The refrain to viciously "go to Social Services" had been constant since this all started. I had thought in the beginning it was just the regular response cops made when going initially on a call. I was finding out this was not what they were doing at all. Social Services was seen as derogatory sarcasm by every officer I came in contact with and by this point it was just about the whole department at the Amsterdam Police Station that also included Montgomery County Sheriffs, Fulton County Sheriffs, and the State Police. Why did all these men hate me? What had I done to any of them? I was not a criminal, had not been involved with any of them, and tried to avoid being in trouble at all costs. I hated the kinds of trouble my mother loved to be involved with and had the cops around often when I was a girl.
"You can't sleep here, it's private property," the Sheriff said as I sat in the Walmart plaza. I had been sleeping there since Thursday of the July 4th weekend. I fled the abandoned porch on Market Street after it became a joke there to the men that hung around Stewarts to call me a Prostitute and try to get me to "rent a room in their house" or have sex with them for things like a shower or $20, it had gotten violent by the time I left.
A nice guy just drove by and gave me a Burger King chicken sandwich—it was delicious. I was hesitant, but was hungry and ate it, grateful once again for the kindness of strangers. I had been eating at McDonald's down below and had been very grateful, but the last week I felt like something was very wrong and had been told by someone passing by they were making me sick on purpose. I had already had one order of chicken McNuggets come back with just a container of mayonnaise in it and the last week I was there had gotten so sick I thought my stomach would burn out of my body. It felt like it was literally on fire and I was throwing up each time I ate there.
I told the manager on staff and she said it was "possibly just an accident," I hoped so too. I didn't want trouble and loved I could get to use the WiFi, get a charge for my iPhone and write. It was the only place close by to get a charge on my iPhone. I told her two older men were in the lobby on a regular basis telling people the "service wasn't that good anymore." I also knew it was more than that and these two were constantly talking about sex and being obnoxious. When I didn't talk to them anymore because it was getting excessive they got angry making up a lie that I saw them and refused to speak to them. I had explained I didn't see that well now because I didn't have my contacts and was wearing just one old one sometimes, but it didn't stop their ugliness. I knew some of the sex talk was about me being a "working girl," as if my suitcase suggested that instead of the professional I was and still am. I had used the Liz Claiborne suitcase to travel for the last job I had as a Communications Manager and was all I had left, but comments were made in a suggestive way when I first got there by these men that this was not what I was doing—that was not my "work!"
I had started to trust again after the kind people at Walmart, it's always the people with so little that give so much. I made a list of everything people had given and I wanted to use what they gave me to continue my online business with a new emphasis on raising awareness about Sexual Assault and Homelessness. I was now seeing that Human Trafficking was another painful part of this ordeal I had to come to terms with.
I knew some of them were not genuine. I had people coming out of the place a door away saying they had just eaten, had leftovers, and wanted to give them to me. It reminded me of the way my mother had treated me and I knew it was being done on purpose. The way they acted and the way the food was given to me. She seemed to have these kinds of people everywhere causing all kinds of trouble. They were slumlords I rented from, neighbors, and various others she bragged about from work, court, and now the police department. She was even bragging now about Judges she knew. How was my mother doing this?
I was now angry she continued this and devastated the way she really thought about dogs. I was finally getting in touch with my anger as the lies continued to unravel. Dogs are wonderful companion animals and the cruelty I saw with the way she treated her dogs and her refusals to get my dog "Bentley," but then name her son's wife's daughter's son after him was hard to understand. He is a sweet boy, the most wonderful baby I have ever taken care of, but I was told the name he was given was done on purpose. It would be like my mother to do something so cruel, but I would never take anything out on the little boy Bentley like she did with me. She blamed me continuously for her life and would beat me often with rage over my father and grandmother. I know now she wanted to hurt me over my dog Bentley, knowing he would be taken and I would have to interact with this little boy Bentley—it was so cruel. I had watched repeatedly her women friends as a girl, myself included abuse, one child, over another because that child was by a different father. All her friends talked about and bullied me as a girl too. She gossiped with them about me all the time making up things about me I never did. It was the same about her own mother. She talked viciously about my grandmother all the time. I hadn't quite fully come to terms with this in my own life or the horrible extent of the lies and deceit.
