Growing Up & School.

From a early age, I remember being around the age of 4–5 living in a townhouse with my dad & step mom (I found out later in life when I was 16 she wasn’t my real mom). There was various moments of verbal & physical abuse that I endured from her that I recall. One of the moments was her chasing me around with a Halloween mask scaring me thinking it was funny, but there was 2 key points I specifically recall. One of the incidents was when I was in the kitchen and I peeled off the lids to my hugs juice jugs and combined them into a container thinking it would be “yummy”. She came into the kitchen yelling at me and cornered me against the kitchen countertop covering my mouth and nose so I couldn’t breathe. I remember her telling me “not to scream for my dad or it would be much worse” and as soon as she loosened up I yelled out for my dad, which he ran downstairs putting a stop to it and yelled at her. Another night I remember her trying to feed me corn, but shoved the spoon far into my throat because I wasn’t eating fast enough, basically choking me. Eventually, my dad and her was expecting my sister Taylor and we ended up moving into the home I grew up in.

As I progressed into elementary school I was very shy and awkward, so I had a rough time making friends. In the 1st grade, I fell asleep with a candle next to me as I was putting Pokemon cards in a binder with sleeves, trying not to have my parents see my light on in my room after being told to go to bed. This ended up burning my left arm bad and resulted in bullying during elementary. Soon after my sister was born, they had my brother, Jake. My dad and step mom gave them full attention, and I was basically put to the sidelines. She forced me into taking Adderall for being too “energetic”. Not only was my step mom physically and verbally abusive, but she was also racist and a bigot hating gays. Having that around me it rubbed off on me unfortunately and I regret allowing that negativity become a part of who I was early on in life. There was multiple times I recall her physically assaulting me, once stabbing me with a kitchen knife because I took a break from vacuuming the living room carpet to get a drink of water. She also grabbed me while I was brushing my teeth and took the toothbrush out of my hand, then scrubbed my teeth so hard my gums started to bleed. My dad ended up punching through the glass door to the stand up shower telling her to get off me. She would even spit on him, ran him over once, and threatened to get a divorce and take my siblings and the house if he continued to stick up for me. She would also be extremely verbal and physical with my siblings as well and constantly caused conflict between other members of my dads side of the family or my dads friends. Any time I was allowed to have a friend over, they would assume my step mom was nice, but I constantly told them she was acting different around people when we had guests over. Ever since I was a kid though, I would always go to my Grandparents over the weekends to visit. This became my safe place when things got bad at home. As I was getting older and started to become more interested in girls I began to visit less. After turning 16, I started dating a girl named Erika A, which everything was great at first and then slowly started to become more sexual until I lost my virginity to her. After that, Erika slowly began to be verbally & physically abusive often times hitting me or cussing me out whenever I wasn’t giving her affection/sex or attention. The only time she seemed happy was when I did anything sexual with her. Soon after it became to much and I broke up with her, which I feel like that completely traumatized my mindset afterwards. From that point forward I felt like sex was the key to keeping a woman happy and in my life. Later in the year my grandmother passed away. She was my backbone and biggest support system growing up. It was my first experience having someone I cared about passing away. I pretended to not let it phase me around family, but it really hurt bad. I fell into a bad depression and started drinking and going out to parties. I’ve never opened up about this with anyone, but I was developing a addiction to alcohol and hid it well from my family and friends. When I was sixteen, I found out about my real mom cheating on my dad and leaving me when I was a baby, which also was depressing for me for awhile. Going into highschool I was very socially awkward and mostly stayed to myself and slept a lot. I got bullied and harassed frequently because of how I dressed, me listening to rock/metal while other kids listened to rap. I got into multiple fights, so I went to alternative school. Constantly, my stepmom made everything and every conversation about my brother and sister. Whether it was their grades in general, doing well on tests, sports they was in, etc. It just bottled me up with anger and wishing I had that love, attention and support regardless of how well I was doing in school. They would constantly get new clothes while I was stuck with old stuff, taken on trips with her while I got left behind. They would get food at nice restaurants and she would come home telling me “Oh I didn’t think you were hungry”.

They overall would get anything they asked for, between having as many friends over as they wanted while I rarely could have 1–3 of mine over or getting items like tv’s, games, or anything expensive. In 11th grade I dropped out because the bullying was getting so bad. After that I began working with my dad, but life at home continued to get worse after I turned 18 and lost both of my grandparents. My stepmom got more and more adamant on her arguments with my dad over threatening to kick me out, and would threaten him with divorce, saying she would take my brother and sister away and the house. One day it got so bad me and my dad ended up being kicked out of the house for awhile because he fought against her trying to put me out. She told my siblings that my dad “loved me more than them” filling their heads with lies. He tried to pick them up from the bus one day and they ignored him. It hurt him so bad that he talked about suicide and thought they hated him. Eventually, we moved back in, but the arguments were endless. With both of my grandparents deceased and no actual friends to talk to, I was constantly drinking and going to parties as much as possible. I basically stayed drunk and away from home as much as I could be to get away from my stepmom and the dark headspace I was in. Enduring a rough life at home, being depressed and also having bad breakups I started to send photos of myself around trying to get some sort of gratification. Most people thought of it as me being “sexual” but in reality I wanted to feel love and less alone. Thus, mixing lust & love up unfortunately. There’s no excuse for how I started acting, and all I can do is apologize and try to change from those mistakes. Unfortunately doing that after awhile got me in trouble and has affected me ever since. I’ve not been able to feel alive, or really ever given a proper chance to be someone better than what my past showed. My step mom also caused conflict between my aunt and my dad making him not spend time with her and threatened him for months, eventually I secretly invited my aunt to my birthday dinner. This ended up rekindling my aunt and dads bond thankfully, but shortly after he ended up passing away in January 2017. After my dad passed away I’ve moved states twice. I’ve tried to speak to my step mom, brother, and sister since then, but haven’t heard from them in years. Also, while in high school I definitely took breakups & getting turned down a lot harder than I should have. Mostly from low self esteem & immaturity on my end.

The last time I spoke to my step mom was in 2022, this was one of the last messages I sent her. I eventually got tired of giving effort, then she would randomly message me once every few months and wasn’t consistent or trying. With all of the pain and trauma I had bottled up for years, it eventually came out.