Like the spider spinning its web in an old abandoned room.

She was locked away in her mind trying to understand how she had been consumed.

Like the vultures waiting for the untimely death.

They laughed and counted her out, as she stood in fear and wept.

Her hope and faith wasn’t lost only slightly hidden away.

Like a mouse storing food for the winters stay.

She too would gain from this what she could and rest.

For when this mama bear wakes, oh the mountains that will shake.

When a mother is without her children her heart breaks in a million new ways.

When there is nothing she can do to get back to them, the heart feels like it’s dying and the will to survive leaves like a thief in the night.

I wouldn’t say that I’m suicidal, I don’t want to die.

I just want the pain to stop and a way to make it all right.

I want to live I really do, covered in all this pain it becomes so hard to show you.

I wish I did better in hiding my broken away, instead I secretly count each time I cry; wondering if you too will go away.

I never meant it to be like this, more moments then not; I lay in tears silently wishing I didn’t exist.

Maybe I sleep so much now because I am praying it’s a bad dream that I can wake up from.

Maybe it’s because it only hurts this bad when I’m awake.

I think I stop myself from starting again because without you both here life is incomplete. I am missing 2 out of 4 keys that drive me to be the best I can be.

I’m sorry I tried so hard to be normal and to keep it in order. I tried to be better for you then I had known. I tried so hard to love you the absolute best way I knew how, I’m so sorry it was never supposed to be this way.

Now I’m without you both by my side and although I’m fighting, I am dying inside.

It was never supposed to be this way, I wanted only to give you the world. Instead I broke your hearts, my sweet boy and sweet girl. I am always right here waiting for you as I figure out what I have to do. You’re not children but you’re always my babies and at 18 and 21 you shouldn’t have to know life without me.

I’m sorry that I let life get the best of me, Christian and Gabrielle please don’t ever forget you’re the absolute best of me. I’m sorry the pain of life flooded through me and I believed I could make a difference because you believed in me.

I should have kept my head down and never spoken many words but then I wouldn’t have been me and well what use would I be to my boy and girl?

Had I given in to what everyone else has always said well to be honest I would have been dead. Having you my Gabby was blessing that saved my life and you my Christian made my heart grow to a infinite size.

So how am I supposed to do this now that we can’t be together? Don’t get me wrong I’m glad that at least I can’t hurt you with this insanity I can’t get rid of.

What I have now, is nothing compared to all I have lost. Yet, what I have is true love and hope so it’s everything I need.
What I had was a fantasy, a world where if a human were having a mental health crisis they would be treated with dignity and respect. If that was too far fetched at least compassion and humility. 

What I have now is: fear, trauma, extreme depression, major PTSD, a fear of the police, the EMTs, the fire department, anything in uniform, a fear of hospitals, mental facilities, a fear of our country, and the laws that are in place to protect someone with mental health problems.  

What I also have is extremely bad days, non-existent or extremely strained relationships, and no sense of home. I had no choice but to leave my own home and children to go states away for my safety and theirs.

I freak out when I see emergency lights or cop cars. I don’t trust the words of men and women the same, and I cry all the time. I still can’t walk for more than a few minutes and here we are in mid- December. My leg is still messed up and bruised.

It began in November, and I have this “fabulous” vertigo thing going on for over a week now. After all the head trauma and abuse I had endured at Holly Hills Mental Facility, and no medical attention sought by doctors, nurses, and staff, I would be lying if I said I was shocked.

Still I am fighting desperately to try to find my way back from all that has happened since this October.
So sit back and get ready for one literal hell of a story. 

A mother in this great country of ours. The good, old, United States of America, going through a mental health crisis, should be considered lucky right? I mean it could be far worse. I’m not an idiot, but let me explain what it was like for me beginning in October of 2020.

Now this is coming strictly from a mental health aspect, what had been going on in my personal life as I am also living a life probably similar enough to yours.