Bentley is not related to my mother or my 1/2 brother according to them, but they play games all the time as my mother did to me and still does about my family. I hope Social Services keeps an eye on what is going on. I don't know if his mother knows, last time we talked I tried to ask her if she knew my 1/2 brother was not her father, but she got visibly upset. My mother loves to play these games about how people are related, which is cruel and dangerous. Her son, my 1/2 brother married a Special needs woman who had an affair and had a daughter. My 1/2 brother and she stayed together and raised her and the other daughter they had. They eventually could not raise these two girls and my mother got custody. There were awful fights around that time between all of them but seems no one has any therapy or help from Social Services that is around all the time but does nothing; basic skills, like cleaning, and other simple things aren't checked on. A simple perusal of the rancid food in the house should be enough to know something is wrong. The food she serves is often rancid and old either in the freezer too long or left out too long and other bizarre things she does with food.
He already has what seems to be an irritable bowl and his stool is like rocks. I watched him a couple of months when I stayed there and he was rarely given water by my mother. She told me, he "won't take water," which was a lie. When I had him he was so thirsty and would gulp down water every time I had him. He never cried and we had gotten into a lovely rhythm. I felt sad I didn't have children and Bentley was such a good baby for me those couple of months I stayed there. I had not seen my mother in 20yrs, my 1/2 sister remarked "she was now filthy!" I always cleaned and did all the chores as a girl, she was messy and could be dirty, but filthy?
My sister was right, the house was a horrible mess. The makeshift room she made in the garage I stayed in made me physically ill and the cellar had such odors I thought I was going to expire from the lack of oxygen. I had made a video one day of her violence and refusal to let me open the door. The room had no ventilation and she would yell to open the small window she put in. The small indows connected to the other room on the other side, but the urine and feces smell from either old diapers or the used dirty things in there prevented me from opening the windows. She denied any of these smells. The Fire Department had been there pumping out the basement, she is friends with them too and attacked me when I asked why they were doing this. Where was her septic? She didn't know. I had replaced the one at my Lakehouse and knew something was very wrong with hers. The toilet was always plugged up and the cellar was always flooded. She denied all of this and slammed by the door each morning saying she had to "sump pump the cellar!"
The food was disgusting and she was hoarding such disgusting dirty used things it was hard to tell where she was getting all this stuff. She told me people just "gave her things," but so much of it was dirty and disgusting. Even her car was a menace. She bragged about how it was new but told me all the things the kids had broken. Nothing worked and it was dangerous to drive stuffed with all kinds of awful dirty debris.
With my mother, he cried all the time. I asked one day it had gotten so bad what was wrong, "my god is he okay?" I asked. I started to see how she was abusive with food with Bentley also. She told her son's daughter to put two diapers on him when she went out "Western Dancing," which resulted in a rash. She would often take him and her other ex-boyfriend would take him on weekends so his "mother could have some fun." I wasn't comfortable with her ex-boyfriend taking him all the time either. He had been around when she supposedly had sex with my ex-husband and had left him, but they were still kinda together and she told me they might get back together. I was seeing he was just as bad and had lied to me when he stopped at my Lake home one Memorial Day weekend I had invited everyone and they all refused. He told me "my mother didn't want the girls to visit me." I had no idea why and he refused to really tell me saying in that cryptic way they all talk, "well you know how your mother is about drinking." I thought he meant my ex-husband who drank on the weekends, but I was to learn it was not the drinking, my 1/2 brother had "keg parties," all the time. It was the insinuation that they didn't want their kids around me. This was all part of the ongoing gaslighting that had started as soon as I married about me not having children, but it was not the real reason they did this I was to see.
