Mommy Dearest...

"Mother knows best"

Right? I mean, isn't your mother supposed to be your 'role model'? Isn't she supposed to set the bar for what you're supposed to be as an adult?

My mother was 20 when she had me.  She was young and single and hurt.  My grandmother provided a place to live to ensure my safety. When my mother met my step father I was 5 years old.  We went and lived with him in Hollywood in some ghetto studio apartment and from that day forward my life would change forever.

My grandmother's house was a safe haven. A place where meals were finished when I was full; colors I wore were an expression of my creativity and I was spoken to like an adult.  When I was afraid I would go sleep with my mother or my grandmother because it felt safe to not be alone.   When we left, I was forced to finish meals, I was told I had to wait to drink water til my meal was done so I wouldn't get "tool full". It was agonizing to swallow to some foods with a dry mouth.

My mom and I tried to live in our own apartment and the first night we spent the night there was a drive by shooting which shot up our entire top floor to the complex.  [it was two stories; we lived down stairs]  She woke me from sleep and threw me on the ground and covered me.  I thought I had done something wrong because when I tried to get up she yelled at me.

When we moved to Hollywood, I told her I wanted to sleep with her because it was a new place with a new man in it I didn't know.. and he told me to sleep on the couch and HE slept with my mom.  After being there for a few months I woke up to them having sex on the couch that was across from the one I slept on and hated her for letting him do that to her.

My mom worked a lot during this time and usually I would be safe with grandma or in school.. but at this time she would leave me with him and his other male room mate who both were 22 and annoyed by my open mouthed opinions and ability to stick up for myself.  One time I was talking back to him he dunked my head in the toilet and then lied to mother when I told her what happened. She believed him.  We went to the movies one day and he told me we were going to see Snow White, but really went and saw Menace II Society in theaters. I knew the movies had bad parts so I closed my eyes the whole time.  I hated him.  I began to show abandonment issues at this time and began hoarding and hiding trash from the bathroom and trash from the kitchen so as to save things we could use later.  One day he went through all my things and threw away what ever HE thought was trash and I screamed and cried the whole time. I was devastated.  Those were MY things.

We went to the mall once.  I felt someone touch my butt. Right at the bottom where your butt touches your naughty parts. I turned around and said HEY! You touched my butt! and he said," I thought you were your mother."  Those words haunted me until I was 11 and I eventually blocked this and, the fact that I'd occasionally wake up with out panties on, out of my memory.

When I was 6 we moved to Pasadena and my brother was born.  When he was 3 or 4 months old my mother was working again and so was my step dad.  We had an old man living with us that was a friend of his family.  He took this gentleman somewhere and left me alone with my new brother.  My bother woke up and began screaming.  I had no idea how to make a bottle. I had no idea how to take care of baby. I was so scared.  I figured out how to call my mom at work and she came home mad at my step dad.  I still felt responsible because I didn't know how to make a bottle. I should have watched her better.

We moved to another house when I was 7. We had a cousin move there too.  He hit her there.  He smacked her.  They would argue a lot. even in Hollywood.  He hit her in Hollywood too. She hit him too.  But this time, when I was 7, it pissed off our cousin, who I loved dearly and he moved.  When I was 8 we moved to another house in Pasadena.  This is when my life was different forever.   I began going on stupid auditions because they were all in "the business".  They would make me act out scripts and then laugh at my Spanish.. because I was never taught.  I felt alone a lot.  We had nannies since I was 6 and my brother was born.  I watched our nanny keep my brother's head under water too long when she would give him baths and I never told anyone because I liked that she taught me how to cook and how to iron my clothes and didn't want to get her in trouble.  One day we came home from some place [ I forgot where or what we were doing]  and they were arguing in front of me.  He threw a hand towel at her face and raised his hand to her and I lunged onto him and beat his face and scratched him.  He took me into the bedroom, threw me against the wall in the corner and hit my face so hard he split my cheek open.  I wasn't allowed to go to school for 2 days because my mother was afraid of the school reporting it.  This was the beginning......

She got mad at me for attacking him ...



I can't keep going right now.... I'm numb.