A week or so before my mental breakdown, it really started to show itself, trying to come through. My baby boy had moved out at 18 years old because I, much like many other mommas out there, had gotten tired of sounding like a broken record saying the same things. On that particular day, everything was coming to a head, and I just couldn’t see it.

I had allowed helping others to take over my family and personal life as I strove to do the best I could for my family. I allowed personal boundaries to become blurred.

I can’t tell you when it happened exactly, but all of a sudden my days off weren’t mine anymore, I was rearranging my plans to accommodate the needs of friends and strangers in need, and taking way too much on. So when the dog had gotten sick, I was already on edge. I honestly took it too far and blamed my son for not doing enough, and I blew it out of proportion. I didn’t consider his feelings or emotions, nor his heartbreak or feelings. I had become so wrapped up in everything else it was hard to think straight.

So when I got pissed and flipped out he said, “fuck this.” He wasn’t entirely wrong. When I look back now, I wish I would have had the compassion and understanding for my kid who clearly needed me. Instead, I was wasting it on those taking full advantage of me.

So that’s a good starting point. So after my son moves out suddenly, and moves in with my ex, I’m now in full blown denial of how I felt. If you know me at all, you know that my children are my life. A mother without her children will lose her mind. I mean Jesus, my whole entire existence revolved around my babies. They remain the reason I breath. Without them in my life I am unstable at best. At this point I stopped sleeping. 

Add in a family member and her sudden trip to come see us within days of talking about it. It caused a major imposition on our lives from me canceling prior obligations, and then her backing out of the trip at the last moment. Only for her to do the exact opposite thing she blamed for the reason she was cancelling the trip.. I had fucking had it. 

At the same time, Tiffany and I realized we could finally afford to pay for a Disney trip in cash. This was something we had decided we were going to do for Gabby since I had allowed my ex to absolutely ruin the last time we had gone. Add the guilt of not having Chris there, and the heartbreak it was bringing I should have stopped everything and I was definitely trying but life is funny. 

Just like that I couldn’t catch myself I was spiraling and fast. Before I knew it, truth was everywhere and I couldn’t sleep anymore. I couldn’t eat nor stop to actually understand what was happening anymore. 

 I was trying to process everything going on, and I was definitely going through some shit in other aspects. I couldn’t get any time alone to sit and understand what was all happening, and all I wanted was a bit of normalcy with Tiffany and Gabby since Chris and I weren’t talking. 

I had sent Tiffany for Musashis and planned for the three of us to watch The Crow. I don’t really remember what happened that night. All I know is, I wish like hell I could turn the hands of time back because all the pain I had ever experienced or caused was nothing compared to what was about to happen. 

I remember a fight. I remember trying to leave my house before it got any worse so that I could get downstairs and be in nature. I remember cops coming up the walkway as I closed my front door. I remember them asking me what had happened. I told them, “Please, I need to just go downstairs to get into nature, and clear my head. Please.” As I cried and said if you give me a moment to do that I can talk I just need air. 

I remember handcuffs and a cruel abusive cop who kept on saying, “No the time for that is over.” He refused to let me put my hands down on the dirt below me. I remember lie upon lie, and my not understanding why they were lying to me when all they had to do was be honest.

I remember one, only one officer, who didn’t mean to lie. He apologized to me for what was happening as he gave me water, and tried to help me. His name was Office Taylor. I remember trying to trust him ,but not being able to because of the actions of the other officers.

I remember being forced into the cop car with my hands cuffed behind my back and then coming out with them in front of my body. I remember desperately trying to pull my underwear and pants up during the ride to the hospital. I cried and couldn’t see but felt pain everywhere as I was shoeless and had no glasses.

I remember the bruises and the nice hospital staff that tried to help me in the psych intake. As the officers watched and I was terrified. They had recorded the bruises and brought me for X-rays with Mrs. Justice.

I remember the nurse that asked me why the cops had found me rolling on the ground in the leaves outside. When I asked her to please repeat herself she did. I then informed her, that is not at all how they found me. Just then one of the officers was walking by, coincidentally it was the first officer. The one I had made eye contact with while closing the door to my house earlier in the night.