I told her I would never do that when she tried to ask me why he had a rash. I told her probably wearing two diapers all day while my mother refused to change him was probably the reason, but she didn't like my answer and wanted to blame me along with asking why he "touched himself all the time." I didn't see that, but after she bragged about calling Child Protective Services (CPS) on people and being charged, I knew I better not babysit anymore and told her in an email I could no longer babysit. My 1/2 sister told me that she had upwards of six calls and maybe more about people and these could be felonies. She laughed about it and said she "just liked to do it" the day after I sent her an email saying I could no longer babysit. Women were showing up as I had done to ask her and my mother questions and my mother told them to "leave she would call the Sheriffs!" I could hear the anguish in their voices in the same way mine had been when I tried to talk to her after 20yrs and she had me arrested for trespassing!
By that time the cruelty was reminding me of how she was when I was a girl and I was horrified to see her now doing the same to this sweet little boy they named Bentley. I know that was part of the sick, sadistic fun she had planned all along. I saw her leave him in the driveway and then leave. When I went out to get him, she told me the "neighbor next door would watch him!" I watched in horror thinking how quickly a truck could pull into the driveway and run him over. She was doing other abusive dangerous things to me and him.
Social Services had been coming often, but of course, nothing was done. They saw me confined in the garage but said nothing. They didn't even ask my name when I would answer the door they knocked on. It had been the same when I was a girl. They came all the time but said nothing to me. Nothing about her constant, unrelenting abuse. I knew never to say anything, her threats started very young and continued until she threw me out at 17 after I was accepted to college. She raged and hit me often demanding to know who I thought I was going to college. "Miss high and mighty!" she would yell and get everyone in the house to go along. She would often throw whatever was available often saying she loved knives the best. She would often throw nails, hammers, glass ashtrays—whatever she could grab.
There were dogs in cages they ignored and the other dogs had went to the Vet because they were fighting also, but I came to see it was her. The dogs were gentle and kind when I was with them and as soon as she came home I would hear them fighting and it was awful. I knew she did it on purpose now and my dog Bentley did not feel comfortable around her either. He loved everyone, but when she came by he would bark at her. I know it's why she made up some story about trying to get him when they violently took him from me, but I knew it was a lie. She blamed the abuse on my 1/2 sister's daughter and said she had locked the one in a cage all his life and that's why he attacked the others. After I got to know the dog, I knew this was another lie. She probably did lock him in a cage, but he was not the one getting them fighting—she was! The grief and sorrow were piling up as the lies continued to unravel.
I was told to go to Social Services at 9am and see a "Kim," but when I got there they acted like they had no idea what I was talking about. The room was empty and not at all like the offices I went to as a little girl that was often crowded with women all day long and their children waiting hours to see someone. I had to once again fill out the long-form they give you. I explained I filled one out in Gloversville and they had told me to wait in the parking lot for a "telephone interview." You have to fill out a new one if it's a different county, the woman at the check-in said. It had been a sunny day in Gloversville NY and I didn't question it, but after they accused me of not showing up—I knew it was being done deliberately.
Again, there had been no one there and the woman was sarcastic and abusive telling me that I had money. I told her about my $700 per month alimony and that I would pay rent and was trying to get a job, but without my car getting a professional job here was impossible. I had applied numerous times over the years for jobs I was more than qualified for, but would not get. They would give me these long interviews and then laugh and joke about it. Once in a while, I got a job, only to be bullied out of it like the recent School District job. The problems were not about money per say, but the ongoing violence and stalking by my ex-husband and mother that caused trouble at every apartment I tried to rent after I was violently removed from all the properties we had together and told "nothing was mine," and that I needed to "go to a Homeless Shelter!"
I saw the same young woman after I was forced violently out of my home on 3 Evelyn Street in Amsterdam NY after the cops were there repeatedly allowing my then-husband and his friends he got to rent the downstairs to do constant damage to the apartment. I went through all the damage with one Black officer that would refuse to take a report and then when I was beaten up and robbed on Arnold Avenue refuse to investigate that insinuating I was violent and he didn't know what to tell me about my iPhone, credit card and license other than to "go to a pawn shop and look," and "call the Bank for a new Debit card." The damage to the downstairs was severe and ongoing and the Cop that had sexually assaulted me was there all the time telling me "nothing was mine!"
