The Apple From The Tree On the Hill @elphess - Tumblr Blog

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Is there no salvation for a godless soul such as mine? Weeping in silence with no faith to save me. Ah, though I am godless I can feel the warmth of the earth and feel the love of the sky. Salvation is close; it is achieved by mine own hands. Work, hands. Work and reach that place of comfort and peace

#poetry #prose #prose poetry #writing #amwriting #faithless #godless #lonely

theartofanimation

mintyfreshmangos - http://www.mintymillie.com - https://twitter.com/mintyfreshmango - http://mintyfreshmangos.tumblr.com

theartofanimation

Rella - https://twitter.com/rellakinoko - http://rellaorz.lofter.com

theartofanimation

Paul Connor - http://ichigopaul23.tumblr.com - http://websta.me/n/ichigopaul28 - https://twitter.com/ichigopaul23 - http://ink361.com/app/users/ig-28292955/ichigopaul28/photos

Discourse

I couldn’t tell you when the end truly began. I don’t know when things absolutely dissolved in our house.

When I was 13 my mother told me that when she was pregnant with me, and told her parents that she was about to me an unwed single mother, my grandfather demanded she have an abortion. He did not want her to have me out of wedlock so his default was for her not to have me at all. Sometimes I think I was born out of spite; that she gave birth to me just to piss her father off.

When I was 13 I was also told that the reason my mother’s first marriage didn’t work out was because her sister, my aunt, slept with her husband. I was also called fat when I was 13 because I could not fit into a dress my mother had worn when she was 18.

While there were a lot of issues, I tried to keep out of the house. When I was 15 I started working as much as I could. Sometimes I had two or three jobs at a time. My final year of high school I worked three jobs and went to school full time. I managed to land on the honour roll and got a scholarship for university (which I promptly lost in my second semester). I lost a job because of my mother. I was cornered and yelled at in public in front of the post office in my town.

It was the year I turned 18 that things went to hell. I used to think that I needed to drop out of school and support my mother, or that I needed to go to the community college and stay close to home and help her. At the age of 18, 10 years after my parents divorce and 10 years after hell began, I was realizing I needed to look out for me.

There was a night in the summer before my birthday that we fought. It was 2 am. We physically brawled. This would not be the last time. It concluded with me slamming her to the floor. It began with her poking me in the chest with her pointy as fuck finger that prompted me to swat her hand away. Which prompted her to make a fist and try to hit me. And so on.

I left. I went to a friend’s house that night.

But I came back, like I always did. It wouldn’t be until October, a week after Thanksgiving and three weeks after my 18th birthday that I would return home on a Wednesday night at 10pm to find my door locked. Chain on. That would be the night I moved out for the first and last time.

#childhood #child abuse #abusive parent #bad parenting #childhood trauma #physical violence #discourse

Abuse is not Love

During and after those four years in that house with D were the worst years of my life.

While my mother did not overly strike us, she still inflicted abuse on us.

On me.

I was constantly told I was stupid, I was a bitch, I was an idiot. I was fat, I was lazy, I was dramatic.

The important thing to remember when dealing with abusers is that not all abuse is physical. After suffering years of emotional and psychological abuse I developed a very low opinion of myself. I was worthless. I did not matter. I started cutting myself at age 13. I fantasized about killing myself on a regular basis.

I could just walk in front of that car. I could hang myself from that banister. I could suffocate myself with that bag. But every time I would stop. I thought myself weak. Why couldn’t I just do it? Why couldn’t I just put myself out of my own misery? After having truly attempted suicide the year I turned 25 I know it takes much more strength to live. But it does take strength to die. I don’t like people who think that those who commit suicide are cowards. It takes a different kind of strength to end it all. Of course, that is not something I wish on anyone. I wish for all people who are in those situations to be able to live on. As someone who has walked the line between death and life I understand that sometimes life is just to heavy to bear.