I remember her promising she would document what has just happened and what was admitted to her. I asked for a manager because surely if they lied to you to get me in, and they just admitted it then they lied to the judge to get me involuntarily commited and they can let me go home.

I remember asking for no medication, and telling them it was against my religious beliefs. That I had proof only to be held down by police, and the shift change nurse repeeatedly forcing injections into my body. Then I remember being at Crossroads, and they were good they tried to help me and they supported peer support. They tried so hard to boost morale, and they did the best they could. The staff at Crossroads were kind. It wasn’t abusive there. I didn’t realize the worst had yet to come.

My dumb ass walked straight into fear. The fear of how we’re going to make it through this. The fear of how we will survive and get by while we wait for Tiffany to find work.

I don’t know how it all began or what truly happened to make us lose all that we loved, built and held dear. Losing everything hurt but losing my children broke me in a different way then I can even comprehend.

I don’t understand how in 2020 a mental health crisis or whatever you want to label it as could cause you to become homeless, unemployed and banned from returning to your home you shared with your kids. With nothing at all but the clothes we had we left NC the morning after I was released from Holly Hills. We knew if we stayed in NC any longer I would be institutionalized again at best or dead.

So we did what we could and we left it was the hardest thing to do and I struggle all the time with grief, guilt, heartbreak, fear and panic to name a few and to be really open now I struggle with PTSD and Depression like never before, this is pain and mental torment like I had never known and I have known the worst of them trust me. I do know with a certainty because of all we have endured is that true love and loyalty do exist.

I know that faith isn’t something that can be stripped away but only hidden because of the negligence of others myself included. At no point do I claim innocence or ignorance.

I know I inflicted some pain but while passing judgment on me I wonder how many thought about what if it happened to you?

Call it what you will a broken hearted mother, a mental breakdown, a final awakening… because your guess is as good as mine.

All I know is now I’m forced to live states away from my children, forced to leave my home and my life with one person who chose not to leave my side.

So for now I focus on the fact that I have someone who loves me more then anything I have ever know when it comes to a romantic love. I have someone that refuses to give up on me and holds me close as I cry a lot, she listens to the things that happened to me while I was in the mental ward and she holds me as I shake.

The ways she loves me is more than I have ever known or probably deserve she is soft and gentle just as she is strong and protective. She doesn’t seek to hurt me or manipulate me, she is patient and kind she listens to the stories and I see the pain in her eyes.

She holds me and we cry for our family and our life and she tries to tell me it will be alright. She is all that is good in this world and she has the most beautiful soul I have ever known I’m so blessed to have her as my girl.

It takes hold of you like a mad lover refusing to let go of a relationship that should have ended decades ago.

Clinging to your every move.

Contaminating your every thought.

There is no off switch and you can’t just make it go away. There are emotions to be felt, processed and understood.

Depression sets in and you start to believe the stories you tell yourself and how can you do anything else?

The phone doesn’t ring and you feel like a burden to what good you have left in your life.

Depression makes your worst fears seem like reality and brings you to a dark, dark place where you would give anything to feel alive again.

Depression is temporary and if your heart is beating and your breathing you can beat this!

I want you to beat it because I want to beat it too.

Depression doesn’t have to be so lonely if it could only truly be understood.

It’s terrifying to be honest about depression because people tell you one thing and then you watch what they do and listen to them talk shit about people with depression.

The worst part is they don’t even realize what they do.

It’s like hey I have depression but I manage it better then you because I can keep my house clean so let me judge you.

When judgement takes seat that’s when I bow out because the last thing anyone needs is to be judged for the way they are handling their depression.

Depression is a road to hell paved in good intentions.

It’s the I am going to get out of bed, take a shower, get dressed and go do something only to cry for hours because you couldn’t even accomplish that.

It’s the I’m so drained and so down that I can’t eat or drink and I have zero desire to do any of it.

