Chemotherapy flashbacks

Well, today is Karen's consultation appointment to decide what form of treatment the doctor's think will be best to attach and destroy the remaining abnormal cancer cells in her body.

I have to admit that this has me flashing back to the chemotherapy that my mother engaged in prior to her death. I fear that I am going to lose another mother figure and there's nothing I can do to change or prevent this or make things better. I am helpless and it's all out of my hands.

I try to keep positive thoughts and I tease Karen that if she loses her hair we will buy her crazy wigs and we both laugh but the reality is that it's out of my control and I have no one I can just break down and pour all my fears out to because she is the person I would normally do that with.

It's always greener on the other side of the fence

Lately, my friend and I have been discussing how we have changed and how our lives have changed as we grow older. Remember the days when you could barely make ends meet, but somehow you always seemed to have money to go out with friends? Remember the days when you would stay up all night hanging out with friends and then go to class and work the next day? Remember the days when you had so many people that you always had something to do and were rarely at home unless your residence was the party location?

It seems as we have grown older we have weeded out friends and have only a handful now of people we can really count on, connect with and have a bond with. It seems that we would rather sit at home and read a good book or two or four instead of go out clubbing.

Not that there's anything wrong with the women we have become. We've decided we are pretty ok in our own skin, even if the men we married turned out not to be!

However, lately we have been reading books with these characters of men who would move heaven and earth to save their wives/girlfriends, they would endanger their own lives to protect them, they talk quietly in sexy voices and say all the right things, they listen to the women in the stories, they hang on to every word they embrace them and hold them in such a way that you the reader can almost feel the heat and passion between the characters and we continue to ask ourselves do men ever really act like this? Where is the man that feels as if his world would end if we were not in it? Where is the man that would heaven and earth to protect us? Does this man really exist, or are they all lazy, sloppy, momma's boys just wanting someone to cook for them, clean up after them, work a full time job, be a super mom, and still have time to be the "whore" in the bedroom with little emotional or mental stimulation and just be able to turn it on like the flip of a switch?

Cold Weather Moves In

Well, I guess it's that time of year when the winds start to blow and we bundle up in blankets and snuggle up to try and stay warm. I don't think I am actually ready for this yet. I want it to stay warm longer, at least until my house sells! I think it would make things so much easier if the weather was nice and the plants were still in bloom.

I keep telling myself that things are going to work out but every day my house stays on the market is a day closer to me losing the house I want to be buy! It's perfect for me, in the perfect location, has perfect out buildings that I could turn into a gardening room, work room, laundry room, storage and of course a garage to park my truck in to protect it from hail damage and tree sap! I can even see opening the kitchen up for a more open feel and view of the office and living area and I can see the decorating I would do on this house.

The house is located across the street from my best friend and this would make it easy for me to help her with her son and when we want to socialize. She says she's going to be speaking to an attorney this week to start divorce and custody proceedings so it would be perfect timing too if my house sold now!

Spilling Over

Do you ever feel like there's so much raining down on you that you have so much frustration and anxiety built up that you feel like you are physically spilling over at the seems?

When most people feel this way they turn to their friends and family. These people are supposed to be the ones that love us the most, lift us up when we are down, comfort and nurture us and provide us with a soft place to fall. However, in my life, there have been few people like that in my life. Because of the attacks I suffered throughout my childhood and young adult years I grew very jaded and unable to trust and this makes it difficult for me to create and maintain lasting bonds.

I have been blessed enough to have built a lasting relationship with a mother figure, Karen, a best friend/sister Robin, and a somewhat strained relationship with my older sister. However, sometimes I feel like I don't have good things to share often enough with them and I don't want to just dump all my stresses on them so I bottle it up until it just starts spilling over.

Sometimes I wish I knew how to open up and let people in but in the past when I have opened up and tried to form friendships they seem to fake. All they want to do is sit at the local bar and pay for over priced drinks or sit up all night drinking in someone's house. I don't know if anything is wrong with that but some reason in my life I just want to have a slower paced, more relaxed existance and build friendships based on more than sitting up drunk all night.

I don't know what this all means or if it means anything at all I just know that sometimes it helps me to write about it.

Is anyone ever really happy?

Holding it all together is not the easiest task. Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed and I think that no one will ever reach out for me, that I will never have a soft place to fall. Being alone is not always a bad thing. I love the fact that I make the rules, I live how I want to, I answer to no one, but other times when I have had a really stressful day, or received overwhelming news like a friend has cancer, or I am scared I am not going to be able to make ends meet, or something really great happens, or the day is just beautiful that I had someone to come home to, someone to pick up the phone and call and share my life with.

I think about past relationships and those memories make me so happy that I am single, but what is it about people that it is so hard to make real lasting friendships too? I have no trouble meeting people and making friends and they all lean on me and ask my advice and want me to come out and socialize with them, but when it comes to anything real - a conversation, sharing lives then it all seems so fake.

