My head still hurts from my mother hitting me in the head with the door. I have no lock on the door so it made it hard to just close it when she started to rage about me being here. I had asked her to leave, there was no point in talking about anything anymore. Whenever I tried to talk to her it ended up the same way. This had always been the relationship I had with her and this time was no different, but unlike the other times my ability to live my life was becoming next to impossible and she seemed to know all about what was going on but was continually doing as she always did with these cryptic one-liners that prevented me from understanding what was going on—something she had always done.
"Just let it all go," she kept saying, something she had always said to me as a child too. Only now we weren't talking about things she denied me as a child or allowed the kids she babysat to break or the myriad of times she blamed me for things that were never my fault. This time we were talking about the property I had worked on over 20yrs—my home and also vacation property. My brand new car that rightfully belonged to me, even personal belongings were gone, including portfolios to get a professional job and all the work and equipment from a business I recently started. None of this seemed to move her to any sort of compassion. My dog was even taken and she acted like this was no big deal either. I was beside myself but knew that asking her anything would get another one of her fists in my face, which I was trying to avoid as she was continually calling the sheriffs telling them I was violent and incompetent. It all was so over the top even for her.
It had been so long since I had seen her, 20yrs since I had gotten married, and was told she wanted nothing to do with my wedding even though she eventually agreed to come and then shortly after told me in no uncertain terms, "if she ever saw me again, never would be too soon!" It was Christmas and she had written this note and left it in the bag with two Sconces she gave me when I went to invite her to the Christmas dinner I was having. I was shocked and after that didn't see her. I was told she moved and didn't want me to know where she lived. I had no idea why, but she had been playing these vicious games for so long I had come to accept them as normal. Her current boyfriend stopped by one Memorial day weekend to tell me she refused another invitation. He stopped by insinuating she didn't want her granddaughters at our vacation property. I thought it was because my ex drank, but I was to learn it was never about his drinking. That the allegations from her and the rest of her old boyfriend's family were about me.
So much sorrow lately as I tried to process what has been done to me and what has been going on. I know it will be next to impossible to get a job here. "Why did you come back here," she viciously said. I struggled to understand where was it that I was supposed to go after everything in my life had been viciously taken. She seemed to always be involved lately and to show up periodically making these outrageous claims about my marriage and what belonged to me. Why was she involved in my marriage and especially my finances?
So much sorrow lately as I tried to process what has been done to me and what has been going on. I know it will be next to impossible to get a job here. "Why did you come back here," she viciously said. I struggled to understand where was it that I was supposed to go after everything in my life had been viciously taken. She seemed to always be involved lately and to show up periodically making these outrageous claims about my marriage and what belonged to me. Why was she involved in my marriage and especially my finances?
I knew she had some idea of what was going on, but she was being her usual cryptic self whenever I asked her anything. I hadn't seen her in 20yrs and knew better than to ever call and ask her for help and after all these years I never did, but there was just too much going on and she always seemed to show up lately knowing something and thinking somehow it was a joke, like when she told me my ex would have all the tenants now. I sat dumbfounded wondering why she thought my ex would be getting all the properties we worked equally together on the past 20yrs. The rental business we agreed would be our retirement. The rentals my mother-in-law promised for all the times they gave me nothing at Christmas, but gave my sister-n-law lots of babysitting, gifts, and help. Telling me all the time that she got hers all these years and you'll have rental income later on.
"That was a long time ago," when I asked her about getting a pizza when I got there and wanting one from Bottistie's pizzeria. Her and her boyfriend Fred used to get pizza from there. I loved their pizza and loved it cold too. I was going to treat everyone but knew better than to ask anymore. It was just another odd interaction between us that was regularly occurring.
"Go walk the streets," she said in that breezy way she could deliver something so awful but make it seem like it was perfectly fine. I remembered that voice as a little girl and dreaded it. I knew it was going to be something awful, something I had no control over and she would pretend it was no big deal and I needed to deal with it. If I did try and ask for her help she would start in about how I lived in the past and could not just let things go. Letting go was usually something that I liked, something nice, or something I needed. I was always letting go of things as a child. Standing before her now left me reeling as I struggled to understand how she was telling me to let go of things that were mine once again, only now I was an adult. I had thought I had been so far away from this kind of horrible way she made me feel—weak, pathetic, disempowered, groveling in some sick way to understand. I was also starting to see how my ex was very similar, but I was sure my assets were mine. I had no idea about economic abuse or the gaslighting that they all employed to destroy 20yrs of my life's work.