Depression is not knowing where or how to begin so giving up and not even trying because if you fail again it may be the last straw that you’ve been waiting on.

Depression is scary and it can make you lose everything you never wanted to.

During the holidays depression really sets it’s hooks into you when you realize just how little you actually mean and begin to wonder just how many people would show up to your funeral, then wonder why they would even bother especially because they refused to show up for your life unless it was convenient.

Well this took a morbid turn quickly…..

So let’s see if we can find a bright side together if you’re reading this it means you’re still here and for that I’m grateful because it means you have hope and that brings me hope.

Hope that you are looking for reasons to fight the depression and maybe even hope that you hope I will fight the depression.

That shows me we don’t have to know each other to love each other and want better days for each other, that brings hope back to life.

It means that maybe some one will have released some emotions as they read this cried, laughed, hoped and maybe a little spark will have been ignited.

It means maybe you have a reason to come back later to see if I wrote something hopeful and inspiring.

I want to but right now I also know to be gentle with myself, you should be doing the same. With all that’s going on now a days it’s okay to not be okay. Just know if you find yourself alone you can come here and see you’re not alone I’m going through it too and we can quietly root each other on.

Depression is hard but we are strong and if you’re here there is a high chance that you have already survived some pretty hard shit.

Neither! You should actively try to acknowledge what’s happening in life and take action. The dark night of the soul happens when you continue to ignore what is right for you.

Let me simplify it- someone hurts you repeatedly you don’t tell them you ignore it, they continue to do it. You’re tired, hurt, heartbroken even; but never change it, you continue to allow it.

Enter dark night of the soul- okay you had opportunities you wouldn’t honor yourself and your truth so now; let’s call it your higher self steps in and destroys what it was so now you can clearly see it.

Okay you continue to choose against yourself. You are comfortable even tho it’s painful and wrong and you know it; you also don’t know how to leave it and no one really cares.

Enter the awakening- now it’s taken away by any means necessary as the other involved now knowingly continued to hurt you although you spoke to them and they understood. So it’s removed through divorce, job loss, homelessness etc the list goes on and on.

Words are beautiful so telling and true…

If you know how to listen and hear you will see who each person is to you.

The tides have shifted as ignorance is destroyed.

Wild days turning into intense nights are ahead so hang on tight.

Successes built on lies now pushed out too the light.

Not to cause fear or pain but to show you it’s wrong now will you do it again?

When I realized I couldn’t deny the truth of who the person I thought I loved was supposed to be over what I wanted or even allowed myself to see, That was the turning point for me. I believed for so long if only I was patient and gave her unconditional love ; If I was understanding and forgiving she would change finally, choosing to stop hurting me. I mean at that point I was convinced it wasn’t her fault, how could I possibly blame her after the childhood she had ; regardless of the fact that my childhood was far worse. I couldn’t see that while I chose to be better then I had known, she was more then happy loving as she was taught. The real truth is I could see her for what she was doing and choosing and I did, I just didn’t want to admit it because then I had to take accountability for allowing it to continue. I couldn’t understand that it was okay to stop letting her treat me horribly because this is what I had always known love to be. If I am being completely honest my entire life up until three years ago, I absolutely thought that this was love. It was the only love I had ever known or seen, it was the same everywhere I looked so it reinforced that belief. Yes other families displayed it in different ways, some had it better, some had it worse, some didn’t survive it. Still if you broke it down taking all the relationships I had been around.. friends and family, the differences didn’t matter the way it was all handled were still from the same basic structure. Love as we were taught and learned, it always went so against what felt right. I remember being beat and being told it was in the name of love, I remember love that wasn’t unconditional or fair, love hurt… if you didn’t give everything that was asked of you, if you tried to say no it was held against you and used to punish you later. Love didn’t mean I can come to you when something was wrong and you would make it better, instead love meant I trust that I can come to you on my part and when I do you will find away to make it my fault and I will be punished. Love meant if I did things you didn’t like I was thrown away and told I wasn’t wanted. Love didn’t encourage my dreams it only told me in every way at how my dreams weren’t realistic and how I would fail so I shouldn’t try. Love didn’t support my emotions and feelings love didn’t nurture me. Love taught me to use violence against those who wanted to hurt me because words were useless. Love taught me that I wasn’t good enough. I was too fat, too broken, my hair was a curly crazy rats nest and no one wanted me around. Love to me was pain and fear it is just what happened. So when I believed I had found my one while I was going through a major awakening/dark night/ reaping the consequences of all that I had allowed in life. Even while knowing what this was wasn’t right, or that it couldn’t really be love,I decided I wouldn’t give up this time I would do better. The love I was taught sucked and hurt and I had already decided that it wasn’t love. So I loved like I always have believed love should be, just as I tried to do better with my children. I couldn’t let this be their reality and it would be if I didn’t change it now. I started to hold her accountable because she was still giving me the only love she ever really accepted to be real. I tried to help her but with each time I did and gave all of me.. she only kept taking and using it against me… why? Because I allowed it. I only further lost myself and the more I lost, the more I broke until I found myself fighting for the will to live and no one was coming to save my kids or me but myself.