Even now, my mother inflicts her abuse. I haven’t lived with her since I was 18, when she kicked me out after coming home at 10pm on a Wednesday. She tells me that my memories are false, that she was perfect. Or she will say she was not perfect but that I am exaggerating. For a few days, I began to doubt my memories. Perhaps I was remembering wrong. There was a series of events that I will get into in another post that lead me to believe this.

I felt cornered, growing up in that house. I felt like I had to spend my life supporting and caring for my mother. I almost dropped out of high school because I thought I needed to support her. That I needed to work instead of learn and provide for her. But I am not her parent. I am not her partner. And I did not drop out of school.

When you look at signs of abusive relationships, people tend to interpret that for romantic relationships or partnerships. I want to be very clear that all of those signs of abuse are the same for parent on child abuse, and child on parent abuse.

I was not protected by the people who were supposed to love me. I will not let that happen to my children or anyone else I care about.

#child abuse #abuse is not love #suicide #childhood trauma #growing up #painful past #painful memories #doubt #self-doubt #I am stronger than you know

"Just follow your heart and keep smiling."

Because who doesn't love Hayao Miyazaki?

#wonderful #miyazaki #hayao miyazaki #hayao #artwork #fanart #lovely #I want them!

The House

I don’t remember my first meeting with D. Part of me recalls that fact that he seemed a stranger until we moved into his house. There may have been one occasion when we went to his house before we moved in. I remember seeing the room that was to be mine filled with dirt bike parts and grease. When we moved in, that room was freshly painted pink and all my things were there.

This was a log house in the middle of the woods. The road to it was made of dirt and the driveway set it far back from the road. Going forward, I would have to get up very early and take a bus to school. At this point, it would just be one bus.

For four years we would live in this house. In the beginning, it would be fine. Our dog was there, there was plenty of space for children to run and roam. We would eventually get rabbits, raise a pig (named Sammy Squealer) that we would end up eating (he tasted really good). We would have several chickens and I would go to a new school where I made friends.

It would be in this house that I broke my leg skiing for the first time. We lived there when my brother broke his femur at the age of four. We lived there when my father stopped taking us and moved to another province. We lived there when I would stop writing letters to my father and find myself firmly in the “I hate him” camp. We would travel to Quebec and spend summers camping and canoeing. This would be the house we lived in when D broke his ribs while racing his dirt bike. Where school would be cancelled because the roads would freeze. We would live in this house the summer my mother rolled her car and only lived because she wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.

We would live in this house for four years while D abused my mother. While he hit her, punched her, called her names and screamed at her. It would be in this house that I would learn true fear. It was in this house where I had only a heavy curtain for a door and the dog and my brother would come into my room when they started yelling. This would be the house I lived in for four years where I only had friends over once, in sixth grade. We were already living there for two years at this time.

It was in this house that my mother would feed us breakfast and send us outside to play on nice days and lock the door. But we could still hear the violence if we stayed near the house. So we would leave. We would go far far from the view of the house. We would play in the burned down barn and discover a board game that had escaped unscathed. We would look after the rabbits and chickens in the other barn. Play in the foundations of a house that was never built. Travel and explore the dirt bike racing track for hours.

It was in this house that at the age of ten I planned to run away. I wrote out a full plan on how I would escape to my grandparents. It was in this house I called the Kids Help Phone and hung up because I was too scared to talk to them. When they called back, I lied and said it was a miss-dial. It was this house where Child Protective Services would visit my mother at school for the first time.

There was so much violence in this house. This is the house where I watched my mother point a knife and her chest and threaten to kill herself if D even took one more step closer to her. This is the house where my brother, 6 years my junior, would tell me he saw D hitting our mother and ask me what that meant.

I will forever have this house burned into my mind. I cannot escape it now. It has been twenty years since I have lived in that house. But I remember it. I will always remember it.

#that house #domestic violence #growing up #painful memories #lost childhood #my story

fuckyeahcomicsbaby

theinturnetexplorer

“The human body has limitations; the human spirit is boundless”

darkseraphscorner

After reading this, I had to reblog it…. because damn, these people deserve to be remembered.

elphess

Reblogging again because it made me cry at work. This is tragic and inspiring and awesome at the same time.