I couldn't speak as she hurled around and I thought she was going to strike me as she waved her hand to gesture to the highway that ran alongside her house. I shuddered and started shaking. "Walk the streets?" I repeated mumbling the words catching in my throat. Old painful memories colliding with what she was saying only now I wasn't a little girl, but a grown woman, and she still somehow was wielding this horrible control over me—how did this happen? I started to feel dizzy and had to stop talking. I thought I was going to pass out again and was getting scared this was becoming a regular occurrence for me as she walked away. The constant insinuations that somehow I was or had been a prostitute were happening all the time now. My head would reel trying to make sense of what these people I hadn't seen in so long were saying. Years of her telling me to get out, years of her beatings and abuse colliding with my present reality—how could this be happening? How could this be happening when I did everything I could to have a home. A quiet, safe, paid-for home that I would never have to face her rage again. That I would never be continually terrified about being left on the street with no place to go. I had so many homes now fully believing I would never not have a home again, but I was horribly wrong.
I pleaded with her numerous times that I had no place to go after telling her how grateful I was that she allowed me to stay with her for a while until I got another apartment. "Well you should have stayed out there!" she said, whenever I said that I could not find housing in Syracuse, NY. I had been sent to Hutchins Psych ward after spending 4 months in jail awaiting a court date. I was charged with resisting arrest. It was all a bunch of lies like all the other arrests, but that didn't matter. I was only supposed to be there for 90 days, but it ended up being another 4 months. The assigned lawyer called me at the Jail telling me she had good news and she was sure I was ready to leave and could make that possible after being there for so long already, but when I finally went to court papers were shuffled and she and the Judge that accused me repeatedly of not understanding the proceedings, which was untrue, exchanged papers and I was escorted downstairs thinking I was to be released only to be told by the guard I was being sent somewhere else. I asked to speak to the lawyer that had been assigned, that there had to be some kind of mistake, but I was told she was gone and there was no mistake.
Because my apartment was cleaned out, I had no place to go home to. There was no formal eviction. The landlord just threw my things out on the porch and according to my mother acted as if this was perfectly normal to do to someone. My mother actually siding with the "landlady" because after all I "was not there and not paying rent!" my mother sneered. I was in jail for god sakes I thought. I had been a landlord 20yrs and would never do this to someone, but none of this mattered. My mother wasn't asking me what happened, she was telling me, demanding that I accept her version. I had no idea where it was all coming from and why they were all being so horrible to me.
After the landlord stole many of my things; the cable equipment, which cost me $100 for not returning, a $600.00 National Grid bill I had to pay and wasn't even there, and stealing just about all of my personal belongings and most heartbreaking of all my beloved dog "Bentley" was taken—I had no place to live. My mother knew that but as usual, she was too busy she said or acted as if I didn't understand, and if I asked too many questions she would get violent claiming I was starting with her. There seemed to be an ongoing attitude by everyone I tried to talk to that I just didn't understand, either that or they called the cops on me and refused to speak to me.
"It's in the past, let it all go!" Once again I was a little girl, and she had all this control again and if I said too much to her, she would punch me again in the face. She had already done that once and had also hurled herself on the ground claiming I pushed her down. Her violence had become much worse than when I was a girl. Pulling back her fist to hit me in the face was shocking, and surpassed the shoving around and hitting she did to me as a girl, but I had not seen her in so long. Horribly, I was realizing that I knew her even less now. The mother I remembered even more violent than the one from when I was a little girl—I didn't know her at all now. She seemed alien now so different to me, not like the mother I remembered, the one I usually felt sorry for. Now she seemed to deliberately want to be violent towards me. I was also now not trusting the sheriffs she kept calling repeatedly having these long private conversations about what went on and it seemed her lies were what they were writing up. "I know sheriffs," she said condescendingly. I had no idea what she meant or that she could lie to them and this is what she was doing—it was becoming one nightmare after another.