I started seeing the gaslighting for what it was and as I played our relationship back in my mind, reading through the emails I had written to myself to release some of the pain of our relationship.

I finally let myself see that I was dealing with a master narcissist. I may never know if it was fully intentional or if it was planned, I do know that in her way she loved me the best she could as the others before including my parents. Fast forward 3 years later, I can stand in my truth and say she has never really fully changed.

I know she is absolutely aware and I am not saying she didn’t try in her own ways but the fact remains she is still unhealed and when angry she is blinded by darkness and rage. At times it was so bad I had no other choice then to try and show not only her but myself that I wasn’t crazy. I began recording conversations because I started to believe her mind games. I genuinely thought I was losing my mind, she would purposefully and intentionally say something and start a fight and then convince me I said it. When I caught her and had physical proof on tape, I went to show her, she laughed in my face telling me she knows what she is doing.

I had no choice left in the matter ; The abuse, torment, struggle, loss and neglect were too much.

No matter what I gave her or she stole from me, no matter how I tried, no matter how I spoke honestly and asked her to stop doing things like stealing from me and leaving us with no money for basic household needs because her desires were more important. It didn’t matter that I was asking her and begging her to stop if she really loved me, to stop destroying me. It never changed for more then a few days. I had no choice now. I had to choose my children and myself because it was never and would never be enough to fill the void she held within her. The worst part is that it had nothing to do with me, but I still had to pay for it all and I wasn’t the only one.

I finally left and yes it hurt more then anything. I was so scared and left feeling broken and alone, all my worst fears & beliefs from a trauma filled childhood absolutely reconfirmed yet again by another shitty relationship. So I took time for me to heal and really figure out who I was because I no longer knew me and to be honest I didn’t really know my kids anymore either. The pain around our hearts became too intense to bare and all because I allowed it in. So now I am a single mom of 2 hurt and confused teenagers, I am broke & alone trying to make it all better and yet find a way to keep breathing because the weight of it all is collapsing my chest and what I wouldn’t give for a moment of peace. We’re in a new state and the way we got here ensures I would be left with minimal help if any at all. I broke all the way open. I couldn’t hold it back anymore. I began to release all the pain and trauma as i worked through all the beliefs I adopted in my past. As I healed, the way forward became clearer as I walked into this new chapter of my life. After healing and understanding what I wanted in a relationship and in a person, I decided I wouldn’t settle for anything less. Boundaries high, clear expectations in place and if you weren’t capable of clear communication and comprehension it wasn’t for me. I had set my standards high because I had taken the time while healing to not only heal myself but start to heal my children as well, no longer could I be blind to the pain I had caused them. I didn’t stop there. I continued to better myself, I added more degrees to my portfolio and started doing all the things I had forgotten that I loved to do. I took time and got to know people, weeding them out one at a times and then when I least expected it and no longer wanted it. That point changed it all.. I had felt it coming I just didn’t know what it was, I only knew it was going to be something amazing and that was putting it mildly. This is where love as it was always intended found me. Now there is no falling out of love because love is like the fairy tale I dreamed it was but never really believed possible! I never realized the love that we were taught was really pain disguised as love before experiencing true love. The love I have now is healing, it is patient, it is kind and it is whole. I now realize you cannot fall out of something you never fell into. The love we now continue to build together is one built on a strong foundation of communication, honesty, truth, love, respect, and trust. We may rock as we find balance while maneuvering through the last bits of trauma in relationships of the past and guiding each other in our truth but there is no fall.