The Beginning of the Storm

When my parents divorced when I was 8 years old, things changed. Not just your normal life is different change, but a deeper, scarier change.

I don’t remember much from my childhood. I remember living in a farm house with mountains of chickens in the barn. We raised a chicken in the house. I remember playing in the willow tree. I remember a cat that used to visit our house every sunny Saturday afternoon and lay in the sun with my baby brother. I remember not having two front teeth for two years of school pictures because I pulled them out before they were ready (hey, they wiggled).

I remember getting molested by my male babysitter who was the son of my parents friends. I remember him molesting me and his sister several times.

I remember skinning my knees trying to run for the bus. Taking an hour to get to the house after drop off because our driveway was long and I always got distracted by the flowers. I remember my parents yelling at each other, but I also remember camping trips; family meals, going to church, being happy.

The divorce happened in such a blur. I vaguely remember an instance when we were waiting for my father to come and pick us up for visitation. He didn’t come on time. He was late. My mother wanted to go get groceries and was getting impatient waiting for him. I remember her asking me, if I wanted to wait for him or just go. I decided we should just go. As we pulled out of the driveway and drove down the road, he came from the other direction. My mother said she could turn around. I told her not to bother.

My mother spent a lot of time and energy turning us against our father. He’s not the greatest person in the world and he’s made mistakes. Now that I’m older I have a different view. When I was younger, I hated him. He was leaving us. He didn’t want us to be a family any more. As far as I knew, he hated us for a reason I didn’t understand. Like most kids, I felt the divorce was my fault. No one ever told me it wasn’t.

At some point, my mother got herself a boyfriend. It was determined that we were going to live with him and my mother and father were selling the house. They decided to sell it in the spring. I was in school still. Luckily for me my grandparents lived down the street from the school. My mother left me in my grandparents care and took my brother to move in with her boyfriend. I’ll call him D.

During this transition, my mother didn’t hug me much. It bothered my grandmother a lot and she told me about it. She said she always gave me lots of hugs and attention to make up for it. It also bothered her that my mother only left me, instead of my brother as well so at least we were together until it was time to move into D’s house.

Perhaps, this was the beginning of the storm. Maybe if things had been caught earlier, other things would have been different.

#growing up #childhood #divorce #molestation #painful times #transitions #tough times #toughlife

I only have like, 2 people following me

Rules: Tag 20 followers that you would like to get to know better! I only have two people. @dreamerallherlife and @xforeveralwaysx

I was tagged by @breakdowntime which would be the only other person I would tag.....

NAME/NICKNAME: MOM!

STAR SIGN: Libra all the way baby!

GENDER: female

HEIGHT: 5′2″...on a good day

FAVOURITE COLOURS: Purple. The richer the better. The paler...well, it’ll depend.

TIME RIGHT NOW: 8:26am

AVERAGE HOURS OF SLEEP: Sometimes around 7. Usually 6 or so. Depends on when I go to bed and if the kids get up.

LAST THING I GOOGLED: I was looking for a picture for the line: Happy Day. Found a cute picture of that written on a coffee cup. Score!

NUMBER OF BLANKETS: Duvet for the win!

FAVORITE FICTIONAL CHARACTERS: This is hard because I read a lot of things that people are like: “Whaaat?” I also watch a lot of things that make people snort. So, Kyoko Megumi from Skip Beat!, Sachi-san from “The Samurai’s Garden”, most of the characters I create for my books, Charlie Kilworth from “The Piano Man’s Daughter”, Akane Tsunemori and Shinya Kogami from Psycho-Pass.

FAVORITE BOOKS: Street of a Thousand Blossoms, The Piano Man’s Daughter, Headhunter, The Samurai’s Garden

FAVORITE BANDS: All the music! Stars is my favourite but there are a lot I like.

DREAM JOB: Student advisor/counsellor in any academic setting.