"That was a long time ago," when I asked her about getting a pizza when I got there and wanting one from Bottistie's pizzeria. Her and her boyfriend Fred used to get pizza from there. I loved their pizza and loved it cold too. I was going to treat everyone but knew better than to ask anymore. It was just another odd interaction between us that was regularly occurring.
"Your things are on the porch," when I called to try and get a hold of my mother to ask her about my apartment. I was told that I had no apartment after I was sent to the Psych Ward for "treatment." My apartment was cleaned out and I had no place to go. I sat in shock when the Doctor sneered at me and told me, another indication of my so-called illness was being unable to keep my apartment. There was no mention of this being another illegal eviction, which would by this time be the 11th. This was happening every couple of months since the Divorce started. I was thrown out of every apartment I tried to rent. All were illegal because I had no heat, paid close to $1200 each time to get an apartment, never got my security back, and evicted after a short time and called "incompetent," but I was still trying to piece it all together and my mother's violence was not helping. Why didn't she bail me out of Jail for the lousy $100?—nothing made sense. "Why don't you get along with your mother," the doctor kept asking even though I kept explaining, he refused to accept what I was saying as if they all had already decided.
"I don't want her to come home," my mother said to the doctors assigned to my case at the psych ward, my "treatment team." "I'm concerned about her violence, I have children in the house!" I sat listening in that surreal way I had come to expect from circumstances in my life lately. I was never violent with my mother or anyone else. I took her beatings my entire childhood and never once raised a hand to her. I struggled to understand why she was doing this and why would she be saying she would be concerned about children in the house. I sat thinking about her new great-grandchildren, one a premature little boy they named "Bentley." I was told when I was home last Summer for a short time that they didn't get the name from me. My dog was named Bentley and there had been ongoing problems and threats of him being taken, but it still hurt. I missed my dog Bentley and was still trying to find out where he was and to get him back. Being told I was the one who was a threat was another surreal experience, especially by my mother.
Because I didn't have an apartment then they could not release me. This is one of their rules to supposedly release you to a "safe place," but to me, it seemed that putting me out of my apartment and then telling me that they had no place for me to go and I would have to stay there was far more dangerous than helping me keep the apartment in the first place, but like so many other things I was to learn the hard way that people often stayed far longer than needed because they could "not find housing." I was already having a hard time. Day after day of their regimen was getting to me and that combined with the Medicine that I was forced to take was making it harder and harder to have hope I would be getting out of here anytime soon. My mother's involvement was also increasingly making me really upset. She was finally getting some kind of sadistic wish to twist everything around after all these years of her abuse. I told the doctor when I got here about her being involved, but he acted as if this was part of my alleged delusions. It felt like one of those psychological thriller movies I used to watch as a girl. I loved the old black and white movies and had even watched "Gaslighting," as a girl before we started recently using this word for the insidious kind of abuse it is, which is what she was now doing.
In the next few days, I would be filling out rental applications for various apartments around the area. I had hoped I could continue my career. My business had been destroyed when they stole all my personal belongings in storage. I had started to write more and that combined with my Communications experience and Graphic Design I figured I could at least get some kind of Administrative Assistant job, but again I was to be shocked at how precise the destruction to my life had been done. Most of the applications consisted of numerous questions about your rental history and your background check. I sat most days after learning my apartment was gone trying to go through what exactly my background was. It has been so long since I had looked at my background. It had been years since I struggled to overcome the obstacles as a child and arrive at a place where I had a pretty decent background. I spent years managing my credit so I had very good credit. Years spent learning computer software, going on interviews, building a career, owning and maintaining a home, vacation property, and managing a rental business that my ex-husband and I had built together. Years of being successful. To find that now my "background" was so awful that I was unable to even get an apartment was devastating.