Wait they say to think for yourself but stay out of your mind what does that even mean???

1. Yes you should absolutely think and rationalize and question everything.

2. No stay out of your mind.

Wait? What? How? Why?

Okay breath and calm down let me explain because yes your right without this explanation you get stuck!

Simply #2 means begin to rely on your intuition/knowing/instincts/ the feeling in your stomach you get when you’re doing something wrong and you know it.

Which means you know what is right for you instantly you feel what your answer to a question is. For example Tom wants to hang out you don’t really like Tom but you feel bad and even tho you don’t want to you say yes, to make him feel good.

so you didn’t want to and you knew it, but your mind told you it was the right thing to do although you know it wasn’t the right thing for you.

so you go and you have a terrible time and Tom gets upset with you because you’re acting weird and he tells you to leave, which hurts your feelings because you didn’t even to come you only did it for him so now you have resentment too.

This is why you are told to stay out of your head. Except now you know fully what it means what it feels like and looks like and how to do it.

Q. What do I do I want my married ex back, I love her help!

A. Let me put this mildly that isn’t love…. If you love her then leave her alone she made her choices and created her life. Love as it was intended doesn’t cause intentional pain so leave it alone. Now love as you were taught which is toxic based in fear, pain, manipulation and control is what you’re feeling.. That feeling of being madly in love & wondering if it’s the best you will ever have is fear/regret & more. If you were madly in love and the love was true you would still be together, the reality is the person you knew and are holding unto no longer really exists. As time has passed she has grown and healed she has evolved, again leave her alone. There is nothing that will fill the void you want so desperately to be gone then that of self love and self discovery figure out why you are who you are, why you think, feel, behave, act and live as you have and as you do. Begin to take accountability and heal and then perhaps you will get a taste of what true love as it was intended is.

Q: Can you have an affair and love your spouse?

A: If you love her you will be honest with her before you do anything. While I fully support and respect each persons own path and free will there is a right way and a wrong way to go through life. Give her the respect & honesty she deserves and don’t treat her like she is a fool. Karma is very real and all that you do will be repaid by you in many many unseen and unforeseen ways. Be wise you reap what you sow. If it was love it wouldn’t be a question. This is not love as it was intended this is love as we were taught. This is selfishness, inconsideration, toxic love and lack of communication which we now call the modern day marriage.

While I fully support and respect each persons own path and free will there is a right way and a wrong way to go through life. Give the respect & honesty that Is deserved and don’t treat anyone like they’re a fool. Karma is very real and all that you do will be repaid by you in many many unseen and unforeseen ways. Be wise you reap what you sow. If it was love it wouldn’t be a question. This is not love as it was intended this is love as we were taught. This is selfishness, inconsideration, toxic love and lack of communication which we now call the modern day marriage.

Q: why do marriages and relationships fail?

A: We have been governed and taught to use people and love items as a result we have become selfish and beyond inconsiderate. We began Demanding and assuming instead of understanding and asking for clarity. Honesty and integrity took a backseat and as a result we have lost our ability to effectively communicate. Therefore not many true relationships exist that are started in love as it was intended. Now they begin in lies and deceit and wonder why they find themselves in marriages based in pain that they called love.