WHAT AM I WEARING RIGHT NOW: I’m at work so, blue dress pant-things, a shirt I ordered from China and boots.

WHEN DID YOU CREATE YOUR BLOG: Uuuuuhhhh......on a day in a year sometime in the past :P

CURRENT AMOUNT OF FOLLOWERS: It says like, 32 which is pretty cool.

WHAT DO YOU POST ABOUT: I mostly reblog, but I’ve started writing about my childhood and adult experiences with my parents and the damaged relationship we have in an effort to make sense of it all.

DO YOU HAVE ANY OTHER BLOGS: Yup. I have one on Wordpress where I talk about my book and my characters.

WHEN DID YOUR BLOG REACH ITS “PEAK” (WHEN DID YOU GET MORE FOLLOWERS, HAVE POPULAR POSTS, ETC): Probably never? I only have 32 people.

WHO IS YOUR MOST ACTIVE FOLLOWER: No one probably because I haven’t really been posting in a while. Just a lot of reblogs which are reblogged from people who would have reblogged me if I didn’t reblog them in the first place. Ha! Wrap your head around that!

WHAT MADE YOU DECIDE TO GET A TUMBLR: I was looking for a platform to talk about being an army spouse. All those posts are gone now though...I think....

DO YOU GET ASKS ON A DAILY BASIS: Noppers!

#Me #My Life #Is This Thing On?

The Apple Is Born

I was born in 1983 in a town (which is now very much a city) in Southern Ontario. My parents were married approximately two weeks before I was born. My father is from the East Coast, Nova Scotia, and my mother is an immigrant from England. I spent more time with my mother’s side of the family than with my father’s. My father’s family has been in Canada for generations. They immigrated from Ireland during the potato famine, or so I’ve been told. I don’t know much about it. My mother’s family immigrated to England from India where my grandparents were born and raised until they left for England in their 20′s. They came to Canada on a boat in 1967.

My mother didn’t have the easiest childhood. It was difficult growing up in the generation where corporeal punishment was acceptable. It was difficult not being ‘white’ in Canada in the 1960′s. It was difficult coming from a family where even though we are Anglo-Indian, speak fluent English (have never spoken another language, really), with educated parents who went to British schools, my family was still different. My mother had two sisters and their small family of five had varied shades of brown for complexion. My grandfather and eldest aunt were the darkest. My mother then came next with my grandmother and the middle aunt being last. My one aunt could pass for white without a problem.

I have been told that kids at school would shout at my aunt and tell her to have a bath because she was dirty. I have been told they threw bars of soap at her. I have been told that she tried to stand strong and protect my mother and her other sister from the bullying.

But we all know kids are assholes.

Maybe that helped warp my mother into the person she is now. I don’t know. I wasn’t there. When my mother was in grade 10 she dropped out of high school and started working in the printing industry with my grandfather. She got married at 18 to a man who abused her. They divorced after 6 months. I don’t know how bad it got and I don’t want to know. It’s not my business.

She met my father sometime in 1982. Probably late fall/early winter. My half sister was born in August 1982. I was born in October 1983. The point is, neither of my parents were perfect.

My father was given the choice to walk away before I was born. He had run off to the Yukon when shit hit the fan. I wish he had stayed away. I feel like things would have been different if he had. Not necessarily better, but easier for me.

Their marriage was the picture of rockiness. My brother was born the year I turned 6 and all our lives finally went to hell. They divorced when I was 8 years old.

That’s when the nightmare of my life truly began.

#childhood #trauma #growing up #personal #this is my life

mysharona1987

Facelift

Oh my dears. I’ve given the page a bit of a facelift and will start writing tomorrow. I’ll be giving a full, intimate, nitty-gritty account of my life growing up and where I am today. It won’t always be pretty, it won’t always be ugly. Read if you’d like and hang on for the ride! I’ve got some sorting out to do and this is my best channel.

Because who doesn’t like bitching about life on a public forum? I feel I need to get it all out if I want to move forward. This is my first step.