As I tried to fill out the rental applications I realized in horror that my background was no longer the one I had 3 years ago. One morning as I went to the bathroom I realized my hair had just about all turned white. I hadn't really been looking too closely in the mirror. Most of the time I had to hurry in the bathroom. I was often exhausted. The Medicine I was on was making me extremely tired and I had an awful "drugged" feeling. I had objected numerous times to taking any "Meds," but with the threats of having to stay longer if I didn't "Cooperate," I relented and said I would cooperate and take what was prescribed—5MG of Risperidone. I was told the Risperidone was prescribed because of my "delusions" when I asked specifically what those were I was told delusions about my marriage, domestic violence, being sexually assaulted by a cop, thinking I was a professional, and believing my mother was involved with my ex-husband. The vicious Judge continually involved in this had sent me numerous times for a "psych eval," after each arrest which were adding up to close to about 12 in the last 4yrs. I explained I had been sexually assaulted by a cop, who now wrote up a long police report about me being "in and out of psych wards," making it seem all these evaluations were hospital stays, now culminating in some kind of history of psychological problems and making up sexual assaults. I had to agree to take the meds, the doctor kept insinuating I wasn’t cooperating and then I would have to stay longer. I agreed for a month and then got off them—it was awful. I had already passed out again fearful of another seizure. My diet also wasn’t good and I had lost a lot of weight.
"I don't want her to come home," my mother said to the doctors assigned to my case at the psych ward, my "treatment team." "I'm concerned about her violence, I have children in the house!" I sat listening in that surreal way I had come to expect from circumstances in my life lately. I was never violent with my mother or anyone else. I took her beatings my entire childhood and never once raised a hand to her. I struggled to understand why she was doing this and why would she be saying she would be concerned about children in the house. I sat thinking about her new great-grandchildren, one a premature little boy they named "Bentley." I was told when I was home last Summer for a short time that they didn't get the name from me. My dog was named Bentley and there had been ongoing problems and threats of him being taken, but it still hurt. I missed my dog Bentley and was still trying to find out where he was and to get him back. Being told I was the one who was a threat was another surreal experience, especially by my mother.
Because I didn't have an apartment then they could not release me. This is one of their rules to supposedly release you to a "safe place," but to me, it seemed that putting me out of my apartment and then telling me that they had no place for me to go and I would have to stay there was far more dangerous than helping me keep the apartment in the first place, but like so many other things I was to learn the hard way that people often stayed far longer than needed because they could "not find housing." I was already having a hard time. Day after day of their regimen was getting to me and that combined with the Medicine that I was forced to take was making it harder and harder to have hope I would be getting out of here anytime soon. My mother's involvement was also increasingly making me really upset. She was finally getting some kind of sadistic wish to twist everything around after all these years of her abuse. I told the doctor when I got here about her being involved, but he acted as if this was part of my alleged delusions. It felt like one of those psychological thriller movies I used to watch as a girl. I loved the old black and white movies and had even watched "Gaslighting," as a girl before we started recently using this word for the insidious kind of abuse it is, which is what she was now doing.
In the next few days, I would be filling out rental applications for various apartments around the area. I had hoped I could continue my career. My business had been destroyed when they stole all my personal belongings in storage. I had started to write more and that combined with my Communications experience and Graphic Design I figured I could at least get some kind of Administrative Assistant job, but again I was to be shocked at how precise the destruction to my life had been done. Most of the applications consisted of numerous questions about your rental history and your background check. I sat most days after learning my apartment was gone trying to go through what exactly my background was. It has been so long since I had looked at my background. It had been years since I struggled to overcome the obstacles as a child and arrive at a place where I had a pretty decent background. I spent years managing my credit so I had very good credit. Years spent learning computer software, going on interviews, building a career, owning and maintaining a home, vacation property, and managing a rental business that my ex-husband and I had built together. Years of being successful. To find that now my "background" was so awful that I was unable to even get an apartment was devastating.
As I tried to fill out the rental applications I realized in horror that my background was no longer the one I had 3 years ago. One morning as I went to the bathroom I realized my hair had just about all turned white. I hadn't really been looking too closely in the mirror. Most of the time I had to hurry in the bathroom. I was often exhausted. The Medicine I was on was making me extremely tired and I had an awful "drugged" feeling. I had objected numerous times to taking any "Meds," but with the threats of having to stay longer if I didn't "Cooperate," I relented and said I would cooperate and take what was prescribed—5MG of Risperidone. I was told the Risperidone was prescribed because of my "delusions" when I asked specifically what those were I was told delusions about my marriage, domestic violence, being sexually assaulted by a cop, thinking I was a professional, and believing my mother was involved with my ex-husband. The vicious Judge continually involved in this had sent me numerous times for a "psych eval," after each arrest which were adding up to close to about 12 in the last 4yrs. I explained I had been sexually assaulted by a cop, who now wrote up a long police report about me being "in and out of psych wards," making it seem all these evaluations were hospital stays, now culminating in some kind of history of psychological problems and making up sexual assaults. I had to agree to take the meds, the doctor kept insinuating I wasn’t cooperating and then I would have to stay longer. I agreed for a month and then got off them—it was awful. I had already passed out again fearful of another seizure. My diet also wasn’t good and I had lost a lot of weight.