They were there so many times, I lost count. One time busting in the door and telling me I was "agitated and crazy." I was put in handcuffs and forced to have a psych eval shortly after. They took me to Hutchins in Syracuse NY for a 72hr eval and I told them repeatedly I had been sexually assaulted and the victim of ongoing Domestic Abuse, but the psychologist kept telling me I would have to go to a Homeless Shelter. I was then a short time later violently put on the street by a City Court Judge that had been a Divorce Lawyer and shared an office building with our Financial Planner we had all the years of our 20yr marriage that recently threatened to arrest me for asking for copies of our income taxes. My BIL and then-husband had removed all our legal documents from the house. I didn't even have my car insurance policy and I repeatedly called our Insurance man about that who also threatened to have me arrested and then took me unknowingly off the policy we had for 20yrs together. The cops then took my new car, arresting me and charging me with having no insurance then refusing to give me any information about it.
One of the tenants that were renting the downstairs apartment in our home on 3 Evelyn Street worked at the Library and it was becoming an ongoing joke. One of our other tenants was the Director of the Library and I was told I could ask her to help me get a job by one of the Family Court Judges I went to after going to Catholic Charities for help—I was now sleeping in my car, the divorce hadn't even started! They told me they couldn't help me because I "didn't have children." I was trying initially to get some of my own money. My then-husband had deceived me about controlling the money through one account, which he ended up using as his personal one. We had no joint accounts, I was told repeatedly this didn't matter. There had been numerous lawyers involved in our Estate that included my inlaws, but I was to find out it was all planned and none of them had been looking out for my interests even after I complained numerous times throughout the marriage and was told "everything was fine" and that it was all 50/50—we were married!
I sat before this young woman again, telling her my story again as I had when I had been violently removed from my home and cops told me I had "to go to Social Services!" after they had arrested me for being "paranoid," when I tried to tell them what my then-husband and his friends were doing downstairs. I had no idea why. Why would I have to go to Social Services? "I had single women as clients," she said when I worked for Catholic Charities, and "I never turned anyone away." I could tell the games were starting again. She wasn't very friendly and treated me with suspicion. I told her this was welfare fraud by my ex-husband and mother that continue to deny me assets along with cops at the police station that think it's funny to force me once again on Welfare. She treated me as if I was lying and after a brief time told me she had a list of "rooms to rent," but that was about all. I could go to the City Mission in Albany NY!
In Gloversville, the woman on the "Telephone Interview," sarcastically remarked, "What do you think? we don't have "lists of landlords you can rent from!" She implied I was an idiot. I told her I had been a landlord for over 20yrs, but she talked to me as if I was lying and treated me like I was 12yrs old. I also explained the numerous violent evictions that were now making it impossible to rent anything; my destroyed credit, no job, car, and all the arrests, but she just kept repeating the same one-liners that seemed rehearsed, basically telling me to get lost. The parking lot was empty except for staff and there was no one waiting. I wasn't sure why she had no time to even explain what "SNAP," was—I had no idea.
I felt humiliated and degraded once again and I had tried all along to do what these people asked. Filling out yet again forms about Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault and being told there is help was triggering in ways I knew was getting me exhausted and weak again. I didn't want to go into shock again. The seizure I had suffered made my physical health very poor as did the constant anxiety about where I was going to sleep. My mother's rages flooding my mind remembering being told my entire childhood to "get out," the "door swings both ways," if you don't like it. Not liking it was basic things a little girl would ask for; things about school or homework or playing. She refused to do anything with me, often yelling that "she was NOT a PTA mother!"
I swore to myself I would never be on Welfare again. I loved children but knew I had no help or money so having them was out of the question. I survived by telling myself if I worked really hard I could support myself and be okay. I loved the idea it was more acceptable for women to work when I entered college and women could now have careers. I was desperate to leave and be away from the abuse. My grandmother told me all the time to make sure I went to college, to "save my pennies" and things would work out. She loved to learn and would remark at my being able to spell and use words she had no idea about and would ask what they meant. My mother hated the idea of college often accusing me of thinking I was so smart. When I met my new inlaws I should of not ignored the red flag when my MIL told me I used big words and I should stop!