It's the same thing with my own blood family. They all say they love and miss me, but then it's a series of forwarded emails, mindless phone calls in which nothing of any substance is exchanged, to inquiries as to how you are doing and if there is one, it's quickly averted to something superficial and then the call is ended. Which I can't honestly say bothers me too much because I don't have the desire or need to maintain fake relationships at this point in my life and I lack the desire to even try.

Sometimes I think it's just me. Sometimes I wonder if I am the only one who feels so alone but then I talk to my best friend and she tells me she has the same problem with people. She grows weary of attempting to make new friendships only to realize that they are superficial.

Maybe I am meant to be alone. Maybe there isn't anyone out there for me. I would like to think there is someone out there for me and I just haven't found them yet, but with each passing year I look at the people I have known and wonder.

My ex husband bounces from relationship to relationship and has had 2 children by other women but I know he's a liar, cheat and a thief. My ex boyfriend is in a relationship with a woman and they have been together for years and they fight constantly, they lived together for awhile but eventually he moved out but they stayed together. My brother married a woman he got pregnant and all they ever do is fight. For three years it's been one complaint after another including fears that she was cheating on him, doesn't care for their child and just spends money and complains that he doesn't make enough for her.

My friend married a guy a few years younger than her. He's immature and doesn't realize how to be a good husband or father and just expects that his wife should take care of the house and the child and then on top of it all have sex with him whenever he wants it. She's OCD and controlling and they clash on a regular basis.

I just look at every relationship around me and wonder how does it work? How does it happen and is anyone ever really happy?

Scary and Exciting all at the same time

Recently, because of all of the harrasment from a neighbor I have decided to put my house on the market. I am just ready to get out of Stephenville where there never seems to be any help when you need it, and closer to my best friend.

The problem, I found the perfect house in the perfect town, in the perfect location for the perfect price and I am stuck waiting to see if my house sells in time! I just want things to settle down. I just want to find some peace.

I have struggled my entire life to own my own home, achieve and education, and have a cushion in case of emergency and no matter what it seems every time I turn around there is some kind of obstacle to overcome. I don't know how much I can continue to fight to over come. Sometimes it just seems as if it is all getting to be too much.

Being stuck in Stephenville away from the people who love me makes it all even that much more difficult so I pray that God will help me to sell my house so I can be closer to the ones I love, so I can not be isolated, so I can continue the work I do with the crisis center to create awareness for awareness and help prevent others from going through what I have gone through. I fear that if I don't have a safe place to fall then I won't be able to help others either and that's is the worst thing of all.

A lifetime of abuse gives birth to an adovacate b Amanda Kimble

Her mother's boyfriend

The abuse began when she was just a toddler, only four years old. She was thrown into a non-traditional relationship following her parents' separation. "My mother and I lived with a couple, a man and his wife. My mother was their girlfriend," Toni said. Almost as quickly as they moved into the home, the terror began. The man sexually abused her and his wife beat the young girl. "The physical abuse was frequent, the sexual abuse was nightly," Toni said. The abuse spanned six years and nobody, not even her mother knew. In addition to living in the shadows of abuse, she was caring for her ailing mother, who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Until she was nine, she cooked for her mother, fed her and bathed her daily And, every night, the monster would enter her room. "My mom was so sick, I couldn't tell her," Toni said. The first abuser was a military man and the family was always on the move. Looking back, Toni said it seemed every time a light would begin to shine into the dark reality of her life, he was relocated to another post. There was the time in Washington when Child Protective Services was called after the children were bathed in scalding hot water and there was another incident in Austin that raised eyebrows. "I don't remember why CPS came in Austin," Toni said. "But there was never any follow through." Toni admits she never made a cry for help. "Kids don't know how things work, how things are supposed to be," Toni said. "I remember being terrified. I was afraid if I told, I would pay the price." Her terror grew the day she watched her mother die. "I realized I was there alone, with no escape, trapped with those people," Toni said. But help arrived a week later when her father, with whom she had little interaction with over the years, arrived to take her away. It wasn't until later that Toni discovered the couple's two younger children were also abused. Neither of the abusers faced justice for their crimes. "When I was 14, I got a letter. It said the man had committed suicide. I was angry I never had a chance to confront him, that he never had to face justice," Toni said. "At the same time, he would never get a chance to hurt anyone else." In 2001, she was informed the woman was very ill and was being cared for by her daughter.

The Cinderella Years

Although her father arrived to take her out of hell, she said, "I always felt, always knew I wasn't wanted." She moved in with her dad and his wife. "My stepmother always told me they were going to send me away." Toni said. "She would always say I looked and acted like my mother, and she had a real problem with that. She was very emotionally abusive." But the "wicked stepmother" did have a purpose for the girl. She quickly became the caretaker of her younger half siblings and her list of chores grew daily. "I never had the opportunity to be a kid," she said. "Do your chores," she would always say. I felt like Cinderella."