As I struggled with all of this, the implication was that I was also a prostitute kept being insinuated and hurled at me along with being homeless and being told to go to a homeless shelter. If I questioned any of this I was dismissed, ignored, waved away in that way that made whatever I said irrelevant. It was frustrating and demoralizing, to say the least, especially meeting the prostitutes at the jail. All of them had no problem talking about times they were sexually assaulted, raped, or trying to overcome their addictions, which was primarily Coke and Heroin. Even the lingo they used was not something I knew and I would joke how I needed crib sheets to keep up with the definitions of words they used. All the women were prostitutes and had drug addictions. I was overwhelmed that my hometown had so many now. I had no problem with adults consenting, my problem was being forced. I was being forced on the street and told this was what I was now.
"That's how it's done," I was told. All your stuff is put out on the street and you have no place to go. "You need to get a pen pal," they told me, or a "sugar-pop!" I had no idea what either was but was told I could get lotion and other goodies from the commissary that a sugar pop or pen pal would give me. I had been denied commissary because I had no friends to help me, I had been robbed and assaulted before they jailed me so my debit card had been stolen and I heard nothing about that. Basically, I was being punished because I had no one to call for anything. At one point they all voted and told me no one cared about me or my dog. I had no idea, but as time went on the brother of the cop that sexually assaulted me worked as a guard and they all seemed to be friends. Being friendly with a guard got you "favors" and they all stuck together. Each time I went to ask about my case, my personal business, or any jail-related questions they all treated me the same way. It reminded me of high school and of course, a couple guards knew my mother and a few inmates told me she slept with my ex.
"I don't think that's true," I said nervously when I was told my mother had "fucked" my ex and it probably went on a few times. Many of the inmates were younger and I thought it just probably was some kind of joke about mothers we love to fuck or MILFs that I heard some women brag about, but with so many betrayals going on I knew I could not totally dismiss it. If you want to know what is going on and all the gossip—jail is the place. Everyone knew everything it seemed or maybe it was because I had been so isolated all these years as a sort of protection and privacy I was out of the loop, but now needed to understand what was going on. It seemed everyone knew my business.
"It's like a whore house here," I said. My jail friend laughed and said she didn't want to be "whored," me neither I said. She said I could run one, but I told her that I was thinking about advocacy, helping women—not starting a prostitution business. It seemed the way they were being treated was awful and certainly the way I was being forced into it. I was learning about forced prostitution and trafficking and the more I learned the more I was horrified that this is what had been done to me—my entire 20yr marriage was set up. I thought with all the girls here why was there a need for more? Why were these women struggling if things were so cool with prostitution? Why did the numerous Judges I was dragged in front of think this was all so funny?
Nothing made any sense, but I knew things had to change. I started writing grievances and knew I was onto something when ads were running about Bail Reform. I was told I was "crazy," and talking to the TV. I was sent to mental health numerous times, but each time I told them the same thing, and each time they did nothing about anything. The psych nurse at the jail also worked at the Hospital and was married to one of the psychologists that wrote up more lies about me. He was also the psychologist for my ex's mentally ill aunt I took care of for 20yrs, but Judges viciously told me that if "they had wanted to leave me something they would have!" I was incompetent, did nothing, and was a prostitute! I kept wondering what Third World hell I had been taken to without me knowing, certainly this wasn't the USA. Often I had no idea where I was going, cops and guards never tell you, laughing as if it's all a joke if you ask. Your just a bag of goods being transported somewhere and not a human being. I thought I was innocent until court, but that had no reality in jail. You're treated as if you're already a criminal and of course I was already a "mentally ill prostitute." Things were getting worse and worse, but I was getting nowhere asking questions. I was getting nowhere telling the truth. My life was some kind of joke to all these people and they were making up whatever they wanted, it was all so devastating and getting worse, like some kind of pre-planned slow-motion demolition of my life.
Comments