I loved learning and school, but my classmates were cruel and threatened me all the time. I was often bullied and called out to fight. I hated to fight, often spending weeks taking alternate routes to walk home until finally the girl that tormented me I was face to face with. One tough girl is a Trooper today. I thought she had finally been decent when I first met my ex-husband and we went to another friends wedding, but it seems she had always been a bully and still is, but when I confronted her as a girl she backed down and told me "she had no problem with me." She is friends with all of them and it was the basic response whenever I confronted them, but they still kept up the torment because they always had their group. I just never knew how deep the hatred and how violence gets worse over time. How their judgments about "family," were always used to condemn.
One Judge even viciously dismissed me by saying if "your own mother doesn't like you, it must be you!" My mother loved to use the idea of motherhood to get sympathy from people and did the same to me. Often crying about how hard her life was, how she always had nothing and how I and my father were the cause of destroying her life. I believed all these lies as a girl, but once I started to refute the lies the entire story fell apart. It was never him that was the abuser, it was her. She had gotten pregnant deliberately to either sell me or destroy him—she ended up doing both.
She loved all the Welfare problems. I could never figure out why as a little girl. My grandmother told me my mother was spoiled and today I know it was true. My great grandparents were well-off and it contributed to my mother's blaze attitude about not caring about anything. She would often parody the Doris Day tune "Que Sera, Sera," Whatever will be will be. When I was a girl, the song goes my mother would say to me...
It was the same for me, my mother would say the same, but as the years went by her words would cut me to shreds in pain. She would barge in my room and just destroy things. "It's all in the past," she would laugh—Que Sera, Sera! It became her retort for all the pain she inflicted. Just forget it she would say, it's all in the past. You like to dwell on things and don't let them go, she would go on. Something could happen a few minutes ago and I would be commanded to let it go. "Why do you always bring up the past," she would say then sing Que Sera, Sera! I could never get a straight answer about anything or any information to make any decisions or to know the truth.
This was her retort for everything. Moving constantly, not having things I needed, her not wanting to help me, her beating, drug use, boyfriends, and constant bullying—it was always no big deal, in the past! I thought as a girl it was a way to let go of the pain. I felt sorry her things would be destroyed, but I came to see she did it on purpose. My grandmother was always there for her and my mother moved through life like a whirlwind doing whatever she pleased and not caring. Cops were called often, but they loved her and my grandmother.
They were always around like bees to honey with my grandmother when she was the manager at Stewarts and often wanted to date her, but my grandmother had only been with my grandfather. My mother was another story, even bragging recently about the cop that sexually assaulted me "would never arrest her!" and that if "she had orgasms, her and he would hook up!" as she giggled like a schoolgirl. I was often embarrassed when she talked this way and didn't want to listen to her sex life. At the time, I didn't know she had sex with my ex-husband before all this started now bragging when I finally found out she was a MILF!—what the fuck I thought? She pretended she hated sex and would rage about my father wanting her to wear lingerie when I was a girl. I often wondered why this was so awful. It seemed he loved her and it sounded sweet, but I was to learn this was a lie. I was the one that was scared to death of cops! I hadn't realized until recently when dealing with being arrested so often and going into shock and old pain that I thought had long ago been gone.
I didn't realize until recently I was one of those kids that were told the cops would take me to the children's home and come and get me! She was often flirtatious and seductive with them. I had put it in the past, I had let it all go and moved on. I didn't realize until recently how horrible this was and how often I was left places her boyfriends would pick me up to get a ride home—she was too busy! She pretended she would not return and pick me up, but what was even more horrible was the corrupt cops that were friends with my mother that now we're going to do just that. Only now it was a psych ward, jail, and confinement as some kind of "incompetent," she told everyone I was. She had set it all up a long time ago with her boyfriend's family, my ex-husband, and his friends and was now openly bragging about cops, sheriffs, and judges she knew. I sat in horror thinking and writing how long she had gotten away with doing this to me and I was finally learning the truth. The words and stories tumbling forth as my muse once again was helping me heal and move forward as I had done when I first married and learned to Journal, trying to understand the often bizarre things that went on.
copy of original iPhoneography from Art collections stolen.
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