When her father and stepmother separated, the abuse turned into neglect. Her father started dating, was rarely home and left Toni and her sister alone. "There were no groceries at the house. I ate at a friend's house or ate whatever I could find," Toni said. "He was taking my social security check and spending the money on women and partying. He wasn't even paying the bills." Soon her dad was married again and ready to move his daughters in with their new mom. Toni had already found ways to cope and methods for making money. "I was selling and doing drugs, whatever I had to do," Toni said.

One day, at 16 her life took a turn when she walked in on her stepmom beating her step sister - she had enough. The teen soon found herself confessing the truth about drug sales and use and her father's neglect to a court appointed advocate. The truth about the prior abuse never came out.

"I told Brown County Judge Ray West that nobody was taking care of me," Toni said "He asked me what I would do if he emancipated me and declared me an adult." she said she would straighten out her life,, complete her education, continue working and get a roommate. The emancipation was granted and the teen worked to make a life of her own, on her own terms.

The Stranger

Toni now admits her choice in roommates was a bad one. she moved in with an older friend, a woman in her 40s. "I sold drugs to her," Toni admitted. "That was how we met."

Although Toni was ready to leave drugs behind, the roommate was a frequent user and had men in and out of the home. "I woke up one night and one of those men had come into my room.. He was on top of me," Toni said. "I got up and said, "this is enough. I have to get control of my life. I have got to find a good situation, a safe place for me to live and survive." And that safe place wasn't hard to find.

"I was dating a boy, whose mother Karen Deal (of Brownwood) has to be an angel. She moved me into their home and I lived with them until I was 18." It was her haven and is still a safe place when times are tough. "That is where I go on Christmas," she said. "Karen is who I call on when things are bad."

Her Husband

Toni moved to Stephenville in 1996, quit dealing and doing drugs. About three years later she met the man who would become her husband. "He was very attentive. We traveled, went places. He would show up with flowers for no reason. He would bring full meals to me when I was on my 30 minute lunch break," Toni said.

It was the little things that convinced her she had met Mr. Right. Still cautious, she decided they should move in together to "test the waters". After about two years, they were married and Toni had her hands full. "I was working on my bachelor's degree, had a full time job and we were running a business," she said. But soon the light began to fade.

"I started noticing that something was wrong," Toni said. She soon discovered her husband was doing drugs, something she said she never suspected. "I was too busy trying to be a normal person and live a normal life and I trusted him completely I needed to trust him, he was the only person I had, outside of Karen," she said. But the situation continued to get worse. Her husband was failing to show up at job sites. he wouldn't answer her calls, she began asking questions and when she demanded answers, he became abusive. She turned to law enforcement for help.

The couple had purchased a home in Lingleville and moved their storefront to the proeprty. In the final days of their relationship, she said there were daily confrontations as she fought to keep everything she had worked to achieve. "through it all, I saved the business. The house was in my name. I had worked my entire life to not worry about my next meal and a roof over my head," Toni said. "Maybe I shoudl have left, but I was not willing to let go of it all."

Sheriff's deputies visited the property frequently. "He could have killed me," Toni said. "The cops would tell me to go to a shelter. I was not going to lose it all, so I refused to leave." Finally, Toni went to Cross Timbers Family Services and found a friend at the agency, Beth. She eventually sought the assistance of an attorney and obtained a restraining order, which kept him out of the house but allowed him to visit the business - just feet from the home. "The restraining order enraged him. He came to house with two shotguns and stood outside the house screaming." Toni said. "I picked up the phone and dialed 911. He ripped the wiring off of the house, so I reached for my cell phone." She said after waiting on law enforcement for an hour, she grabbed her handgun. Moments later she saw two patrol cars approach. Deputies disarmed her busband. She said he was not taken to jail. She finally decided to leave town while the divorce was "being ironed out." Eventually the house was hers and "just two days later it went up in flames" she suspected it was no accident.

Healing

Finally, at 33 she has started to heal. Although they still hurt the physical and emotional wounds have finally scabbed over, but the scars are still visible. The neglect of her father has faded into disappointment. While the memories are fragmented and certain events of those dreadful days have been shoved into the deepest recesses of her mind, she has found the strength to resurrect the demons and face them head on.

"I blocked the childhood memories for so long," Toni said. "But I have finally started to piece those years back together." Just five years into the healing process, she said, "There is no way I have grown, or healed enough."

Toni recently started volunteering at Cross Timbers Family Services. She shares her story and hope with other women and children faced with similar horrors. "I was suicidal before I reached out, but I decided I could not kill myself. I could not let those circumstances destroy me," Toni said. "It is important that other victims know they are not alone. There are places for you to go, people for you to turn to." Toni admits she will never have children of her own, although she loves kids. "I have struggled so hard to take care of myself I don't think I could live up to the responsibility of taking care of a child and being a good mother," she said. "I have a fear of making a child feel the way I felt. In my mind, those uncertainties are not worth the risk." still she has moved on. Toni owns her own business, is working on her master's degree and will continnue to heal and offer that same hope to others.