, and it was supposed to be a religious home. They forced us to be baptized and “saved” by the lord. That maybe why I hate organized religion so bad. I got myself thrown out and in the back of a police car for giving another girl my medication so she could kill herself. She had a seizure and I never knew what happened to her after that. In order to keep from going to “kiddy jail” I slashed my wrist so I could go back to the hospital.

This place was called Greenleaf Hospital. It was great. I made friends and stayed almost a month. I was really excited because I was going to be placed in a foster home with new parents. Then my doctor informed me that he didn’t know my mother was still alive and she wanted to come take me back to Texas. She showed up with her boyfriend Mike. (Spitting image of Robert Redford as he is now) Mama signed all the papers and flew back to Texas. A few days later my dad shows up, the doctors drug me out of my mind, and I’m taken to Jacksonville, FL, where I’m put on a plane and sent to Texas. I arrive at the airport, still recovering from the dugs, sick at my stomach and angry. Mama, her brother and her mother are there. Mama is SO drunk that she’s falling down in the middle of the airport making a scene, crying, hollering, and pissing me off even more. We go home.

Things are awful. Mama and Mike are living in a one bedroom apartment in Fort Worth. I’m sleeping on a cot in the middle of the bedroom while mama and Mike camp out in the living room. There’s a TV, two air mattresses, and a couple of cardboard boxes used as tables. I soon start my anger fits again and end up in the hospital for the third time. This one I didn’t like as much. It was more of a drug rehab center for teens and I couldn’t relate to the kids there as much. I ended up there again after school started. Mike and mama moved into a 2 bedroom apartment and school was going okay. I met my first true love, a teacher named Donna. She was 47 years old, I was 17. She caught me roaming the halls, which I did frequently because I couldn’t stay in class, and she took me in. We became best of friends and she was the first lesbian I had ever really known. She let me come to her house and we’d go places. I thought she was beautiful. She was about 5 ft tall, Jewish and butch. I think back on her now and she was really NOT attractive. Teachers started assuming things about us and she backed off. I stared going to extreme measures to get her attention and eventually pushed her away. I ended up back in the hospital and I haven’t spoken to Donna since.

When I left the hospital I was placed in another school. This is where I came to know the deaf kids. I was placed in a behavioral class where I was the only girl and the only white kid. After listening to the teacher talk about the great Jesse Jackson and how horrible the white people are to the blacks and other bullshit I though was racist EVERYDAY ALL DAY LONG, I began skipping class. I would come to school and sit outside just to avoid that classroom. I was known as the crazy girl and the kids were afraid of me. So were the teachers. I was never punished. I’ve always been a good manipulator so I began working all the teachers. They gave me grades out of fright, and the principal REFUSED to throw me out. He thought that’s what I wanted. Everyone though I wanted to be written up and thrown out of school. That's really what I was afraid of the most. I took up with the racist teacher's boss and got him fired later on. I'll always be proud of that. He was an awful man, and not only because of his racism. Soon after meeting Stacey over the internet I dropped out.

Stacey and I have been together 2 years and I’m sure I’ll be with her for quite sometime. There must be something really wrong with Stacey, or she must love me more than anyone else ever has for me to not have pushed her away yet. I have no contact with anyone from my past out side my family. I have pushed them all away with in a year of meeting them. Maybe I’m okay now, maybe my mind knows it doesn’t have to act out negatively for attention anymore now that I have Stacey. I used to dream about killing myself. I’ve tried and failed. Maybe I just didn’t want to die that bad. I haven’t thought about suicide since I’ve been with Stacey. I no longer see a therapist or take any medication. I still have my moments where my so-called bipolar/depression/ADD/OCD/ and all the other bullshit I’ve been diagnosed with over the years kicks in and I become a demon and mentally hurt people, but it’s nowhere near the extreme it used to be. I’ve never blamed my past, Jennifer, my mother, my father or anyone else for my behavior, though everyone else has. I refuse to use them as an excuse. They hurt me then, but I don’t really think of it all that often now. My wild child has been tamed and domesticated, partly thanks to Stacey and partly thanks to myself.

When it comes to my dad, I don’t have many memories of him in my life. Everything was about Jennifer and that’s all I knew. He never abused me or totally abandon me. He just sat back with his head turned the other way, as if I never existed. If Jennifer didn’t like me, he didn’t like me. She was all that mattered. I feel like thanks to her, I wasted 6 years of my childhood. I’ve put that behind me until now. Why I’m posting this for all the world to see, I don’t know. Like I said, this isn’t an excuse for my behavior. This is just my life shortened and summarized in to a few paragraphs to give my readers a look into who I am and where my father stood in my life. I’m really glad that my dad has now what he has always wanted. A boy. He told me one time, “I’ve already failed with you, I won’t fail with Quinton.” That’s what I remember of my dad in my life.

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